Frank Stricker: New Book Wages War on Poverty Frank Stricker’s first book, Why America Lost the War on Poverty- And How to Win It was released this fall. In it, the professor of history at California State University, Dominguez Hills examines the economic and social mores surrounding American poverty and policy from the 1950s to the present.

Photo above: Groundskeepers Bill Ota (Class of '76, B.A., biology) and Steve Kadota (center and right) help maintain the Japanese Garden in the lower level courtyard of the Social and Behavioral Sciences building under the direction of Haruo Yamashiro (at left).

Yamashiro, a renowned landscape architect, has contributed to the design and construction of numerous traditional Japanese gardens and structures, including the Japanese Pavilion at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and gardens at the Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo. He designed the Garden, which was completed in 1978 by a volunteer group of local gardeners, nurserymen and Dominguez Hills faculty and staff. Known as the Peace Garden, the site was the first collaboration between the university and its surrounding community. Ota’s father, Ralph, was among the volunteers.

For a pictorial history of the Japanese Garden in the Special Collections of the University Archives, click here. Photo by Joanie Harmon