African American Studies in Library Special Collections

This series documents long-term and multigenerational business ownership in the black community through oral history interviews with owners of businesses located in Los Angeles County. The title is inspired by Martin Luther King, Jr.'s last book, Where Do We Go From Here? Chaos or Community, which focused on economic issues, including issues related to black-owned businesses.Businesses were chosen to participate in the series based on two criteria: that the business had been in operation for at least twenty-five years and that it was currently active at the time of the interview. An effort was also made to ensure that the businesses selected represented a variety of sizes and industries. They range from small, local businesses with only a couple of employees to enterprises that have a regional and even national reach, and the industries represented include construction, real estate, insurance, communications, dry cleaning, restaurants and catering, mortuaries, barbershops, and stove repair. Due to limited resources and time constraints, the interviews focused primarily on businesses in the Pasadena area and in South Los Angeles, with selected businesses in Hollywood, Gardena, and downtown Los Angeles as well. South Los Angeles remains one of the most important centers of Black economic activity in the region, and the Pasadena area has historically been a final stop for many Blacks who migrated to Southern California. It is also important to note that although the series focused mostly on these two areas, the reach and customer base of these businesses span well beyond their local communities.The first section of each oral history covers the individual’s family and migration history. The second and third sections then examine each business from two perspectives: (1) the day-to-day functioning of the business, i.e., staffing, profit and losses, marketing, etc., and (2) broader businesses strategies, including responses to policy changes, technological development, demographic shifts, and changes in the economy. For reasons that included scheduling, health, and capacity issues, some of the business owners who were invited to be interviewed declined. Those businesses included Eso Won Books, Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles, Pete’s Foods Products, Winmax Construction Corporation, Beauchamp Distributing Company, and Gallery Plus.The UCLA Center for Oral History Research has also created a website that offers more context about black businesses in Los Angeles and includes numerous audio clips from this interview series.

This series documents community organizations and institutions that arose in the aftermath of the Watts Rebellion to address issues such as education, employment, healthcare, housing, transportation, and police harassment. The first phase of the series involved interviews with key organizers of the Black Congress, an umbrella organization of Black activist groups whose purpose was to reconstruct the community.

The Los Angeles branch of the National Urban League stems from a 1921 organization founded by Katherine Barr and others who attended Booker T. Washington's Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. The league gathered information about racial discrimination against African Americans and other minorities in jobs, health services, and housing; helped develop fair employment programs during World War II, and was active in the formation of the City Human Relations Commission. The collection consists of correspondence and papers relating to African Americans, immigrant labor and problems of social planning in Los Angeles.

Diane E. Watson is an American politician who served as a United States Representative, United States Ambassador to the Republic of Micronesia, California State Senator, and Los Angeles Unified School District Board of Education member. The collection covers Watson's time in the California State Senate, Ambassadorship to Micronesia, and in the U.S. Congress. It includes press clippings collected and arranged by Watson's staff, a sizable collection of photographs from events throughout Watson's career, correspondence, and documents from various events, meetings, and conferences.

Ivan J. Houston was born in Los Angeles, California in 1925. That same year, Houston's father, businessman Norman O. Houston helped organize Golden State Mutual Life Insurance, one of the largest historically black-owned companies in the country - a company Houston would head over four decades later.