Katherine Towle graduated with honors from UC Berkeley in 1920. Her first university job was as an assistant in the Admissions Office. She then took an administrative job at Miss Ransom and Miss Bridges School for girls before returning to campus for more graduate work. She earned a Master’s in Political Science (1935) before going back into university administrative work, this time as assistant to the manager and senior editor at UC Press, where she worked from 1935 until 1943. In that position, she oversaw the production of official university publications.
In 1943, she took a leave from the university to become one of the first women in the US Marine Corps, where her first assignment began before public announcement of the establishment of the Women’s Reserve in February, 1943. She advanced quickly through the ranks, becoming Colonel and taking over as the Director in 1945. When the Women’s Reserve was deactivated in 1946, she returned briefly to UC administration, serving as Assistant Dean of Women, but when Congress passed the Women's Military Integration Act, she went back to the permanently established women’s Marines until she reached the mandated retirement age in 1953. At that point, she returned once more to the UC Dean of Women’s office at Berkeley, as the Dean. In the last stage of her career, she was appointed Dean of Students in 1961 and retired in 1965.
As a student services administrator, Dean Towle was the first woman to serve as the Dean of Students, and she made great strides in bringing the concerns of women undergraduates into parity with those of men. She broke down the gender divide in the Dean of Students Office and prepared the way for student services and facilities that could be equally available to students of all genders.
Read more:
U.S. Marine Corps University profile
Administration and Leadership at Cal
New York Times Obituary