Oral Histories

Interview of Ann Sumner (1983)

Chief publicist for University Extension and active UCLA alumna. Interviewed because of connection to UCLA Regent Edward A. Dickson.
Subtitle:
"The Godfather of UCLA": Regent Edward A. Dickson
Series:
"The Godfather of UCLA": Regent Edward A. Dickson
Topic:
UCLA and University of California History
UC Regents
UC Regents
Biographical Note:
Chief publicist for University Extension and active UCLA alumna. Interviewed because of connection to UCLA Regent Edward A. Dickson.
Interviewer:
Wutkee, Winston
Interviewee:
Sumner, Ann
Supporting Documents:
Records relating to the interview are located in the office of the UCLA Library's Center for Oral History Research.
Language:
English
Copyright:
Regents of the University of California, UCLA Library.
Series Statement:
This series contains reminiscences of individuals who knew University of California Regent Edward A. Dickson.
Abstract:
Ann Sumner on her memories of Edward A. Dickson: Dickson's ancestry; family's 1885 move from Minnesota to Sacramento after father's death; mother Gurie Iverson Dickson takes Edward Dickson to hear Susan B. Anthony speak; Dickson's preference for reading history over fiction; scholarship to University of California, Berkeley; friendships with Waldemar Westergaard and David Bjork; historians Robert Glass Cleland, John W. Caughey, and George E. Mowry; opinions of motion picture industry; Will Rogers; proposed Gutenberg film; Clara Bow; admiration for Edward R. Murrow and Fulton Lewis, Jr.; Gurie Dickson's death; Edward Dickson's years at Berkeley; work on Daily Californian; John and Elizabeth Eshleman; late 1930s Japanese attempt to photograph Colorado Aqueduct frustrated during Dickson's tenure on Bureau of Water and Power; teaching in Japan, 1901-2; loss of master's thesis in Yokohama Bay; working without pay on Sacramento Union, 1902-5; reporter on San Francisco Chronicle, 1902-5; hired on Los Angeles Express by Edwin T. Earl, 1905; friendship with Guy Earl; Dickson purchases Express, 1919; Wilhelmina De Wolff Dickson's family background and meeting with Edward; covers state legislature and San Francisco earth-quake stories; Meyer Lissner; Marshall Stimson; California progressive movement; Chester Rowell; Lincoln-Roosevelt League; Katherine Phillips Edson and 1910 women's suffrage plank; Hiram W. Johnson's gubernatorial campaign, 1910; secretary to Senator John D. Works in Washington, D.C., 1910; appointed University of California regent, 1913; Garret McEnerny and John F. Neylan; Johnson-Dickson break; William D. Stephens; Los Angeles's westward growth and John Bullock; choosing Westwood site for UCLA; California Club; Sunset Club; Los Angeles Coliseum built; Edwin, Harold, and William Janss; Ernest Carroll Moore and Royce Hall; reappointed regent, 1942, by Governor Culbert L. Olson; chairman, regents, 1948; naming of Dickson Art Center; L. Dale Coffman and UCLA law school; Southern California Historical Society; Fletcher Bowron and reform in Los Angeles; plan for University Associates; Herbert and Mortimer Fleishhacker; Verbeck family; Earl Warren.