The Sandra Baldonado Endowment Fund
Sandy Baldonado, Claremont Museum of Art President 2010-2017, was the visionary behind the Museum’s move into the historic Claremont Depot. A longtime champion of the arts in Claremont, she made provisions in her will for an estate gift to CLMA. Sandy’s children made the decision to use the estate gift to set up the Sandra Baldonado Endowment Fund. Other contributions made in her memory have added to the endowed fund.
About Sandy Baldonado
Sandy Baldonado was born in Shanghai, graduated from Smith College, and worked for Senator Lyndon Johnson in Washington, DC, where she met her first husband. They moved to Los Angeles, then Claremont and had four children. Sandy became an active community volunteer and taught elementary school. She went to law school in her 40s, opened a law office in Claremont in 1983, and practiced law until 2018.
Always active in politics, Sandy ran for the California State Assembly in 1976 and 1978, and she served as Vice Chair of the California Democratic Party from 1977-81. She was elected to the Claremont City Council in 1999 and served as Mayor from 2004 to 2006. She was on numerous non-profit boards throughout the years, including House of Ruth, Pilgrim Place, Claremont Senior Services, League of Women Voters, Claremont Heritage, and the Chamber of Commerce.
Sandy had an abiding passion for the fine and visual arts, especially the works of Claremont’s legacy and emerging artists. After serving on the Board of the Claremont Museum of Art, she was elected as the third president in 2010, leading the Museum through a period of rebuilding and revitalization. She was the visionary, with City Manager Tony Ramos and the City Council’s support, who secured a new venue for CMA in the historic Claremont Depot in 2015.
Under her leadership, and after a successful fundraising campaign, two rooms in the Depot were renovated. The Museum formally opened with its first exhibition in the Depot in November 2016. Sandy stepped down as president in 2017, and she was honored at the Museum’s Fall Gala in 2021 with the naming of the Atrium in her honor for her leadership and commitment to CMA.
Sandy continued to be a motivating force on the Board as the Museum increased its fundraising efforts and moved forward to convert the final two rooms in the Depot into stunning new gallery spaces, which opened in the spring of 2022. At that year’s Gala, the Museum announced its new name, the Claremont Lewis Museum of Art, in honor of a generous endowment gift from Randall and Janell Lewis. Sandy was proud and grateful that the Museum had accomplished so much in such a short time and that it now has a solid financial base to help secure its future.