Born in San Francisco in 1926.

Historian, educator and a leader in San Francisco's and later Fresno's Armenian communities. Her Erzengatzi (maternal) grandfather, Avedis "Moruk" Hinaekian, was a teacher, lawyer and Hunchakian leader, he was one of the local founders of Party chapter in the region in 1888 .

Louise is said to have been influenced by her mother who shared with her the life story and experiences of her grandfather.

Louise Nalbandian took her undergraduate studies at San Francisco State University and her master's and Ph.D. degrees at Stanford. Her masters thesis in 1949 was on "The Origins & Development of Socialism in Armenia: The Social Democrat Hunchakian Party 1887-1949". She also wrote articles for Armenian Newspapers and periodicals. Before joining the faculty at Fresno State in 1963, Dr. Nalbandian was a research associate at UCLA. She is also the author of "The Armenian Revolutionary Movement - The Development of Armenian Political Parties through the Nineteenth Century" published by the University of California Press in 1963. The book, which was also her Ph.D. thesis, is an excellent study of the development of Armenian political parties through the Nineteenth Century. To research for the book, Dr. Nalbandian had travelled to Beirut and New York on numerous occasions to study the archives of the "Eridassard Hayastan" and "Ararad" (the party organs of S.D. Hunchak Party in America and Lebanon respectively), she had conferred personally with numerous Hunchaks in America, Europe and the Middle East, who were involved in the revolutionary and political activities of the party. Widely travelled in America, she was active in raising funds for the education of needy Armenians throughout the world.

Dr. Nalbandian died tragically in 1974 of injuries suffered in an automobile accident at Newman, California. She had spent the Thanksgiving weekend with relatives and was returning to Fresno State University where she was a professor of history and co-ordinator of Armenian Studies. It is often mentioned that Hunchaks are humanitarians thanks to the principles of the ideology of their affiliation, they have a positive point-of-view on society and a caring disposition towards people. Louise Nalbandian had those characteristics. Her personality and scientific contribution that she had made to Armenian and Hunchak historiography makes her an outstanding name amongst American Armenians, in the company of historians and within Hunchakian circles.

Top