Former UCLA Vice Chancellor Park dies at 97

Rosemary Park Anastos, a former UCLA vice chancellor, remembered
by many as a highly intelligent, passionate individual with a wry
sense of humor, died April 17 in her Los Angeles home. She was
97.

Park, a language professor and co-founder of the Perpetual
Learning and Teaching Association, served as UCLA’s vice
chancellor from 1967 to 1970 and retired as professor emeritus of
education in 1974. Park was also the former president of Barnard
College and former president of Connecticut College.

June Macklin, a professor at Connecticut College, remembers Park
as a feminist in a “pre-marked feminist era.”

“President Park embodied the model of what a woman could
do without having to emphasize that we were women,” she
said.

Linda Lear, a Connecticut College graduate, knew Park in her
student days and admired her throughout her academic career.

“She had a steel-trap mind. … She processed things and
kept things in her intellect that most of us don’t even dream
about.”

Park was also known for the high standards she held her
colleagues and students to, said Helen Astin, UCLA professor
emeritus.

Esther Hirsch, a member of the PLATO society, said she
remembered Park attending the early days of one of the
society’s meeting committees but saying nothing.

When Hirsch questioned Park about her silence, Park reportedly
replied, “I am only here to ensure that the level of
offerings of the PLATO society are such that UCLA should support
it.”

But Park was far from all work, no play. “She loved good
times,” Astin said. “She was not just all about
business. … She was a woman for all seasons.”

Park attended the weekly meetings of the PLATO society her
entire life. After an operation that shortened one of her legs,
Park continued attending the society meetings with Hirsch.

“I would take her to discussion at the PLATO society every
week, until the last week of her life,” Hirsch said.

Hirsch once questioned Park on whether attending the meetings
was too difficult. She said Park admitted it was getting hard, then
countered with, “But I love it.”

Park earned a bachelor’s degree in German from Radcliffe
College and her doctorate from the University of Cologne. After
retiring from UCLA, she traveled the country as a speaker on the
position of women in education as well as the future of
education.

Park was married to Milton Anastos, UCLA professor emeritus of
history and Byzantine Greek, who died in 1997.

Lear, who used to go out to garden lunches with the two,
remembers them as a “very loving, romantic couple” who
“exuded intellectual curiosity and good will toward
people.”

“Those of us who came under her tutelage were all the
better for having her set the pace,” Lear said of Park.