A Final Journey Home

On Saturday, January 3, 2026, Miss Alice Frances Smith posted: “Yesterday my mother began her final journey home.”  Below are her words to her mother’s hometown and alma mater:

Dear Grinnellians,

You are members of two communities which remained close to my mother’s heart – her hometown and her alma mater. My mother is Edith Virginia Renfrow Smith, and she began her final journey to her spiritual home on January 2, 2026, at 1 p.m.

My mother was born 111 ½ years ago, in Grinnell, Iowa, on July 14, 1914.  She was the fifth of six children to her parents, Eva Pearl Craig Renfrow and Lee Augustus Renfrow.  She was a proud second-generation Black Iowan and felt her deep familial roots recognized when she was inducted into the Iowa African American Hall of Fame in 2024. 

My mother attended Grinnell College at the height of the Great Depression.  In June 1937, she became the College’s first Black woman graduate.  It was important to my mother that she was not just a first but the first of many, and she recruited many others to Grinnell College including Alphanette White Price ‘57, Herbie Hancock ‘60, and Samantha Massingale Gerth ‘91.  It brought her so much joy to learn from her adopted granddaughter, Valeriya Woodard ‘25, that over 600 Black women students have followed in her footsteps.  

Like her mother and her grandmother, my mother was a teacher, and I continued this legacy.  After earning her Masters degree from the Chicago Teachers College in 1954, she taught 5th and 6th grade for 22 years at Theodore Herzl, Beethoven, Hope, and Bell Elementary Schools in Chicago.  As a master teacher, she had a particular love for her mixed ability classrooms.   She believed that each of us has unique gifts to develop and contribute, and she knew how to draw those out.  

People meant the world to my mother.  She loved to meet them and learn about them.  She made friends across generations.  After her years of classroom teaching, she volunteered formally and informally.  Into her late 90s, she served as an auxiliary board member, treasurer, and fashion model for Goodwill.  For over 20 years, she greeted visitors to the Art Institute of Chicago.  Through her church, she provided meals and rides to other elders, and both cooked for and delivered food to the unhoused.   In recognition of her decades of service, in 2009, she was inducted into the Chicago Senior Citizens Hall of Fame.  

My mother loved to sing, bake, read, and drive.  When she was in her 60s, she and my father drove across the United States.  When she was in her 90s, she traveled with me to Europe and Nova Scotia.  She was a woman of deep faith.  She was happiest when she was around people, and she loved to talk with them.  She was always expanding her circle of friends.  

As a teacher, a volunteer, and a friend, my mother studied people.  She loved to hear about their journeys, and she noticed what made them unique. She wrote them short notes to show them who they were to her and the light she saw in them.  In her retirement communities at Bethany and Brookdale, she took it upon herself to write birthday cards and notes of encouragement to her fellow residents.  Relationships were her fountain of youth, and she felt that the people in her life were heaven sent. A good, satisfying day was one where she was able to bring a smile to someone’s face. 

The dedication of Renfrow Hall in September 2024 is a highlight of my mother’s later years.  Fifty of us from across three branches of our family tree gathered back in Grinnell, the town my mother always called home.  I felt very proud for my mother, to see her finally honored as a Grinnellian.  

Over the last five years, my mother and I were particularly touched by the undergraduates we met and the research they did as Team Renfrow to bring visibility to her life.  Feven Getachew ‘24, as well as Evie Caperton, Libby Eggert, Hemlock Stainer, and Valeriya Woodard (all class of ’25) made my mother feel so special with their attention to her and our family history.  In this time, my mother adopted Feven and Valeriya as her grandchildren, and I gained a sister in Dr. Tamara Beauboeuf-Lafontant. 

I had the honor to grow old with my mother.  She showed courage and love every day, and I have been blessed to be her daughter.  

My mother was preceded in death by her parents, Eva Pearl Craig Renfrow and Lee Augustus Renfrow, as well as by her five siblings – Frances Helen Renfrow Lemme, Alice Lee Renfrow, Rudolph Bolden Renfrow, Evanel Elizabeth Renfrow Terrell, and Paul James Renfrow— and by my father, Henry Thomas Smith, and my sister Virginia Edith Smith.  My mother held in her heart numerous nieces, nephews, and cousins across many generations and throughout the world.  She was our family’s memory keeper and preserved two centuries of our history in her stories.  The only thing greater than her knowledge of our family was her love for us.  

My mother’s transition was peaceful.  It happened on an afternoon with the sun warming the Chicago winter sky and making Lake Michigan glimmer.  She left us with a beautiful sunset, filled with contrails.  

I want to thank you all for the ways that you have loved and recognized my mother. 

My mother was my superhero.  She still is. 

Alice Frances Smith

Here are some words from Mrs. Renfrow Smith’s two adopted granddaughters:

Feven Getachew ‘24

“Always move forward. You can look back but you make sure you move forward.” This was the advice Grandma gave me for life after college.  

Grandma, you told us on our first trip to meet you in June 2021 that “Grinnell is home,” but you, Grandma, were the one who made every place a home. Chicago became home to me because of you. You taught me how to build: how to build a village, how to build a home. You taught me that it begins with being good and doing good. Grandma, you inspired me, and everyone around you, to grow into a better version of ourselves, to dream boldly and to reach for goals larger than ourselves, goals that leave goodness in their wake. You believed in a good world and you made the world good. Your love and spirit transcends space and time, and I hear your firm and gentle voice guiding me. 

Valeriya Woodard ‘25

The Universe (She has her ways.)   

Gramma E once told me, “Don’t talk to me about history.  I am history.” And she sure is. Her story is a story that reaches back centuries and will continue on for centuries to come. 

Gramma E, I got you. You and your stories will never leave my heart, mind, spirit, and soul, but you already know that; we’ve yak-yakked about it. You’ll always be the vim to my vigor. Our souls will forever be singing to each other.  

Life toucher, soul connecter, proud alum, active listener, avid baker, people seer, lifelong learner, strong hugger (like chokehold strong), ethereal spirit, ground breaker, keen reader, wisdom giver, fashion icon, music maker, recipe writer, elegant poet, funny-face maker, etiquette diva, humble genius, life liver and lover. 

“Be sweet.”  Always.

Below are moving tributes from Grinnell College as well as a number of news outlets:

• President Anne F. Harris, Grinnell College Mourns the Passing of a Legendary Alumna
• Neil Steinberg, Chicago Sun-Times.
• Donna Bryson, Reuters.
• Nick El Hajj, Des Moines Register. 
• Remembering SuperAger Edith Renfrow Smith, FOX 32, Chicago.
• ‘Change-maker, Leader,' KCCI 8 Des Moines.
• Scott Simon and Ed McNulty, NPR.
• Walter Hudson, The EDUledger.
• Charity Nebbe, Dani Gehr, Caitlin Troutman, Talk of Iowa, IPR.
• Taylor Nunley, “A groundbreaker: Remembering Mrs. Edith Renfrow Smith ‘37," Scarlet & Black.

Edith Renfrow Smith tribute wall, Inclusive Funeral Care, Chicago, IL.

Edith Renfrow Smith '37, DHL '19 Memorial Fund

In loving memory of Edith Renfrow Smith ’37, DHL ’19 — educational groundbreaker, community builder, and lifelong Grinnellian — Grinnell College invites all who were touched by her extraordinary life to honor her legacy. Gifts made in her memory will be collected and directed toward scholarship support, helping future generations of Grinnell College students pursue the education she so deeply believed in. Memorial gifts may be made at https://give.grinnell.edu/renfrowsmith or by calling the Grinnell College Office of Development and Alumni Relations at 1-866-850-1846.

“If you have an education, no one can take that education away from you.”

Edith Renfrow Smith, panel in Renfrow Hall loggia, Grinnell College