Nora M. Lynch papers, 1878-2009 (bulk 1926-2002).

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Nora M. Lynch papers, 1878-2009 (bulk 1926-2002).

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/741702990

This collection provides a rich intergenerational account of women's history in California. The memoirs of Nora Lynch, the central figure in the collection, provide engaging accounts of ranch life near Paso Robles in the 1930s and of San Jose in the 1940s. Her extensive involvement with the Girl Scouts in California and Arizona from the 1940s to the 1960s enables an inside look at the workings of that organization, as well as that of the Canadian Girl Guides, whom she visited in 1958 on an official trip documented in diaries and correspondence. Her account of working for Varian Associates in the 1970s and 1980s gives insight into the early implementation of equal-opportunity employment policies. Nora's mother, Virginia Witt Morse Lynch, came to California ranch life through marriage after a wealthy city childhood in the South, and she details her experience surviving on a ranch through the Depression in both voluminous correspondence to her mother and diaries spanning more than a decade. The collection also contains substantive materials relating to Virginia Lynch's mother, Nora Ellis Hughes Morse Toensfeld McMurdo, who was instrumental in the development of cultural life in San Jose, as well as autobiographical texts by Nora Lynch's grandmother Mary Miller Lynch, her aunt Helen Lynch, her father Harold Lynch, and her great-grandmother Alice Mary Kennedy Lynch (photocopy of translation; originals also in Bancroft). In addition, the collection includes materials of interest to disability studies concerning Virginia Lynch's stepsister, Madeline McMurdo, who was diagnosed with Down's syndrome and cared for by the McMurdo-Lynch families. The collection also contains Nora Lynch's genealogical research into the Lynch, Kennedy, and Hughes families.

2 cartons, 1 box (2.7 linear feet)

UC Berkeley Libraries

Information

SNAC Resource ID: 8114097

UC Berkeley Libraries

Related Entities

There are 9 Entities related to this resource.

Girl Scouts of the United States of America

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6wr0t0d (corporateBody)

The Girl Scouts were founded by Juliette Gordon Low on March 12, 1912 when Low organized the first Girl Guide troop meeting of 18 girls at her home in Savannah, Georgia. By the next year they became the Girl Scouts of the United States. By the 1920s troops were forming overseas as well. Low was inspired to start the Girl Scouts after she met Robert Lord Baden-Powell, the founder of the Boy Scouts, in 1911. Beginning with Lou Henry Hoover, the incumbent First Lady has served as the Honorary Pr...

Lynch, Harold James.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w63b90w8 (person)

Lynch, Virginia Witt Morse.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w65b32xw (person)

Lynch, Alice Mary Kennedy.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6zk8h3z (person)

Varian Associates.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6np60v3 (corporateBody)

In 1989 Varian Associates established an oral history project. The primary objective of the project was to document the management philosophies that shaped the Varian organization and to provide insights into how those philosophies contributed to the company's evolution. The secondary objective was to record how the company's principal product lines evolved and their significance. The first phase of the project focused on the period prior to the formation of Varian Associates throught 1969. The ...

Lynch, Helen Abbie.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6hq710s (person)

McMurdo, Nora.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w63r3tgp (person)

Lynch, Mary Miller.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6fb83sw (person)

Lynch, Nora M.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w66h7hrk (person)

Nora May Lynch was born November 13, 1926. A fourth-generation Californian, she grew up on a farm in San Luis Obispo County during the Depression. As an adult, she worked extensively with the Girl Scouts on both the local and national levels. In 1970, she began working for Varian Associates, where she was instrumental in implementing new policies promoting workforce diversity and supporting employees with disabilities. After her retirement in 1989, she served as a volunteer ranger at Shoreline P...