A Pulitzer Prize-winning author and the chair of the University of California's governing board are sharing a stage in La Jolla tonight, bringing together a sweeping new history of UC with the system's current top leadership. Miriam Pawel will discuss and sign her book “California Dreams: The Making and Remaking of the University of California” in conversation with Maria Anguiano, chair of the UC Board of Regents, starting at 7:30 pm at Warwick's. The event is free and open to the public.
Pawel's 448-page book, published by Bloomsbury Publishing on September 29, examines how the UC system grew up alongside the state itself, according to Bloomsbury Publishing. Rather than tracing the university purely through policy and budgets, the book structures its history around the lives of five pioneering graduates to illustrate UC's role as an engine of social and economic mobility, per reporting tied to the book's publication. Pawel's research drew on 10 archives and dozens of interviews, supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Public Scholar Fellowship and a fellowship at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute.
As KPBS notes, Pawel is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author who also wrote “The Browns of California” and “The Crusades of Cesar Chavez.” Before turning to archival history, she spent 25 years as a reporter and editor at Newsday and the Los Angeles Times, and her 2018 book “The Browns of California” won the California Book Award Gold Medal, according to UC Davis. The scale of the institution she writes about is hard to overstate: the UC system manages an annual operating budget of approximately $60 billion and more than $180 billion in assets across 10 campuses, six health centers, and three national laboratories.
A Regents Chair With San Diego Roots
Anguiano took over as chair of the UC Board of Regents on July 1 for the 2026–27 term, having served on the board since Governor Jerry Brown first appointed her in June 2017, per the University of California. Her path to the system's top governing post runs through San Diego County: Anguiano grew up in National City and crossed the border from Tijuana daily to attend elementary school before building a higher education executive career that included serving as Vice Chancellor of Planning and Budget at UC Riverside.
That local connection gives tonight's conversation an added layer, pairing a national history of California's public university system with a regional governance story rooted just miles from the bookstore hosting the event. KPBS's event listing notes the conversation is billed specifically as a dialogue between the two, with Pawel discussing and signing her book as part of the program.
Inside Warwick's, La Jolla's 129-Year-Old Bookshop
Warwick's itself carries its own long history. The store traces back to W.T. Warwick, who founded it in Minnesota in 1896 selling books, writing paper and writing instruments, according to the seed listing for the event. The business relocated to California in the mid-1930s and re-established itself in downtown La Jolla, where Wynn and Louise Warwick took over in 1950 and expanded and modernized the shop.
Ownership passed to a third generation in 1964 under Bob and Marian Warwick, who oversaw two expansions, and then to a fourth generation in 2001. Nancy and Cathy Warwick, W.T. Warwick's great-granddaughters, later undertook the store's third renovation. The bookstore's survival wasn't guaranteed: in May 2021, more than 30 local community investors pooled $8.35 million to purchase the building at 7812 Girard Avenue after an unsolicited cash offer threatened to displace it, according to CBS8.
Over its history on Girard Avenue, the store's author series has drawn figures including former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, per the same CBS8 account.
Attending Tonight's Event
Seating tonight is free and first-come, first-served, subject to available space, though reserved seating is available with a pre-order of “California Dreams.” Warwick's is on Girard Avenue in La Jolla; the store offers parking behind the building for shoppers, along with complimentary gift wrap and delivery options for purchases within La Jolla Village. As with any bookstore event, dates and times are subject to change without notice.
