Anne Grimes (1912-2004)

Anne Grimes, Ohio folk singer and scholar, died of natural causes at age ninety-one on January 14, 2004, at her Kendal residence in Oberlin, Ohio. Formerly of Columbus and Granville, Ohio, Grimes was a classically trained vocalist and an accomplished pianist. In the early 1950s, Grimes began to travel from her home in Upper Arlington throughout Ohio to collect hundreds of traditional songs, which she tape-recorded, researched, and sang in performance. She also became an expert in the lore and techniques of the plucked, lap or Appalachian dulcimer; the Anne Grimes Dulcimer Collection of these rare folk instruments at the Smithsonian Institution ranks among the nation's finest. In 1997, Grimes and her long-time friend Joe Hickerson, folklorist at the American Folklife Center, performed traditional songs in a presentation of her dulcimer collection at the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Her 1957 Folkways recording of "Ohio State Ballads: History through Folk Songs: Anne Grimes, with Dulcimer" was reissued in 1991 on tape cassette by the Smithsonian.

"Everybody thinks you find folk music in the hills; you don't_._._._it's in people's heads," Grimes told a reporter for the Columbus Citizen-Journal in 1971 before performing at Governor John Gilligan's inaugural gala at the Ohio Theater in Columbus. "In the folk music field, the technical term is 'informants'; I prefer to think of the people as contributors."

The songs of her contributors—people from all walks of life, including Carl Sandburg, the poet—are preserved in her audiotape collection housed in the Ohio Historical Society and the Library of Congress. At the time of her death, Grimes was working on a book honoring both the songs and the people who sang them, many of whom became her close friends.

Born May 17, 1912, in Columbus, Grimes attended North High School, graduated from Ohio Wesleyan University with both bachelor of arts and bachelor of music degrees, and did graduate work in music history at Ohio State University. From 1942 to 1946, she worked as the music and dance critic of the Columbus Citizen. She served as a judge from 1961 to 1993 at the national competition Dulcimer Days, in Roscoe, Ohio.

Grimes served as president and editor of the Ohio Folklore Society, was a member of the advisory board of the National Folk Festival, and was an archivist of the National Federation of Music Clubs. Her awards included a Distinguished Career in Music Award presented in 1993 at the Ohio State University School of Music honors convocation; and the Alumni Awards Distinguished Achievement Citation in 1994 from Ohio Wesleyan University. She held honorary life memberships in the Ohio Historical Society; Delta Kappa Gamma, the educational honorary; and the Ohio Folklore Society.

Her husband, James W. Grimes, chair of the art department at Denison University until his retirement in 1969, died in 1981. Anne Grimes is survived by five children: Stephen Grimes, Sara Grimes, Jennifer Grimes Kay, Mary Grimes, and Mindy Grimes; a grandson, Sean Kay; and three great-grandchildren, Cria Anne, Siobhan Mattie, and Alana Rose.