Educator, activist, newlywed: Melva “Mimi” Taylor Grimes dies at 84.

Melva “Mimi” Taylor Grimes – an educator who taught for three decades in suburban-area Chicago elementary schools before becoming a supervisor of teaching education at the University of California, Santa Barbara – died on November 24th in Palm Springs, California. She was 84 years old.

Mimi was a lifelong advocate for Cooperative Learning, an instructional teaching strategy grounded in the understanding that students of different abilities learn best through the small, brave act of cooperating with one another.

“In many ways, our mom’s educational philosophy was her life’s philosophy,” said her son, Robert K. Ream, a Professor of Education at the University of California, Riverside. “She taught every student as if they were a member of her own family. And she was committed to fostering spaces where we listen to and learn from one another, and where differences are seen as a strength.”

A social justice-focused Methodist, Mimi was active in the national Reconciling Ministries Network, where she played a critical role in mobilizing the Methodist Church to embrace and respect those of all sexual orientations and gender identities; and a member of United Women in Faith, a national, faith-based organization that seeks to address climate, racial, and gender justice. A pianist and singer from an early age, Mimi was also a proud member of the Riverside California Resistance Choir; and took part in the 2017 Women’s March alongside her daughters.

“Our Mom had a deep faith and spirituality, but it was not rules-based. For her, love was the highest law,” said her daughter, Kary Ream, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker.

Working to create a world free of gender-based violence, an issue that had directly impacted her family, was a labor of love for Mimi. She was a member of the Speakers Bureau at The Voices and Faces Project, a non-profit organization created to bring the stories of gender-based violence survivors to the attention of the public; served as an advisor to the board of directors of the Arkansas Coalition Against Sexual Assault; and established the Arkansas chapter of Threads of Compassion, a collective of knitters who crafted healing scarves for distribution to sexual violence victims in hospital emergency rooms.

In 2011, in recognition of her work to end gender-based violence, Mimi received the National Sexual Violence Resource Council’s “Visionary Voice Award,” which was presented to her and her daughter Anne K. Ream at a Clinton Presidential Center ceremony.

“Our Mom was a ‘gentle activist,’” said Anne, the founder of The Voices and Faces Project. “She was able to meet people where they were, and then move them, through her quiet, kind, but insistent example, towards justice.”

Born Melva Allene Taylor on January 14th, 1940, in Aurora, Illinois, Mimi grew up in Naperville, Illinois, and was a 1958 graduate of Naperville Community High School. She attended Naperville’s North Central College on a music scholarship, graduating in 1963, and took courses at the Art Institute of Chicago. In 1990 Mimi earned her master’s in education from National Louis University.

Mimi’s life was marked by reinvention. After her marriage to her first husband David Ream ended, Mimi moved to Santa Barbara, California where she eventually met and married Joe Luker, with whom she retired to Eureka Springs, Arkansas. After Joe’s passing in 2015, Mimi moved to Riverside, California to be closer to her son and his family.

In early 2022, Mimi returned to the state of her birth to spend more time with her daughters, making a new home in La Grange Park, Illinois. There she met Dave Grimes, who had also grown up in Naperville. Though they had never – to their knowledge – met, their paths had long ago crossed: a found photo of Sister Lily’s 1948 Naperville piano recital features a nine-year-old Melva Taylor one row behind a twelve-year-old Dave Grimes.

On October 12th, 2024, Mimi and Dave wed in a ceremony attended by their large, blended family. “Years ago, we began our journey in the same small town,” said Dave. “In meeting each other, our lives truly came full circle. We were together for too short a time. But we loved enough for a lifetime.”

Mimi is survived by her husband, Dave; her children Anne K. Ream, Robert Ream (Patricia Ream), and Kary Ream (Tony Wittrock); her chosen daughter, Camila Di Mauri (Javier Otero); her siblings, Oliver Taylor (Marsha) and Nadyne Noffsinger (Ken); her grandchildren, Jules, Arline, Alaina, Marisa, and Joey; and her new family of Grimes children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren. A devoted aunt and cousin to multiple generations of the Taylor family, and a woman with a wide community of friends and former students with whom she remained lovingly involved, Mimi – who was preceded in death by her parents, Walter and Lois Taylor, and her sister, Dorellyn Taylor Sheldon – will be deeply missed.

A celebration of Mimi’s life will be held on Friday, December 20^th, at 2:00 p.m. at Plymouth Place Retirement Community in La Grange Park, Illinois. In her honor, her family is launching The Mimi Grimes Scholarship Fund, which will provide full scholarships to those seeking to take part in The Voices and Faces Project’s testimonial writing program for survivors of gender-based violence.

To donate, visit voicesandfaces.org or send checks to The Voices and Faces Project, 303 East Wacker, Suite 2108, Chicago, IL 60601.

To attend the memorial livestream, please visit: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2m7sygyhFT0kTbm2yPkTnQ/live