/frl c University of California Berkeley REGIONAL ORAL HISTORY OFFICE Regional Oral History Office University of California The Bancroft Library Berkeley, California Geraldine Knight Scott (1904-1989) A WOMAN IN LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE IN CALIFORNIA, 1926-1989 Introductions by Jack Buktenica and Reed Dillingham Based on Interviews Conducted by Jack Buktenica, 1976 Edited by Suzanne B. Riess 1989 Copyright (c) 1990 by The Regents of the University of California Since 1954 the Regional Oral History Office has been interviewing leading participants in or well -placed witnesses to major events in the development of Northern California, the West, and the Nation. Oral history is a modern research technique involving an interviewee and an informed interviewer in spontaneous conversation. The taped record is transcribed, lightly edited for continuity and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewee. The resulting manuscript is typed in final form, indexed, bound with photographs and illustrative materials, and placed in The Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and other research collections for scholarly use. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account, offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is reflective, partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ************************************ All uses of this manuscript are covered by an agreement between the University of California and Geraldine Knight Scott dated August 2, 1989. The manuscript is thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Director of The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to the Regional Oral History Office, 486 Library, University of California, Berkeley 94720, and should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identification of the user. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows : Geraldine Knight Scott, "A Woman in Landscape Architecture in California, 1926-1989," an oral history conducted in 1976 by Jack Buktenica, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1990. Copy no. , , , . ...'.'. GERALDINE KNIGHT SCOTT 1985 Photograph by George Waters Cataloging Information SCOTT, Geraldine Knight (1904-1989) Landscape architect Woman in Architecture in 235 A Landscape California. 1926-1989. 1990, xvi , pp. Early landscape impressions, Idaho, Washington; Oakland, San Francisco, 1914- 1922; landscape architecture degrees, UC Berkeley, and Cornell University, 1926^, 1928; A.E. Hanson office, Beverly Hills; Europe, 1930; sumi painting, Chiura Obata; partner, Van Pelt and Knight, Marin County clients, 1933-1939; marriage to Mel Scott, 1939, European housing study; Los Angeles, Citizen's Housing Council, Telesis; practice: San Jose, war years; Palo Alto, 1947- 1952- UC of 1952; Berkeley, ; lecturer, Berkeley Department Landscape Architecture, 1959-1969; travels and professional associations. Appended: Telesis notes, and Regional Oral History Office interviews with G.K. Scott on Thomas D. Church, 1978, and on Blake Gardens, Kensington, 1988. Preface by Geraldine Knight Scott. Introductions by Jack Buktenica, landscape architect, and Reed Dillingham, landscape architect. Interviewed 1976 by Jack Buktenica. Edited by Suzanne B. Riess . The Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. TABLE OF CONTENTS- -Geraldine Knight Scott PREFACE by Geraldine Knight Scott i INTRODUCTION by Jack Buktenica iii INTRODUCTION by Reed Dillingham vi INTERVIEW HISTORY by Suzanne B. Riess vix OBITUARY by Mrytle Wolf xi BIOGRAPHICAL DATA xii I EARLY LANDSCAPE IMPRESSIONS, COEUR D'ALENE, IDAHO; COLFAX, WASHINGTON; HAWAII, AND SAN FRANCISCO 1 II OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA, 1914; THE PANAMA -PACIFIC INTERNATIONAL EXPOSITION 8 III SAN FRANCISCO, 1918-1922 12 IV UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, 1922-1926 16 V CORNELL UNIVERSITY, 1926-1928 22 VI OFFICE OF A.E. HANSON, BEVERLY HILLS, 1928-1930 28 VII EUROPE, 1930-1931 35 Italy 36 France 43 Italy Continued 46 Spain 48 Tunis 50 Germany 52 VIII SUMI PAINTING, CHIURA OBATA, 1933 55 IX MARIN COUNTY, VAN PELT AND KNIGHT, 1933-1939 59 California Horticultural Society 67 Association of Landscape Architects 68 Chinese Art 70 Rudolph Schaeffer School of Design 70 Some Mar in County Jobs 71 Southwest Slimmer, 1935 77 X MARRIAGE, 1939, EUROPEAN HOUSING STUDY, NORTHERN EUROPE AND RUSSIA 79 XI LOS ANGELES, CITIZEN'S HOUSING COUNCIL, AND TELESIS 86 XII WORLD WAR II YEARS, LOS ANGELES AND SAN JOSE 91 XIII MY OWN OFFICE, 1946; PALO ALTO, 1947-1952 100 XIV MOVE TO BERKELEY, 1952; KINDS OF WORK 117 XV TRIPS TO JAPAN, 1954-1955 124 XVI LECTURER, UC BERKELEY, 1959-1969; PROFESSIONAL ASSOCIATIONS AND RETIREMENT 130 APPENDICES A. "Telesis Notes" dictated 1989 by Geraldlne Knight Scott. 149 B. "A Grove for All Seasons"- -the evolution of Willton Woods, by Geraldine Knight Scott. FASLA, June 25, 1959. 153 C. Oral History Interview, 1978, Thomas D. Church Oral History Prolect. 157 D. Oral History Interview, 1988, Blake Estate Oral History Project. 192 E. Interview, Spring 1988, CEP News, pp. 12, 13. 229 INDEX 231 PREFACE by Geraldine Knight Scott That my personal history and experience as a lady landscape architect in California was unique was first stated by Jack Buktenica, who had worked in my office in the fifties. He had an idea for an illustrated biography. Would I make some tapes recording my experience? I agreed to this strange process of thinking out loud, answering questions which I had never asked myself. Jack was curious about what motivated me. He had a thesis that my lack of a normal childhood and nurturing had been the spur to my choice of the profession of landscape architecture. Perhaps it was. I had not looked back in this way before, and I found the process painful, exposing some wounds, but also many rewards. [In notes accompanying this preface, Mrs. Scott has written: "born too soon; no role models; physically, I was a premature baby; historically, made independent by circumstance; professionally, a woman in a man's profession."] The transcripts of those fourteen tapes was so distressingly complex that Jack gave up the idea of writing a biography, and placed it under "file and forget" where it remained for eight years. However, after making a tape on Tommy Church in 1976 for the Regional Oral History Office of The Bancroft Library, where I was again questioned about my own experiences, I pulled out the old transcript, did some editing, and gave it to the Oral History Office for editing and retyping. Suzanne Riess, who had been my interviewer for the Church project, commented in a letter that the taped autobiography was "an ideal combination of on-going narrative, anecdotal material, reflections on the times, transitions, causes and effects." But I found it to be neither a biography nor a professional history. Again, it was consigned to "file " and forget . In 1985 I was again urged to record my professional experiences. Instead of starting fresh I edited, cut, slashed, and pieced together what might be relevant to the history of landscape architecture in the Vest, only to have several readers raise questions about my childhood and adolescence, and more about my later work and professional concerns. Thus the , introductory and final chapters are a product of recent ruminations. II Time has changed me and my perceptions. The cross-sections and perspectives here assembled are separated by many years of growth and change. Since 1922, vhen I enrolled in the Department of Landscape Design at UC Berkeley, to this year of the 75th anniversary of that department, the percentage of women in the profession has increased from two percent to 55 percent. I was not the first, nor the brightest, but I am the only woman who both had my own office for over thirty years and taught as a lecturer in the College of Environmental Design. I am not a feminist, but I was often the female token representative of the young profession, the "little woman" supervising a crew of workmen in design-build operations. I was the first woman to work in the Los Angeles County Planning Office, the only woman to participate in school and recreation planning conferences, and the only woman to be a member of various city and county committees and commissions, and so on. Herewith, the story of a pioneer without portfolio. Geraldine Knight Scott, FASLA June 1989 Berkeley, California ill INTRODUCTION by Jack Buktenlca I conducted the oral interviews vith Gerry Scott that this history is based on vith the intention of doing a book on her work. For two years, 1956 and 1957, I was an apprentice to Gerry. The sequence that led me to her doorstep was that I became a father and realized the need to continue developing my occupational skills. I had studied two years of architecture and decided it was not the discipline for me to complete. I was a draftsperson for the consulting structural engineer to Mies van der Rohe, and had extensive experience in mechanical drafting and tool design. I again considered completing a degree in architecture, but my original decision seemed correct, and so I decided to have informational interviews with landscape architects. The first on my list of landscape architects, because he responded warmly to my request, was Doug Baylis in San Francisco. He liked the level of my skills in drafting and was very encouraging about developing those skills towards licensing through an apprenticeship in professional offices. He regretted he did not have a need for assistance, but he helped generate a list of potentially receptive landscape architects for me to call.