Louise Booth memorial at Interfaith Center on Saturday, Feb. 25

Louise Booth, the late wife of Professor Don Booth and mother to alumnus David Booth ‘82, will be remembered at a memorial in her honor at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 25, at the Fish Interfaith Center, Wallace All Faiths Chapel.

Booth was a devoted supporter of Chapman University and wrote the award-winning history book
Fulfilling A Dream – The History of Chapman University
, published in 2001.

“Louise was intelligent, independent, and possessing of diverse interests and great strength.  She had a special presence.  When Louise entered a room, you knew it, and it wasn’t just because of her red hair,” Chancellor Daniele Struppa wrote in his letter announcing news of her death Jan. 24

A graduate of Indiana State University, Louise completed her postgraduate work at the University of Southern California.  After teaching English, speech, drama and history for 35 years, she retired to begin a second professional career – writing on a variety of historical topics, a great personal love.

Booth chaired the Centennial Committee of the county-wide Orange County Historical Society working for four years in planning an large array of public events.  The profits funded the publication,
The Centennial Bibliography of Orange County, California
.  As the managing editor, Booth received the Donald F. Pflueger Award for distinguished research and writing on local history of Southern California.  In 1989 Louise also received the William T. Glassell Award from the Orange Community Historical Society for service preserving the local heritage of the city of Orange.

In addition to this work, Louise published six historical monographs, three of them on the Civil War.  In 2001 she wrote the Chapman history book, which won the 61st annual Western Book Exhibition (2002) award sponsored annually by the Los Angeles based Rounce and Coffin Club

Booth was also very engaged in the life of Chapman and entertained many of the speakers in Chapman’s famous Artist Lecture Series.  She also served for a number of years on the archives committee of the Leatherby Libraries.