From Fashion Fair model to role model - Del Marie Anderson, president of San Jose City College; includes related information on Afro-American college presidents

Ebony, April, 1992

SOME 30 years ago, she was dazzling audiences by wearing the creations of Christian Dior and other haute couture giants as a model in the Ebony Fashion Fair. Today, she is still a dazzling model, although of quite a different kind. As president of San Jose (Calif) City College, Del Marie Anderson is role model to 13,000 students, the first Black woman to hold that post.

Appointed last july after she beat out a field of 67 applicants in a nationwide search, President Anderson feels that she was chosen for the job, not because or in spite of the he that she is Black and a woman, but simply because she was the most qualified applicant. "I hope I don't sound like I am bragging, " she says apologetically, "but my application, as far as experience is concerned, was superior to any of the other candidates'. I've been a community college administrator for 15 years and I've done almost anything you can do in a community college.

Her resume bears her out. Since receiving her bachelor's degree (1967) and master's degree in social work (1967) from San Diego State University, she has held positions as vice president of instruction at Skyline College, dean of students at Los Angeles Harbor College, dean of guidance services at Grossmont College, and assistant professor of social work at San Diego State University, to mention only a few. To date her proudest professional achievement is having developed a matriculation program that became the model for all community colleges throughout the state of California.

People who note the poise with which President Anderson goes about her daily duties could easily assume that she comes from a long line of distinguished Black educators and that she had afl the advantages that go with the territory. Nothing could be farther from the truth. She readily-and proudly-admits that her parents were laborers in her native Vicksburg, Miss., that she went to segregated Southern public schools and that she was the first member of her family to graduate from high school. Although she grew up in the city, she says she is intimately familiar with Southern rural life because as a child she spent summers at her great-grandmother's farm. I did everything from cutting down trees to slaughtering animals and curing meats and canning foods " she says.

Anderson has fond memories of her foray into the world of high fashion at age 18. While working her way through college with a variety of secretarial jobs in San Francisco, she attended modeling school. "I had just come from Mississippi and I felt I wanted to be more polished and more poised and make the best presentation of myself that I could, " she recalls. She says that when the Ebony Fashion Fair came to town in 1961 and she applied for a modeling job, she was interviewed by the show's late director Freda DeKnight and hired on the spot.

Her most exciting recollection of traveling with the Ebony Fashion Fair and one of the highlights of her young life was a stop in Washington. There was a Black man from San Francisco who was an assistant to President Kennedy [Asst. White House Press Secretary Andrew Hatcher]," Anderson recalls. "He made arrangements for the Ebony Fashion Fair models to come to the White House and have lunch and be shown around. As we were going into one of the dining rooms, President Kennedy came downstairs with a couple of gentlemen, and Mr. Hatcher introduced us to him. President Kennedy knew who we were. He knew about the Ebony Fashion Fair because his wife, Mrs. jacqueline Kennedy, had been part of the organization in Boston that brought the Ebony Fashion Fair to Boston. So he welcomed us and chatted with us for a while. It aU was very, very exciting."

Although Anderson eventually gave up modeling to pursue her career in education, she does not consider the time she spent on the runway a waste of time. "I feel that my one season with the Fashion Fair was very successful," she says. "it has helped me a lot subsequently to be at ease in public situations, to feel comfortable with my body and in presenting myself "

Consequently, Anderson does not hesitate advising young women who seek a career in modeling to go ahead with their plans, but under one condition. "I think it's okay to pursue modeling as a career objective, " she says, "but I think it's absolutely essential to pursue something else at the same time since most modeling careers don't last a lifetime.

Having once modeled clothes designed by the likes of Dior and St. Laurent has left its mark on the educator who doesn't consider wearing haut couture frivolous and incompatible with the position she holds. I am a clothes horse she admits. "Everybody who knows me knows that I'm a clothes horse. I dress modestly for work, but I do like to wear high-fashion clothes. I'm definitely not the typical business suit person. I like stylish things. The ones that are more ulta-stylish I wear during my off-work hours when I go to the theater or to a club. "

Divorced since 1982 after 16 years of marriage, Anderson says she has no plans of getting rehitched, but doesn't rule out the possibility "if a situation became available where it would make sense to marry. In my lifestyle right now, it would have to be a very unusual man." Meanwhile, she is comfortable with considering herself as "one of those people who are happily single."