GAF gives $10,000 to upgrade LW’s museum in CH 1

HISTORICAL SOCIETY

by Margaret Gillon

Historical Society president

The Leisure World Historical Society was founded in 1993 by two history professors, Kenneth and Claire Walker. The Walkers moved into Leisure World when Kenneth inherited his parents’ unit, purchased when Leisure World opened in 1962.

They immediately began the process of becoming a California 501(c ) 3 educational nonprofit, which was granted in 1995. The Historical Society’s mission is to preserve the history of Leisure World and to educate residents and other interested people about that history.

In August 2006, Dr. Judith Trolander came to the Historical Society while researching her book “From Sun Cities to The Villages: A History of Active Adult, Age-Restricted Communities.” She was able to use Historical Society archives for her research. Her book, published in 2011, contains a complete history of Leisure World Seal Beach. It includes photos of co-founder Kenneth Walker and interviews with members of the Historical Society. This book is available to read at the LW Library.

Since 2014, the Historical Society has been working to digitize materials so they will be available to future generations. Members have converted movies from fading VHS tapes to digital files and posted them on the club’s YouTube.com channel.

The club has scanned over 5,000 old documents and converted them to PDF so they can be searched and read on-screen. It is in the process of digitizing the first 30 years of Golden Rain newspapers from microfilm into PDF files. This conversion will be completed by the end of 2022.

It takes computers with special software to convert these media. After the conversion, large amounts of computer space are needed to store the digital films, newspapers and documents.

Over the years, volunteers have used aging computers and their own personal computers to do this work. But now, the computers are failing and storage space is running out.

In January, the Golden Age Foundation (GAF) decided to support the Historical Society’s work, given the scope of the historical information it has preserved. Last week, the GAF gave the Historical Society a $10,000 grant to install new work desks, computers with large monitors and a server large enough to hold all the precious files.

Leisure World is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year, and the GAF’s generous gift paves the way for another 60 years of preservation for the next generation of LWers.