The Whitsett Program
W.P. Whitsett Portrait, 1947.
Courtesy Los Angeles Public Library
William Paul Whitsett (1875-1965) was a pioneering real estate developer and the founder of Van Nuys. Born to an affluent family that controlled coal mining interests in Pennsylvania, Whitsett demonstrated “energy, faith, optimism, and impressive competence” from an early age, according to historian John E. Baur. In 1905 Whitsett moved to southern California and in 1911 founded Van Nuys, describing the land as "among the richest and best in California” even though at the time it looked like a “wasteland” with no roads, lights, water pipes, gas, or telephone facilities. Whitsett led the successful effort to bring water from the Colorado River water to Los Angeles, which facilitated the post-World War II expansion of southern California, and served as the first chairman of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California from 1930-47 as well as on the board of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.
In 1986 the W. P. Whitsett Foundation partnered with California State University Northridge and the Department of History to establish the W. P. Whitsett Endowment in honor of Whitsett’s pioneering role in San Fernando Valley history. When the W. P. Whitsett Chair in California History was created in 1994, it was the first endowed chair at CSUN. Dr. Gloria Ricci Lothrop was the first W. P. Whitsett Chair in California History from 1994-2002. Since 2005 the W. P. Whitsett Chair in California History has been held by Dr. Josh Sides.
Since the establishment of the Whitsett Endowment, the CSUN History Department has become a hub of professional research and student-centered programming on the history of California and Los Angeles. Its programs include the following:
W.P. Whitsett (standing on running board of car on right) with his salesmen at his Van Nuys real estate office, 1911.
Courtesy Los Angeles Public Library
Each year since 1987, a mid-career or senior scholar is invited to deliver the Annual W.P. Whitsett Lecture. The lecture series encourages an interdisciplinary approach to subjects related to California and the lecture is published in the Southern California Quarterly.
Past Whitsett Lectures
- 1987 Glenn Dumke, "The Boom of the 1880s in Southern California"
- 1988 Andrew Rolle, "Exploring an Explorer: California, Psycho-History and John Fremont"
- 1989 Kevin Starr, "From Oz to Tarzana: Metaphor and Real Estate Development in Southern California in the Early Twentieth Century"
- 1990 William Goetzman, "Re-Mythologizing the American West"
- 1991 Doyce Nunis, "Medicine in Hispanic California"
- 1992 Martin Ridge, "California: The Imagined Country"
- 1993 Gloria Lothrop, "Rancheras on the Land: Women and Property Rights in Hispanic California
- 1994 David Weber, "Writers, Readers, and the Meaning of the Spanish Frontier in North America"
- 1995 Richard Griswold del Castillo, "Cesar Estrada Chavez: The Final Struggle"
- 1996 Donald Worster, “Landscape with Hero: John Wesley Powell and the Colorado Plateau”
- 1997 Iris Engstrand, “The 18th Century Enlightenment Comes to California”
- 1998 Richard White, “Disney’s Nature: Walt Disney and the Nature of America”
- 1999 Norris Hundley, Jr., “Whither Californians and Their Water: Environmental Protection or Environmental Disaster”
- 2000 Glenda Riley, “‘Saving the Wild West’: Women’s Role in the Early Conservation Movement”
- 2001 Janet Fireman, "Horizons of Paradise: Perspectives on Los Angeles History"
- 2002 Elliott West, “Listen Up: Hearing the Unheard in Western History”
- 2003 Leonard Pitt, “The ‘Quiet Revolution’: The History of Neighborhood Empowerment in Los Angeles since 1850"
- 2004 Stephen Aron, “The Afterlives of Lewis and Clark”
- 2005 Roger Lotchin, “The Bad City in the Good War: California Cities in the Second Great War”
- 2006 Phil Deloria, "Tear Down the Butte! Drain the Lake! Build Paradise!: The Environmental Dimensions of Political and Economic Power in Boulder and Benzie"
- 2007 William Deverell, "Convalescence and California: The Civil War Comes West"
- 2008 David Igler, “Captives, Hostages, and the Nature of Culture Contact on the Northwest Coast”
- 2009 George Sanchez, “Edward R. Roybal and the Politics of Multiracialism”
- 2010 Thomas G. Andrews, “Toward an Environmental History of Hubert Howe Bancroft’s Works: The Nature and Culture of an Audacious Western Enterprise.”
- 2011 Steven W. Hackel, “Digging up the Remains of Early Los Angeles: The Plaza Church Cemetery”
- 2012 Brian DeLay, “So Far From God, So Close to the Gun Store: Borderlands Arms Trading and the Travails of Mexican History”
- 2013 Josh Sides, Jake-Alimahomed-Wilson, Scott Saul, Natale Zappia, “Post-Ghetto: Reimagining South Los Angeles”
- 2014 Natalia Molina, “How the Starbucks Generation is Erasing Cultural History”
- 2015 Dr. Margaret Salazar-Porzio, “Practicing Public History: California Stories at the Smithsonian”
- 2016 Jon Wilkman, “Floodpath: The Deadliest Man-Made Disaster of 20th Century America and the Making of Modern Los Angeles”
- 2017 Stacey Smith, "From Citizens of Nowhere to Subjects of the British Empire."
- 2018 Natale Zappia, "Food Frontiers: Native Landscapes and Power in Early North America"
- 2019 Genevieve Carpio, “Collisions at the Crossroads: How Place and Mobility Make Race”
Each year, in conjunction with the Department’s public history offerings, we host a live interview and discussion with a leader in the field of scholarship, exhibition, and curation related to California and Los Angeles.
This day-long seminar showcases graduate work in fields related to California History moderated by leading scholars. We seek submissions from graduate students at any stage of completion of the doctorate (including MA students) and those with PhDs still seeking full-time employment.
Each Spring, members of the Whitsett Committee nominate one or two exceptional graduate students to be Whitsett Scholars. Whitsett Scholars will receive a stipend to support summertime revision of their best work for submission to a scholarly journal. Articles will be given special consideration for publication in the state’s flagship historical journals Southern California Quarterly and California History, both published by the University of California Press.