Interview with Lee F. Browne - Caltech Oral Histories

Browne–17
COHEN: It was a very good high school at that time.
BROWNE: Yes. It was one of the five best high schools. But I had an unusual amount of success
with students. I thought I wouldn’t, because they were very middle class, mostly from La
Cañada. There were 1,000 La Cañada kids that went to Muir, and I’d guess 800 of them went to
college somewhere. A lot of them—200 a year—would go to Stanford. And I thought I would
have trouble, but they were one of the best supporters I ever had at Muir. And that’s why, when
I fell out with the principal at Muir, I was sent to Blair.
COHEN: That’s when Blair first opened up.
BROWNE: Yes. I was sent to Blair. I was the department chairman, and all that sort of stuff.
COHEN: And that’s when I met you.
BROWNE: Yes.
COHEN: All those years ago.
BROWNE: That was a long time ago. The problem was that there were certain kinds of social
rules in this town at that time that were very, very strange—very strange.
COHEN: Like what? Tell me, Lee.
BROWNE: Well, for instance, when they wanted to start busing in Pasadena—
COHEN: OK. That would have been in 1970, or something like that.
BROWNE: No. It started long before then.
COHEN: Long before then, OK.
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