Retirement Traditions in the Archives

October 29, 2024

Retirement, or the withdrawal from one’s active working life, can be a time of great change that holds immense emotional, social, and even physical weight. It can be a time of joy, looking ahead to less time at work and more time with one’s family or favorite hobbies; but it can also be a time of uncertainty and loss. Either way, retirement is a big life event to navigate. To help with this transition societies participate in a wide and varying collection of commemorative traditions. One place to study and learn more about these traditions is the Archives!

In Special Collections & Archives there are numerous collections that document folks’ retirement. Rarely is there a collection solely focused on the event of retirement, instead primary source materials that document the momentous event can be found within personal family papers, often times in photo albums or scrapbooks.

5. Sara Chitjian holding a retirement gift, 1994, Zruhy ”Sara” Chitjian Collection, Box 108 Folder 7. The Zruhy ”Sara” Chitjian Collection holds a photo album that was gifted to Sara by the attendees of her retirement party. Sara began a 34 year-long career as a school teacher in the Los Angeles Unified School District in 1960. In the photo album there is a collection of photographs from her retirement party. Guests signed her photo album, brought gifts, gave speeches, danced, and enjoyed a cake dedicated to Sara. Sara posed for a photograph with almost every attendee.

This type of formal retirement party like Sara’s, held in a conference room or in a big hotel, is a tradition that is well represented in the collections at CSUN. The Jack Davis Photograph Collection holds numerous examples of formal retirement parties. Jack Davis was a Black professional photographer who specialized in portrait and commercial photography. Davis's work has appeared in Ebony and Sepia magazines; as well as The Los Angeles Times, The Herald Examiner, and The Los Angeles Sentinel newspapers. The photographs of retirement parties in this collection likely came from events that Davis was hired as the professional photographer for. The photographs depict how people dressed for the occasion, what types of gifts were given to the retiree, and the types of places that these parties were thrown at. The retirees photographed include Walter Backstrum, Norma Madkim, and Llyod Dickie. 7. Norma Madkim posing with guests at her retirement luncheon, 1978, Jack Davis Photograph Collection, Box 17 Folder 6.

In the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor Collection (LACFL), a slightly smaller retirement party is documented. William “Bill” R. Robertson was the executive secretary of the LACFL from 1975 to 1993. The photographs that document his retirement party show a small group of colleagues in a work conference room enjoying a meal and giving gifts to Bill.

19. Cartoon illustration by Del Manning from Chase Craig’s retirement scrapbook, 1975, Chase Craig Collection, Box 37. Lastly, the Chase Craig Collection houses a unique retirement gift. W. Chase Craig (1910-2002) illustrated, wrote, and produced comic books from the mid-1930s until his retirement from Western Printing and Lithography in 1975. In 1950, he became an editor at Western Printing and Lithography, rising to Managing Editor and Executive Editor. Western's Los Angeles office issued comics based on Walt Disney Studios, Walter Lantz, MGM, Edgar Rice Burroughs, and Hanna-Barbera characters, and popular TV shows of the 1950s and 1960s. Upon retirement his colleagues gifted him a scrapbook. Each page of the scrapbook was an illustration from fellow cartoonists wishing him well and sending him off with a plethora of fine drawings.

This documentation of retirement ranges from 1965 to 1994 and is focused on the Los Angeles area. They are all also likely representative of people who worked at a single job or organization for the majority of their careers. Sara Chitjian was a teacher for 34 years, William Robertson helped lead the LACFL for nearly 20 years, and Chase Craig worked for the same corporation for 25 years. A small slice of retirement traditions is represented here. It would be interesting to see what other traditions and commemorations of retirement could be found in the archives representing different cultures, locations, and types of careers.