Where did you go to school?
John Marshall High School [in Los Angeles]. I started college, and I met my husband. After I met him, I got scarlet fever; I could only miss certain days of school, and I just got married.
Are you self-taught?
Well, I had a wonderful high school teacher in accounting, and I worked in the student store at John Marshall.
When I was 17, I went to work for an assemblyman and helped him out on Saturdays with his clientele.
I learned from the hands-on experience I had.
Did you ever find it difficult as a woman trying to make it in your career?
No, because I worked with good people. And if I was judged, I wouldn’t be here.
You are known in the office for liking to do your work by hand. How have you ridden the wave of technological progress?
I don’t like computerized accounting, because so many people use programs like QuickBooks, and they don’t know what they’re doing; you get a total mess, and you have to undo it all.
So I am not a firm believer in computers. As you can see, I don’t have one. But I feel like I’m fast enough to compete with a computer.
Why haven’t you retired?
It was a means of helping out the family. And the kids and grandkids, and even the great grandkids. If you like the work, it is a traditional thing. It is absolute. You don’t deviate from that.
Do you have plans of slowing down any time soon?
I don’t know . . . I really don’t know.
It forces me to get up in the morning and do something.
I enjoy it.
What do you think of the current economic situation?
Everything will be fine if people just hold on and don’t sell their stock. It’s just a panic . . . it is going to be better. You think positive. You just have to hope and pray that it’s going to go smoothly.
