Debora Curry
English Dept - Administrative Assistant
Email: debora.curry@gcccd.edu
Office Hours: Monday-Friday 8am to 10am and 2pm to 4pm - email Debora for link for her Zoom Office hours
Source: The Gallery, 1970: A Photographic Directory of the Grossmont College Staff. El Cajon, CA: Grossmont Junior College District, 1970. p26.
Source: El Recuerdo Yearbook. El Cajon, CA: Grossmont High School, 1959. p18. Used with permission, courtesy of Grossmont High School Museum.
Source: Sequelle Yearbook Class of 1929. Clarion, PA: Clarion University, 1929. p43. Image copyright, Clarion University Archives Digital Collection. Reprinted in accordance with fair use doctrine for educational and non-commercial archival research, as set forth in 17 U.S.C. § 107, the fair use section of the Copyright Act of 1976.
In 1929, Leone E. Miller Finalle completed her Bachelor's studies at Clarion State College, Pennsylvania, then went on to earn her Ed.D. at the University of Pennsylvania. After subsequently teaching at schools in Shippenville, PA, she moved with her husband to El Paso, Texas, where Finalle remained on staff as a high school and elementary school English instructor.
After finding herself widowed in 1948, however, Finalle moved to El Cajon, California and continued her career at Grossmont High School in El Cajon, teaching reading, literature, and composition, as well as taking on the job of the school's librarian. Eight years later, she was joined on staff by Bob Danielson, whom Grossmont Junior College later hired as one of its charter faculty members. Two years thereafter, Chair Charline Lamons would also bring Finalle on board as a full-time faculty member of the Grossmont College English Department.
At Grossmont, Leone Finalle was a popular, patient, likable, and devoted instructor who drew from her decades of experience as a high school reading improvement specialist to teach courses in her wheelhouse. In fact, in 1970, she gained some campus notoriety after the school newspaper published an article about her in a “Teacher Of the Week” segment.
However, in 1972, after only a nine-year tenure at Grossmont but a nearly forty year career in the profession of teaching English, Leone Finalle retired. She remarried that same year and settled in Jamul, California as Mrs. Leona E. Heth. She passed away in 1998.
Debora Curry
English Dept - Administrative Assistant
Email: debora.curry@gcccd.edu
Office Hours: Monday-Friday 8am to 10am and 2pm to 4pm - email Debora for link for her Zoom Office hours
8800 Grossmont College Drive
El Cajon, California 92020
619-644-7000
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