Academic Historian

Martin Schiesl is Professor Emeritus of History at California State University, Los Angeles. His specialities are the history of urban America in the twentieth century and the social, political, and governmental histories of Los Angeles and California since 1900. He is the author of The Politics of Efficiency: Municipal Administration and Reform in America, 1880-1920 (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1977), co-editor of 20th Century Los Angeles: Power, Promotion, and Social Conflict (Claremont, CA: Regina Books, 1990), editor of Responsible Liberalism: Edmund G. “Pat” Brown and Reform Government in California, 1958-1967 (Los Angeles: Edmund G. “Pat” Brown Institute of Public Affairs, California State University, Los Angeles, 2003), and co-editor of City of Promise: Race and Historical Change in Los Angeles (Claremont, CA: Regina Books, 2006). He is also the author of “Residential Opportunity for All Californians: Governor Edmund G. “Pat” Brown and the Struggle for Fair Housing Legislation, 1959-1963,” Edmund G. “Pat” Brown Institute of Public Affairs, Historical Essay, August, 2013, 1-6. Dr. Schiesl is currently writing a book on the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in California in the years from 1940 to 1970.

Cornell William Brooks (1961- )

Image Ownership: Public Domain” Cornell William Brooks, currently the President of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), was born in El Paso, Texas, in 1961. His family moved to Georgetown, South Carolina, just before he began junior high school. After graduating … Read MoreCornell William Brooks (1961- )

Annie Virginia Stephens Coker (1903-1986)

Attorney Annie Virginia Stephens Coker was born in Oakland, California, on April 7, 1903 to William Morris and Pauline Logan Stephens. Coker attended public schools in Oakland. Her family moved to Pacific Grove, California, where she graduated from high school in 1921. Coker later attended … Read MoreAnnie Virginia Stephens Coker (1903-1986)