Florence (Flo) Thomasian Snyder-Speck’s Ageless Lifetime Celebration

· July 14, 2026

By Christine Vartanian Datian

Carmel’s Florence Thomasian Snyder-Speck surrounded by photos and memorabilia of her years with the Los Angeles Dodgers

PEBBLE BEACH, CA – A dinner party in honor of Florence Thomasian Snyder-Speck’s Ageless Lifetime Celebration was held on Saturday, June 20 at The Pebble Beach Club in Pebble Beach, California. Over 150 friends and family members attended. Many were prominent members of Carmel and the Monterey Peninsula community.

A Friday night celebration was held at the Hallaian home in Carmel, California. Family members and cousins gathered together to surprise Flo with a joyful “BATTER UP” Dodger Party in honor of this special occasion.

We served amazing Dodger Hot Dogs for dinner with Cracker Jacks, peanuts and popcorn. Dessert was ice cream sundaes in miniature Dodger Helmets,” said Chris Hallaian, Flo’s niece.

Florence (Flo) Thomasian Snyder-Speck remembers the moment in 1958 when she returned from a trip to Hawaii, turned on the television, and learned that the Brooklyn Dodgers were relocating to Los Angeles. Seizing the opportunity, she quickly picked up the phone and secured a job with the team, becoming their first female employee when the team moved to California in 1958. Her remarkable experience inspired her book, “Lady in the Locker Room: Madcap Memoirs of the Early LA Dodgers,” where she recounts how a young woman with no knowledge of baseball found herself working for a Major League Baseball team. The memoir highlights Flo’s pioneering and ground-breaking role as one of the very first female staff members hired by the Los Angeles Dodgers

Florence Thomasian Snyder-Speck with niece, Chris Hallaian display the gifts the Los Angeles Dodgers sent her in celebration of her 100th birthday

A native of Los Angeles and a first generation Armenian American, Flo graduated from USC in 1950 with a degree in journalism. She was a member of Delta Zeta Sorority (Alpha Iota Chapter) at USC.

She worked for a time at the Los Angeles Times before uprooting to Hawaii, working at a resort on the island of Oahu running events. However, in the fall of 1957, she found herself back home with her parents. The headlines that fall were full of the Brooklyn Dodgers’ impending move from New York to Los Angeles. Until that point, major league baseball was missing a big footprint on the west coast. Walter O’Malley, the Dodgers owner, famously made the big move and settled the franchise in the west, striking deals with the city and committing to building what would become the current Dodgers Stadium. And Flo had one of the best seats in the house to take in all the action. “It all seemed so exciting, and even though I knew little of major league baseball, since it didn’t exist in California, I understood that having the Dodgers in Los Angeles was a huge acquisition,” Flo writes in her memoir.

After spending nearly two years at the Los Angeles Times, she had good sports department contacts, so she put them to use and set out to see if her skills could be of use to the team as it made the monumental move to the City of Angels. “I kept calling and showing up at Wrigley Field uninvited. Of course, not THE Wrigley Field in Chicago where the Cubs now play, but the one in L.A. which bore the same name and their farm team played until the Dodgers bought it in 1957,” Flo writes. “I simply wouldn’t go away. And my incessant pestering of the Dodgers finally paid off.” Flo was hired as one of the first front office staff by Harold “Lefty” Phillips, the team’s West Coast scout, who was managing the newly Dodgers-owned Wrigley Field.

Flo learned that she brought immense value to the team because of her local connections. Most of the team members from New York moving west were unfamiliar with California and knew little about the area. “I became a sort of combination tour director and information center,” Flo shares in her memoir. Her background working in events, and the fact she was a hometown girl, helped her make connections for Dodgers’ personnel as they settled in the Los Angeles area. She helped the players and staff find places to stay, homes to rent, schools for their children and provided suggestions on the best places to shop or eat.

Part of the Team

The first year that the Dodgers made the move to Los Angeles wasn’t an easy one – for either the team or Flo. Walter O’Malley was having a hard time finding a suitable space for the team to play while they waited for the eventual, now iconic, Dodger Stadium to be built. Things finally fell into place in January 1958 when the team reached an agreement to use the Los Angeles Coliseum. At the same time, Flo found her place and quickly became an integral part of the public relations team under Dodgers vice president Red Patterson, who had a reputation for being loud and demanding. Working in the communications office seemed like it was the center of the hurricane, with requests for information coming in steadily on the new hometown team.

Flo was heading to spring training at Dodgertown in Vero Beach, Florida. For a young woman with little baseball knowledge, she knew this was the big leagues. Flo spent six weeks with some of the world’s most famous sports heroes of the day. But, as one of the newest to the team, she was also on the receiving end of some of the more outlandish pranks while there.

Living History

Flo connected with baseball’s superstars of the day, supporting them so they could shine, including arguably baseball’s perfect pair of pitchers: lefthander Sandy Koufax and right-hander Don Drysdale. “As impressive as their playing records were,” Flo shares. “I leave those numbers to the statisticians and instead simply recount the utter delights in just knowing these two great guys and some of the fun we had.”

Working with Koufax: In her memoir, Flo recounted her unique experiences as a woman working in a heavily male-dominated sport. She remembered Sandy Koufax as one of her favorite players to work with, describing him as incredibly dedicated (“he played his arm off”), deeply polite, and a true gentleman. Koufax was the youngest player ever to be inducted into the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame in 1972 at 36 years old.

Because the team was establishing its roots in a new city, Flo became part of a tight-knit community with the players. She frequently socialized, attended dinners, and shared double dates with the players and their families, gaining an insider’s view of legendary figures like Koufax, Don Drysdale, and Tommy Lasorda.

Florence Thomasian Snyder-Speck with the members of her extended family at her Ageless Lifetime Celebration in Carmel, California

After leaving the Dodgers in 1968, Flo became a public information officer for California’s Department of Justice, which took her to Sacramento. Meanwhile, Dale Speck, a high-ranking officer with the Los Angeles Police Department, was recruited by legendary California Attorney General Evelle Younger to head the department’s Division of Law Enforcement.

“During the first staff meeting Dale and I both attended,” Flo says, “we looked across the room at each other and there was an instant connection. That night we had dinner together at Frank Fat’s famous restaurant. From then on, there was nobody else for me.”

This experience led to her appointment as a public information officer for the Department of Justice in Sacramento and subsequent appointment as California’s first Director of Tourism in the late 1980s and early 1990s under Governor George Deukmejian.

Flo returned to Dodger Stadium in 2008 as they celebrated their 50^th Anniversary in Los Angeles. “I wasn’t prepared for the wave of emotion that engulfed me when I stepped into the mammoth new reception area of my former baseball home,” she writes. “Baseball in the 1950s and 1960s didn’t recognize the presence of women in the hierarchy — let alone permit access to the locker room women reporters have today.” However, individuals like Flo opened doors for change. Meeting her in the press box during her return visit was a young female executive. When Flo looked at this talented young woman, she marveled at how progressive baseball had become. “Women are in positions of responsibility at all levels of the game, and I salute them,” she concludes.

Although officially retired in Carmel, Flo remains active as a volunteer on many local boards and charities and is a member of the Carmel Woman’s Club. We are grateful for trailblazers like her, who, though an unlikely fan, became an ambassador for America’s greatest pastime and an inspiration to others like her who are building their own fields of dreams.

Supporting high-quality healthcare in Monterey County

In gratitude for what Flo calls “the constant, compassionate, and quality care” her late husband Dale received at Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula, she made a substantial donation to Montage Health Foundation to support the Laboratory Services department’s “continued excellence.”

“Philanthropic gifts like Flo’s are crucial to driving innovation and ensuring the highest quality of care at Montage Health,” says Michele Melicia Young, director of Montage Health Foundation. “They empower us to continuously enhance our services and provide exceptional care. Flo’s generosity will leave a legacy, particularly in our Laboratory Services department, and support our ongoing commitment to compassionate, top-tier patient care.”

In his 25-year career at LAPD, Dale progressed by taking every promotion exam for which he qualified and never failed to score at the very top. In 1962 he took the Captain’s exam and at the young age of 36 was assigned Captain at LAPD’s Communications Division at Parker Center. Continuing advancement led to his appointment as Deputy Chief, followed by promotion as one of three Assistant Chiefs to Ed Davis. The two contemporaries he served with were George Beck (father of recently retired chief Charlie Beck) and the late Daryl Gates.

In July 2018, Dale, who ended his justice career as Deputy Attorney General before going into private practice, died in the Carmel community where he and Snyder-Speck retired. He was 92.

Lady in the Locker Room by Flo Thomasian Snyder | Jan 1, 2008

Her “Lady in the Locker Room: Madcap Memoirs of the Early L.A. Dodgers” documents that time, 40 years after it was first suggested by her legendary boss that she was the only person who could write the book on those formative years. It recently received the Independent Book Publisher Award for Best Regional Non-Fiction in 2009. Knowing nothing about baseball, but figuring the new team would need local help, Snyder pressed her contacts “thick and heavy” to parlay her short special events stint at the L.A. Times into a P.R. position, becoming one of the first women in pro sports to ascend past the title of secretary.

“The Lady in the Locker Room is the inside story of the early Los Angeles Dodgers and is filled with never before told tales, rare photos, and a look at the hilarious pranks and antics that today could get you sued!”

To order, go to: https://www.amazon.com/Locker-Lasorda-foreword-Thomasian-Snyder/dp/0977290883

Christine Vartanian Datian, a native of Fresno, is a graduate of California State University, Fresno (CSUF), and a Delta Zeta Sorority alumna from CSUF. She is a longtime contributor to The Armenian Mirror-Spectator Newspaper in Watertown, MA. Her recipes have been featured at The Armenian Kitchen food blog, and The Fresno Bee, Sunset and Cooking Light Magazines, and The New York Times.