This collection includes business papers, correspondence, sheet music, media, and memorabilia from the private collection of comedian and actress Phyllis Diller. Diller broke ground as one of the first and most prominent woman comedians through her stand-up act, films, television appearances, books, and records. Post-retirement in 2002, Diller wrote an autobiography titled Like a Lampshade in a Whorehouse: My Life in Comedy (2005), turned her hobby of drawing and painting into another career, and has continued to make appearances on television and in film.

Phyllis Ada Driver was born on July 17, 1917 in Lima, OH. She studied at the Sherwood Music Conservatory in Chicago, IL for three years, beginning in fall 1934. She married Sherwood Anderson Diller, and the couple and their children moved from Ypsilanti, MI to Alameda, CA in 1945. Diller began her career as writer and women's editor for the San Leandro News-Observer. From June 1951 to 1954, Diller's jobs included: head of newspaper and radio ad copy in the advertising office of Kahn's, a department store in Oakland, CA; copywriter, publicist, and continuity girl at the radio station KROW in Oakland, CA; and, finally, director of promotion and merchandising at KSFO radio in San Francisco, CA. Her copywriting was distinguished by its comedic flair.

51.5 Linear Feet (75 boxes)

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