There was "Otis-Parsons" and then there was "Otis Parsons"

Otis has been around since 1918. In fact, we like to say that we've been in the art education business longer than anyone else in Los Angeles. So far no one has called us on it so we'll keep saying so.

During its nearly 90 year history, the College has been identified by several names including- Otis Art Institute, Los Angeles County Art Institute, Otis Art Institute of Parsons School of Design (commonly referred to as Otis-Parsons) and of course our current (and hopefully final) name: Otis College of Art and Design.

Well one way that I keep up about Otis being mentioned in the world is with "Google Alerts" and I have set them for the many different configurations of our name. Several times an alert for Otis Parsons has come up and it is usually linked to one of our graduates from that time in the school's history.

However tonight, in a case of don't take anything too literally, my Google Alert for Otis Parsons was in fact about a gentleman by that name who lived in the 1800's and whose family tree is on-line.

So now you know two things- how I find out about mentions of the school and that we weren't the first ones to be known by that name.