Obituaries : Lillian Randall Leland Garth; Hollywood Bowl Fund-Raiser

Lillian Randall Leland Garth, a major fund-raiser for the Hollywood Bowl and the Los Angeles County Music Center and a 1954 Times Woman of the Year, has died. She was 86.

Mrs. Garth, who was married to Albert Franklin Leland until his death in 1967, died March 14 in Beaumont, Tex., after a short illness, said her nephew, Albert Leland of Los Angeles.

During her several decades in Los Angeles, Mrs. Garth became a strong ally of Dorothy Buffum Chandler, wife and mother of former publishers of the Los Angeles Times and patroness of the arts. When Mrs. Chandler was president of the Hollywood Bowl Assn. in the 1950s, Mrs. Garth led the group’s 500-member Women’s Committee.

Mrs. Garth said one of her most prized possessions was a gold charm miniature of the Hollywood Bowl engraved “To Lill for devotion and service, Hollywood Bowl 1954, from Buff.”

Mrs. Garth served as executive chairman and Mrs. Chandler was chairman of the Blue Ribbon Committee that raised funds for the Los Angeles County Music Center. The women’s group under Mrs. Garth endowed more than 1,000 seats in what became the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, and has continued as a fund-raising support group.

During her years in Los Angeles, Mrs. Garth also served on the board of directors of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra and was president of the Junior Philharmonic Committee.

She moved to Beaumont in 1975 and married C. Tyrrell Garth Sr. He died in 1990. Her only child, Phillip Randall Leland, died in 1988.