Alumni Story

Dr. Grimes Named First Recipient of Ferrum College Trustees’ Award

Photo: Katherine Grimes (center) is presented the Sam Lionberger, Jr., Trustee Award by Scott Showalter, chair of the Ferrum College Board of Trustees, and Mirta Martin, president. Photo courtesy of Ferrum College

Dr. Katherine Grimes, ’77, a member of the English faculty at Ferrum College in Virginia, has been named the first recipient of a new faculty award named for a former Ferrum College trustee. The Sam Lionberger, Jr., Trustee Award was presented to Dr. Grimes at the college’s recent Awards Convocation. Lionberger, a general contractor in Roanoke, Va., is trustee emeritus and a former board chair of Ferrum College.

In the award letter to Dr. Grimes, Board of Trustees Chair Scott Showalter wrote, “You represent the essence of being a positive role model, teacher, scholar, and collaborator, not only for our students, but for your colleagues and community as well.”

Abigail McGovern, a 2023 graduate of Ferrum’s English program and editor-in-chief of Chrysalis, the college’s literary and arts magazine, says that when she entered Ferrum, she was “really shy and unsure” of herself but that Dr. Grimes helped her find confidence and explore new experiences. “I always felt pushed by her to be the best version of myself, and if it weren't for her support, there are a lot of things I would never have done while in undergrad. I'll always be grateful for how much she believes in me,” McGovern says. 

Dr. Grimes began working at Ferrum in Fall 1991 and has held several administrative and faculty roles. In addition to teaching and coordinating the English program at Ferrum, she has advised Chrysalis; served as interim advisor to The Iron Blade, their campus newspaper; coordinated their First-Year Experience Program; and served as acting chair of the Academic Resources Center and Teacher Education division. She was elected by the faculty to a term as Faculty Council chair. She has twice received the Faculty Appreciation Award by Ferrum’s Student Government Association.

Dr. Grimes was born in Thomasville, N.C. to Edith Bevan Grimes and the late Rev. Van D. Grimes of Conover. She graduated from Newton-Conover (N.C.) High School and earned a B.A. summa cum laude in English and psychology from Catawba College. She earned her M.A. in English from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and her Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Dr. Grimes’s father, her sisters Jane Grimes Brown and Julia Grimes Hayes, and her niece Lizzie White Hunsaker are all Catawba graduates. Hayes is also faculty emerita.