Carolyn Dimmick Final PDF.indd - Washington Secretary of State

Hughes: Eastvold at 32 was the state’s youngest ever attorney general. What kind of
person was he? He became very controversial, in due course, as you know. Did you have
an interview with him to get this job as an assistant attorney general?
Dimmick: I don’t think I interviewed with him. I think I interviewed with Bernie, his righthand
man.
Hughes: Bernie who?
Dimmick: Bernard G. Lonctot.
Hughes: What nationality is that?
Dimmick: I have no idea.
Hughes: Is he a Caucasian person?
Dimmick: Yes. I don’t remember meeting Don Eastvold. I went down, and was
interviewed, and got the job. That’s all I know.
Hughes: Did Eastvold have any kind of quota system like King County Prosecutor Chuck
Carroll, like, “I’ve got one Negro and one Asian and one woman”?
Dimmick: I don’t think so.
Hughes: Did Eastvold think, “Well there’s a pretty, bright girl, I’ll hire her.”
Dimmick: I think that might have been it. (laughs) I think that was probably it.
Hughes: Eastvold’s father was the president of Pacific Lutheran University. And they got
into a real donnybrook over Ocean Shores’ lots and investing PLU’s money and the like.
What did you do for the Attorney General’s Office in 1953?
Dimmick: One of my jobs was habeas corpus out of the penitentiary. I handled habeas
corpus. And I also handled work for the state forestry department in the slash-burning
statutes. We went down and sued the big forestry companies for leaving slash around and
causing forest fires.
Hughes: You got to do some grown-up kind of “guy” things that weren’t just women’s
work.
Dimmick: Exactly. I went down and argued in little towns all along the way, and got in
front of the Supreme Court and did some habeas corpus.
Hughes: Tell us about that.
31