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Voorhis Family Collection
0090
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Title: Voorhis Family Collection
Creator:
Voorhis, Jerry, 1901-1984
Creator:
Voorhis, Jerry Livingston
Identifier/Call Number: 0090
Contributing Institution:
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. Special Collections and
Archives
Language of Material:
English
Physical Description:
4.25 Linear Feet
(7 boxes)
Date (inclusive): circa 1891-2006
Abstract: The collection
contains materials related to the Voorhis family, including writings and drafts by H. Jerry
Voorhis and his son, Jerry Livingston Voorhis; correspondence to and from various members of
the Voorhis family; materials about the Voorhis School for Boys and California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona; materials related to H. Jerry Voorhis' time in Congress;
photographs; and news clippings.
The processing of this collection and the creation of this finding aid was funded by the generous support of the National
Historical Publications and Records Commission.
Advance notice required for access.
Unpublished manuscripts are protected by copyright. Permission to publish, quote, or
reproduce must be secured from the repository and the copyright holder.
[Box/folder# or item name], Voorhis Family Collection, Collection no. 0090, University
Archives, Special Collections and Archives, University Library, California State Polytechnic
University, Pomona.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
The materials in the collection were donated to California State Polytechnic University,
Pomona by Jerry Livingston Voorhis in several increments between 1997 and 2006 and gathered
from University Archives files.
The Voorhis family was known for its philanthropic activities in Southern California and
having donated the land that became the first campus of California State Polytechnic
University, Pomona.
Charles Voorhis was born in Olathe, Kansas on March 13, 1870. In 1895, he married Ella Ward
Smith and they had two children, Horace Jeremiah Voorhis in 1901 and Virginia Jean Voorhis
in 1908. Charles started a hardware company and worked for the the Kingman Plow Company in
Peoria, Kansas before entering the automobile business. While working in that industry, he
served in executive positions for the Oakland Motor Corporation in Pontiac, Michigan and
Nash Motor Company in Kenosha, Wisconsin. In the mid-1920s, Charles retired from the the
Nash Motor Company and moved to Pasadena, California.
In 1928, Charles Voorhis founded the Voorhis School for Boys, a school for boys from
troubled or poor households that was located in San Dimas, California and endowed the school
with $1 million. Voorhis' son, Horace Jeremiah (H. Jerry), served as headmaster of the
school.
In 1936, H. Jerry was elected to Congress and served five terms until he was defeated by a
young Richard Nixon in 1948. The Voorhis School for Boys remained open even after the
younger Voorhis' election but the family eventually decided to close the school in 1938.
That same year, Charles Voorhis donated the land to California State Polytechnic School in
San Luis Obispo under the condition that it was to be used for educational purposes.
The former Voorhis School for Boys campus became the southern "unit" of Cal Poly and was
known as the Voorhis Unit. Charles Voorhis and his wife, Ella (or "Nell"), continued their
involvement with the Voorhis Unit and were known affectionately as "Uncle Charlie" and "Aunt
Nell." Dorms on the campus were named after the couple. A second southern campus, the
Kellogg Campus in Pomona, opened in 1956. For a time, the two campuses were known as the
"Kellogg-Voorhis Campus." All instruction moved to the Kellogg campus in 1956, while
students continued to live on the Voorhis campus. In 1966, the southern campus formally
separated from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo to form Cal Poly Pomona. Cal Poly Pomona eventually
sold the Voorhis land to Pacific Coast Bible College in 1977 and the land is now the site of
the Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation.
Charles Voorhis also was the founder of the All Nations Club, the first boys' club of
Southern California, and served in various positions for the Pasadena Boys' Club. In 1949,
Charles was awarded an honorory Bachelor of Science degree from Cal Poly. He died in 1961 at
the age of 91.
Following his re-election defeat, H. Jerry Voorhis became involved with the Cooperative
League of America, serving as its executive director and president. He retired from those
positions in 1967. H. Jerry Voorhis also wrote multiple books during his time in Congress
and afterward, including
Beyond Victory, a book about achieving peace after
World War II;
American Cooperatives: Where They Come From, What They Do, Where They
are Going
;
The Strange Case of Richard Milhous Nixon; and
The
Life and Times of Aurelius Lyman Voorhis
, a book that incorporates diary entries
from H. Jerry Voorhis' grandfather, who served in the Union Army during the Civil War.
H. Jerry Voorhis and his wife, Louise, had three children, Jerry Livingston Voorhis,
Charles B. Voorhis II, and Alice Nell Voorhis. Jerry Livingston Voorhis taught history at
Cal Poly Pomona and Wisconsin State University. He also wrote several unpublished
manuscripts, including
An Idealist in Congress: The Early Life and Times of H. Jerry
Voorhis: 1901 - 1946
and
Congressman Jerry Voorhis, Mr. Integrity.
Jerry Livingston Voorhis died in 2018.
The Voorhis family continues to be recognized for its role in Cal Poly Pomona's founding.
On April 18, 1979, Cal Poly Pomona held "Jerry Voorhis Day" in honor of the former
headmaster of the Voorhis School for Boys and in 1983, a 76-acre area in the northwest part
of campus was dedicated as the "Voorhis Ecological Reserve", also in honor of H. Jerry
Voorhis. In 1995, Charles Voorhis was posthumously awarded an honorary doctorate and, three
years later, Cal Poly Pomona held a dedication ceremony for Voorhis Park, a triangular piece
of greenscape on campus with a boulder originally located at the Voorhis Unit. On the
boulder is a 1950 plaque commemorating the donation of the Voorhis land to Cal Poly in
1938.
The collection contains writings and drafts by H. Jerry Voorhis and unpublished manuscripts
by his son, Jerry Livingston Voorhis; correspondence to and from members of the Voorhis
family; biographical information about the Voorhis family; materials about the Voorhis
School for Boys and Cal Poly Pomona, including meeting minutes and a newsletter from the
Voorhis School for Boys' alumni group, the Voorhis Viking Alumni Association; materials
related to H. Jerry Voorhis' time in Congress; photographic prints, including cyanotypes, of
H. Jerry Voorhis and other members of the Voorhis family; nature and scenic photographic
slides taken by H. Jerry Voorhis; news clippings of articles written by Jerry Livingston
Voorhis; and news clippings about family members, Cal Poly Pomona events related to the
family, and the Voorhis Unit chapel. Some of the clippings are photocopies.
The collection is arranged alphabetically by folder title in the finding aid but does not
reflect physical arrangement.
Beall, Robert S. "History of the Voorhis School for Boys 1928-1938". Senior Project,
California State Polytechnic College, Kellogg-Voorhis Campus, 1960.
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona University Archives Oral History
Collection, Collection no. 0023, University Archives, Special Collections and Archives,
University Library, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.
Hugh O. La Bounty Papers, Collection no. 0086, University Archives, Special Collections and
Archives, University Library, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.
Jerry Voorhis Papers. Special Collections, Honnold Mudd Library, Claremont University
Consortium.
Kenneth Haun Kitch Papers, Collection no. 0085, University Archives, Special Collections
and Archives, University Library, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.
Voorhis, Jerry
The Story of the Voorhis School for Boys. San Dimas, CA: Viking
Print Shop, Voorhis School for Boys, 1932.
Voorhis School for Boys.
Voorhis School for Boys. San Dimas, CA.: Voorhis
School for Boys, 1927?
The following items have been removed from the collection and added to the Special
Collections and Archives Rare Books Collection.
Voorhis, Jerry.
Confessions of a Congressman. Garden City, New York: Doubleday
& Co., 1947.
Voorhis, Jerry.
Cooperative Enterprise: The Little People's Chance in a World of
Bigness
. Danville, IL: The Interstate Printers and Publishers, Inc, 1975.
Voorhis, Jerry.
The Strange Case of Richard Milhous Nixon. New York: P.S.
Eriksson, 1972.
Voorhis, Jerry, Sr.
The Life and Times of Aurelius Lyman Voorhis. New York:
Vantage Press, 1976.
Voorhis, Jerry Livingston.
Congressman Jerry Voorhis: Mr. Integrity.
Claremont, CA: Jerry Livingston Voorhis, 1997.
Voorhis, Jerry Livingston
An Idealist in Congress. Claremont, CA: Jerry
Livingston Voorhis, 1994.
Voorhis, Jerry Livingston. "A Study of Official Relations Between the German and Danish
Governments in the Period Between 1940 and 1943." PhD diss. Northwestern University,
1967.
The collection was processed by Rob Strauss in February 2019.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Voorhis, Jerry, 1901-1984
Voorhis, Jerry Livingston
Voorhis, Charles
Voorhis School for Boys
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona -- History
Photographs