Leonard J. Leader; Editor, Historian, Union Official

Leonard J. Leader, 77, a union official and newspaper editor who earned advanced college degrees late in life and became a historian of the Depression years in Los Angeles. Leader’s UCLA dissertation, “Los Angeles and the Great Depression,” was published in 1991. He wrote frequently for the Los Angeles Times about Los Angeles history. Leader had returned to college in his late 40s, convincing UCLA officials to grant him a spot in the graduate program, and earned a master’s degree and doctorate when he was in his 50s. Leader formerly was educational director of the United Fur and Leather Workers in New York. In Los Angeles, he was a public relations executive for the City of Hope and at one time was managing editor of the Southside Journal, a community newspaper. He also was managing editor and a columnist for the B’nai B’rith Messenger. Later, he taught history at Immaculate Heart College in Los Angeles and journalism at USC. In Los Angeles on Thursday of complications from pulmonary disease.