Dorothy Buffum Chandler

Dorothy Buffum Chandler (May 19, 1901 – July 6, 1997; born Dorothy Mae Buffum) was an American philanthropist. She is known for her contributions to Los Angeles performing arts and culture.

Personal life

Dorothy Mae Buffum was born in 1901 in La Fayette, Illinois. Nicknamed "Buff" or "Buffie", her family moved to Long Beach, California in 1905. Her father, Charles Abel Buffum, alongside her uncle, Edwin, opened a store that would become later become the Buffums department store chain. An enthusiastic sprinter, she once marked that “I didn't take to boys much except to run against them and beat them".

Buffum went on to study history at Stanford University, and was a member of the Pi Beta Phi sorority. The family lived in Los Tiempos (the Times), a grand house on Lorraine Blvd. in Windsor Square, Los Angeles, where she lived until her death in 1997.

Career

Times Mirror Company Chandler worked at the Times or its parent, the Times Mirror Company, from 1948 to 1976. She was a director of Times Mirror from 1955 until 1973, when she was named director emeritus. She initiated the Times Woman of the Year award, which was given to 243 women from 1950 through 1976.

Chandler was featured on the cover of the December 18, 1964, issue of Time magazine, which praised her fundraising efforts as "perhaps the most impressive display of virtuoso money-raising and civic citizenship in the history of U.S. womanhood." The Los Angeles Music Center held its first performance on December 6, 1964. Chandler hired its first conductor, Zubin Mehta, to lead the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra. The complex was completed in 1967, consisting of three venues: the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, named in honor of Chandler, the Mark Taper Forum and the Ahmanson Theatre. The Chandler Pavilion served as the home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1964 until 2003, when the Music Center opened its fourth hall, the Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Author David Halberstam referred to Chandler as a "woman before her time. A feminist in pioneer country. Always, above all else, a presence." Former Mayor Tom Bradley declared her "a giant in the cultural life of Los Angeles. We shall always remember her whenever we see the Music Center, knowing that without her vision and energetic leadership, it would not have been built in our lifetime." On September 17, 2005, the Walt Disney Concert Hall held a Dorothy Chandler memorial concert.

Awards 1971: the Herbert Hoover Medal for Distinguished Service, awarded by the Stanford University Alumni Assn. 1974: Humanitarian Award from Variety Clubs International 1982: UCLA Medal from the University of California, Los Angeles 1985: National Medal of Arts from the National Endowment for the Arts