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Ruth Newhall

Ruth Newhall is richly deserving of the accolade "The First Lady" of the Santa
Clarita Valley. Through her vision and that of Scott, her husband of nearly sixty
years, the sleepy little Santa Clarita Valley was transformed from its backwater,
rural status into a burgeoning community with a bright future.

Arriving in the Santa Clarita Valley in the early 1960s, Ruth and Scott Newhall
began this metamorphosis through the publication of a crusading newspaper
which alternately scolded and chastised bigotry, mendacity, and tawdriness
and commended those efforts to build a valued community with education,
culture, acceptance of diversity, and reverence for the past. The publication of
The Signal, coupled with their influence in the design and fulfillment of the
planned community of Valencia, set the stage for the continued growth of the
Valley as it turned from a series of scattered housing tracts to become a thriving
metropolitan area that offers true quality of life for its residents.
Ruth has touched the lives of many thousands of residents of this area. She has
molded public opinion and generously contributed her time and energies to
dozens of worthy causes; she has stimulated political actions which ultimately
created local government; and she successfully championed the creation of,
and improvements within, the community college. Ruth vigorously advocated
the expansion of the local hospital, and she was joined by the Newhall
Foundation and magnanimously assisted it and many charitable and cultural
activities throughout the valley.

Boys and Girls Club
She strongly supported the development of the Boys and Girls Club and helped
unite community leaders to serve as its board members. They developed an
organization that provided recreational activities and professional guidance for
children who, until then, had no direction or programs for youth.
Over the past two decades Ruth has personally donated thousands of hours to
this organization. She has in the past actually written the entire Auction
catalog, proofed it when others participated, offered the use of her beautiful
mansion for dinners which she personally prepared and served to the top
bidders at the Auction. As a means of focusing attention to the special items in
the Auction, she has generously opened her home on numerous occasions for
previews of the Boys and Girls Club Auction, where she served as hostess of the
events.

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