Beverly Rae Kimes

Beverly Rae Kimes (1939–2008) was known as the "First Lady of Automotive History" and "The Grande Dame of Automobile History". She was born in West Chicago, Illinois on August 17, 1939 and grew up in Wheaton, Illinois. She received a bachelor's degree from the University of Illinois, and a master's degree in journalism from the University of Pennsylvania.

Her first job was at Automobile Quarterly in 1963. She claimed that the total extent of her car knowledge when she started was the info on her driver's license. She had originally wanted to be a theater writer, but once she started writing about cars, the theater dream faded. She said, "My first assignment was a history of the Curved Dash Oldsmobile and I was hooked." She was promoted to head editor in 1975, a position she held until 1981, when she left to concentrate on free-lance writing.