Illustrated children’s biography on Grinnell’s Edith Renfrow Smith slated for release this fall

     Joining Edith Renfrow Smith, 108, is her daughter, Alice, at left and Monique McLay Shore of Grinnell, right. Shore is authoring an illustrated children’s book on Edith, who graduated from Grinnell College in 1937. This photo was taken on March 25 in Chicago, where Edith lives. “It was taken the day I shared the story I have written with her for the first time,” said Shore.

 ​By J.O. Parker
 
      An illustrated children’s biography on 108-year-old Edith Renfrow Smith, the first Black female to graduate from Grinnell College in 1937, is slated for release this fall.
   The book is being authored by Monique McLay Shore, the Drake Community Library  technology administrator who is also in charge of digital archive projects, including the Poweshiek History Preservation Project. 
     Edith was the daughter of Lee and Eva Pearl Renfrow, who married in 1901 in Grinnell. Other than a few early years in Red Wing, Minn., they raised their family and lived out their lives in Grinnell. The Renfrows were one of the few Black families in Grinnell at the time. Edith was born on July 14, 2014, the fifth of the six Renfrow children.
     According to the booklet, ‘The Renfrow Story’ authored by Shore and available at Drake Community Library, all of the Renfrow children knew it was expected that they would go to college. They had an understanding that they would work together to help support one another to achieve the goal of gaining a college education.
      Edith graduated from Grinnell High School in 1932. For the next year, she took courses in typing and dictation, which allowed her to secure two office jobs on campus that helped her pay tuition while living at home. She enrolled at Grinnell College in 1933.
     Edith was the only Black student on the campus during her entire undergraduate career. When she graduated in 1937, she became the first Black women to graduate from the college.
      After college, Edith moved to Chicago and started a job at the YWCA branch for Black girls and women. Within a few years, she met and married Henry T. Smith and started a family. They raised their family in Chicago, but made regular trips back to Grinnell where they owned the family home on First Avenue until 2007. 
       In 1954, she began a 22-year career as a sixth grade teacher. When she retired in 1976, she followed her passion for giving back to the community by volunteering at Goodwill and the Art Institute of Chicago, among other organizations. She volunteered for more than 40-years. In 2009, she was recognized for her spirit of generosity and was inducted into the Chicago Senior Citizens Hall of Fame.
      Shore first met Edith in 2015 when she was 101-years-old through her work with the Poweshiek History Preservation Project. Dan Kaiser, a former Grinnell College professor and local historian, was researching the Renfrow family and realized there were no photographs of the family in the local archives. 
        They worked with the college alumni office to reach out to Edith and learned that she was planning a visit to Grinnell. They arranged for her to bring in family photos for digitization and Edith also agreed to do an event at the library, a live oral history interview with Kaiser talking with Edith.
       “That was the first time we met her in person,” noted Shore. “She brought several dozen family photos and we started accumulating her story and building an archive collection.” 
       In 2019, Edith returned to Grinnell to receive an honorary degree from Grinnell College. Shore said that raised awareness of her story and place in Grinnell’s history.
       The following fall, Dr. Tamara Beauboeuf, a professor of gender and women’s studies, arrived at Grinnell College. Beauboeuf’s academic research has focused on Black women in academia. Just as she began to look into Edith’s story, the pandemic shut everything down.
       As things began to reopen in the summer of 2021, Beauboeuf began work with student Feven Getachew to research Edith’s story. Building on what the Drake Community Library had collected, they traveled to Chicago twice that summer to interview her. Their work culminated in a retrospective and celebration of Edith’s life on campus that fall.
        In the summer of 2022, they continued to build on their work, this time with Shore joining Beauboeuf and Getechew for another interview with Edith in Chicago. 
         The accumulated research on Edith and the deep roots of the Renfrow family in Poweshiek County was shared with Grinnell College President Ann Harris. Recognizing the historic significance of this remarkable woman, Harris recommended to the college board that the new student residence hall be named Renfrow Hall in her honor.
         “The board unanimously and enthusiastically approved the recommendation,” said Shore.
    In December 2022, the college publicly announced the naming of Renfrow Hall, currently under construction at the corner of Broad and Sixth and scheduled to open in the fall of 2024.
       At the same time, the Grinnell High School inducted Edith into the Alumni Hall of Fame. She joins her older sister, Helen, who is a member of the GHS Hall of Fame.
        “It’s a fascinating story which reaches back to 1859 and the earliest days of Grinnell,” said Shore. “A lot of people had been telling me that someone should write a book.”
       After contemplating the idea for some time, Shore decided that an illustrated children’s biography was something she could do. She began writing the text in earnest around Christmas. The text for the book is now complete and she has connected with an artist who is excited to do the illustrations.
       On April 10, Shore launched a Kickstarter Campaign for the book project to raise funds to pay the artists commission and other expenses of bringing the book to publication. Within four days the minimum goal of $10,000 to complete the book was raised. 
       “It’s her life story, but the broader message is about the power of a mother’s words,” noted Shore. “Her mother’s affirmation has been a guiding principle that offers a powerful message to each of us.”
      The title of the book is “No one is better than you: Edith Renfrow Smith and the power of a mother’s words” will help share the message with readers.  
       With the minimum raised to cover base expenses, any additional funds raised before May 10 will go to provide free copies of the book to libraries in Iowa and Chicago. Shore believes the book will be printed and for sale at the Pioneer Bookstore in Grinnell sometime this fall.
        “It’s a blessing of a lifetime to be in a position to share Edith’s story with the world,” she said.
        Follow progress and update by visiting the book website at renfrowstory.com.
    Editor’s note: some of the historical information for this article was provided by the booklet, “The Renfrow Story.”