Frank Del Olmo: From CSUN to The LA Times

Frank Del Olmo was a Latino and professional journalist at the Los Angeles Times for a number of years. Prior to his career at the LA Times he attended University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) until their journalism department shut down. Del Olmo continued his journalism education as a transfer student at California State University, Northridge. He made a career as an associate editor and columnist at the LA Times where he remained for over 30 years before he died at his office desk.

Del Olmo was a Latino activist and very often reported on important immigration and minority issues concerning minorities in Calif, such as the LA riots and the walkouts of 1968. One of the many immigration issues that Del Olmo covered was border violence specifically between the U.S. and Mexico.

His reporting style often included organized notes, source lists, and a lot of research. His notes were “organized” in a typical journalistic writing. There is overwhelming almost-unreadable handwriting with words or quotes that are circled and underlined. For the most part, his notes were quite extensive, often consisting of several note pages for a single assignment.

Del Olmo often wrote the names of people he was interviewing along with their numbers(as you can see in the picture on the left). This contributed to his source list. Keeping contact information in his notes so that he could connect with the people he interviewed if he needed more information.

extensive research on his topic was a big part of Del Olmo’s journalistic methods. He often kept and looked at court and legal documents along with scholarly research on the topics he was reporting on. The research was extensive and much of the information and documents he would refer and look to were collected alongside his notes. He often collected and acquired collection like files of secondary research. This research helped Del Olmo become more familiar with the legal aspects of his topics as well as understand scholarly perspectives and analysis on those topics.

Frank Del Olmo explored on the realities and impact of immigration in california during his journalistic career. His work has been recognized by many publishers and other latino journalist who were able to join the field of journalism and reporting becuase of his contributions in the industry.