Laura Nagel

LAURA OBERBECK NAGEL grew up with her brother and sister in Monterey, California, where her father was a mathematics professor at the United States Naval Postgraduate School and where he started the Department of Operations Research. (This department has trained the highest number of flag officers in the Navy.) Her mother, involved in the League of Women Voters and Democratic politics at the state level, was also a writer published on the Peninsula, and an actress in little theatre. Now Laura and her husband, Harry, who were married in Monterey in 1974, have retired on the beach in Monterey, and live in her mother’s house, which they rebuilt.

Laura graduated from Monterey High School and then attended the University of California at Davis, CA, and graduated two years later from Barnard in New York. She then went to the New School for Social Research, where she received her master’s in urban affairs and policy analysis in 1976. She spent 25 years working in and around urban planning, housing, and community development in New York, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Evanston (IL), and Fort Worth; and then 25 years working in international development through the nonprofit organization she created, the International Convocation of Unitarian Universalist Women. This organization is now recognized as being in consultative state with the United Nations Economic and Social Council.

She and Harry love to walk and hike, which they have done on vacations around the world, and they stay active locally in social justice work, focused on affordable housing. They both sing in Camerata Singers of Monterey County and the Monterey Peninsula Community Gospel Choir. They enjoy visiting with their two daughters, friends, and family, and especially cherish time with their grandchildren.