The South Colton Oral History Project was a study sponsored by California State University, San Bernardino’s Pfau Library and California Humanities. It was led by researchers Dr. Tom Rivera, Frank Acosta, and Henry J. Vásquez with the purpose of documenting life in South Colton, a 1.3 square-mile ethnically segregated Mexican American community within the city limits of Colton, California, in the time period from 1890 to 1960.

There is scarce documentation of what the community was like in the past and no written information about its people, the discrimination they endured, and the everyday nature of their lives. The researchers for this project sought to capture the knowledge that does remain, by interviewing and recording oral history interviews with life-long residents of the area.

This collection of recordings is managed, preserved, and made accessible to the general public by the Pfau Library’s Special Collections & University Archives.