Julian Beck; Former Teacher, Legislator, Judge

Julian Beck, whose multifaceted career included stints as an educator, a legislator and a jurist, has died in San Diego, where he had lived the last three years.

He was 87 and had retired from the last of his positions--that of Los Angeles Superior Court judge--in 1975.

A Democratic legislator from the San Fernando Valley’s 41st District from 1943 to 1953, Beck was instrumental in selecting the site and securing the land for San Fernando Valley State College, now Cal State Northridge. He later served 16 years as chairman of the college’s advisory board. At the time he represented his district, it involved nearly all of the cities in the Valley.

In Sacramento, he was chairman of the Democratic Caucus from 1948 to 1952 and was a member of the Assembly Education Committee for his entire five terms.

Beck’s interest in education stemmed from his days as a business and social studies teacher in the Los Angeles City High School District during the 1930s and early 1940s. He also had been an instructor for the American Institute of Banking.

Beck earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from UCLA and a master’s in history from USC. He received a law degree from Loyola University in 1935. He was appointed to the Municipal Court in Los Angeles by Gov. Earl Warren in 1953 and served until 1959, when he became legislative secretary to incoming Gov. Edmund G. (Pat) Brown Sr. Brown named him to the Los Angeles Superior Court bench later that year.

In 1961, when he transferred to the Superior Court in San Fernando, he stepped into an office that he had helped create as an assemblyman in 1947 when he introduced legislation that resulted in the district court.

A widower, he is survived by two daughters, Judy Gordon and Julie A. Kuzia, and four grandchildren.

A funeral service is scheduled for Thursday at 1 p.m. at the First Presbyterian Church of San Fernando.