The Renfrow Story

There is a small group of students doing Renfrow related research with Professor Tamara Beauboeuf at Grinnell College this summer. Part of the project has involved digging into an amazing piece of research done by Stuart Yeager, class of 1982, that resulted in a thesis, “The Black Experience at Grinnell College through collected oral history and documents, 1863-1954”. It was essentially an independent study project that resulted in an incredible history of Black students that would otherwise not exist in the college record. There’s lots more to be said about this in another time and platform, but today I want to focus on the part related to Edith. Stuart conducted oral history interviews with every black alumni and community member he could find. There are two interviews with Edith and one with her sister Alice. We recently got a recording of one of the interviews and I was thrilled to hear the snippet I include here of Edith. The interview was done around 1981 and in this 28 second clip you can hear her sharing what her mother always told the children – the very words that are the focus of the book I’m writing!

“And then to with my mother, being the sort of person she was, you know she always taught us, “I don’t care who it is, there is no one born any better than you. They may have more money. They may be more beautiful. They may have outward things, but there’s no one any better.” So naturally, if you hear there’s no one better than you are, then you think you’re pretty special!”

Words to live and inspire by.