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Grace S. Stoermer miscellany

Creation: circa 1900-1952
 Collection
Accession: 2590

Abstract

Grace S. Stoermer (1886-1961) was Assistant Vice President of Bank of America and a civic leader in the city of Los Angeles. This small collection of materials from Stoermer's career as a banking executive in southern California in the early twentieth century includes photographs, magazine articles, and ephemera.

Dates

  • Creation: circa 1900-1952

Creator

Extent

52 item(s)

Biographical Note

Grace S. Stoermer (1886-1961) was Assistant Vice President of Bank of America and a civic leader in the city of Los Angeles.

Stoermer was born in Los Angeles on December 10, 1886, and spent most of her career in the banking industry. Her first job was as a copyist in the Los Angeles County Recorder's Office, after which she became Assistant Secretary to the California State Senate, and in 1921 to 1923, Secretary, the first woman to serve in that capacity in any state legislature.

Stoermer entered banking in 1923 when she was hired to head the Women's Department of the Los Angeles office of A. P. Giannini's (1870-1949) Bank of Italy National Trust & Savings Association, which Giannini nurtured from a small institution serving the immigrant community in San Francisco to the nation's largest commercial bank. When the Bank of Italy was renamed the Bank of America in 1930, the separate Women's Department was abolished and Stoermer became an Assistant Vice President, a post she held until retirement in 1946.

Stoermer was President of the (National) Association of Bank Women from 1930 to 1932, and the member of many social, civic, and charitable organizations, including the Native Daughters of the Golden West, the Business and Professional Women's Club of Los Angeles, the Soroptimist Club, and the Los Angeles County Council of Women's Organizations. During the Depression, she was a member of the Citizens Relief Committee of Los Angeles County, and during World War II a "Minute Man" who helped with the sale of Treasury bonds.

Grace S. Stoermer died in Los Angeles on October 2, 1961.

Scope and Content

This collection of fifty-two items describes elements of Grace S. Stoermer's career, the role of women in executive positions in banking and the larger context of banking in southern Calilfornia.

There are both private portrait and posed publicity photos of Stoermer, the oldest being taken in her youth in the early 1900s, and the last near her retirement. Several show her at work in the bank's offices, or posing with other professional women. A 1942 photograph shows her christening the Liberty Ship Felipe de Neve in company with actor Leo Carillo.

The remaining items are mostly magazines or tear sheets with articles either by or about Stoermer and her place in the banking industry, a semi-annual report and phone list from the Bank of Italy in 1923, and programs and menus from events at which Stoermer presided or was honored.

Access Restrictions

This collection is open for research.

Related Material

Grace Stoermer papers, Collection 221, Department of Special Collections, University Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles

Language of Materials

English

Related Names

Subject

Finding Aid & Administrative Information

Title:
Grace S. Stoermer miscellany
Author:
Christopher T. Baer
Date:
2014
Description rules:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description:
English
Script of description:
Latin

Repository Details

Repository Details

Part of the Manuscripts and Archives Repository

Contact:
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