Bonnie Tinker ’69, Doctor of Laws

Bonnie Tinker ’69 received an honorary Doctor of Laws in memoriam at Grinnell College Commencement 2013.

About Bonnie Tinker ’69

Our lives are defined not simply by the beliefs we hold, but by the actions we take to support them. Through a lifetime of work to support social justice causes, Tinker created fundamental changes that have made our world a more compassionate and generous place.

At Grinnell, Tinker majored in theatre. During her senior year, to express her dissatisfaction with the College’s policy of comprehensive exams, she did what any true Grinnellian would do: She protested. As a result, she never received her diploma. However, as any true Grinnellian would do, she went on to publish an article about the experience in an academic journal.

Not long after college, Tinker joined a group of Grinnellians who started Red Emma, a free health clinic and halfway house in Portland, Ore. In 1975, Tinker became the founding director of Portland’s Bradley Angle House, the first West Coast shelter helping battered women escape from violence. She was also named the first chair of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

In 1992, she created a documentary about lesbian and gay marriage called Love Makes a Family; as part of that effort she also founded an organization of the same name dedicated to helping LGBT people achieve marriage and family equality.

Tinker was known for peacefully protesting for anti-war causes and respectfully debating (and often converting) those who disagreed with her. Her friends describe her as someone who “only knew sidelines as something to step over, pulling someone with her, to do something about injustice.” Indeed, she pursued justice to the very end: In the hours before her untimely death in a bicycle accident in 2009, she presented a workshop on nonviolent change.

Grinnell College is proud to honor Bonnie Tinker ’69 for a lifetime of tenaciously pursuing causes to for greater equality and justice.