University launches a Filipino American Digital Archive

Photos like that of the 1949 installation of officers of Legionarios Del Trabajo (above), one of the oldest Filipino American organizations in the nation can be included in the new archive.

Filipino Americans in Los Angeles' Southbay are literally making history.

Leaders of the Filipino community and local dignitaries along with California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) faculty and representatives of the university’s Gerth Archives and Special Collections launched of the CSUDH Filipino American Digital Archive (FADA) last Saturday, March 5. 

The event, held in the Archives of the CSUDH University Library, doubled as an opportunity for members of the local Filipino American community to bring in their own materials to add to the archive.

“With Greater Los Angeles home to the third-largest population of Americans with Filipino ancestry in the United States, this new archive will be an important addition to the Gerth Archives’ growing list of special collections that document, preserve, and make accessible the histories of the many cultures and people in the South Bay region of Greater Los Angeles,” says Gerth Archives Director Greg Williams.

CSUDH Assistant Professor of Asian-Pacific Studies Mary Talusan Lacanlale says the community was the impetus behind establishing the new digital archive. 

“Several years ago, members of Filipino American organizations in Carson approached Greg Williams and I about creating an archive to document the important work of Filipino Americans in our area,” says Lacanlale, author of the recently published "Filipino Musicians, Black Soldiers, and Military Band Music During US Colonization of the Philippines."

Lacanlale, Williams, and the staff at the Gerth Archives liked the proposal and got to work setting up a database with initial contributions by local Filipino American leaders.

Among the first contributors to the archives were Florante Ibanez, author of Filipinos in Carson and the South Bay, and Linda Nietes-Little, founder of the Philippine Expressions Bookshop in San Pedro and an icon of the Filipino American community. Ibanez donated boxes of his photos, newsletters, and other collected items, and Nietes-Little contributed memorabilia along with a collectible copy of Carlos Bulosan’s America is in the Heart.

Mary Talusan Lacanlale helped lauche the Filipino American Digital Archive.

To help grow the archive, organizers of the March 5 event invited community members to bring their own photos, videos, meeting notes of organizations, and any other material they would like to submit to be preserved for safekeeping in the archives.

CSUSD is located in Carson, Caliofornia, home to a large Filipino American community. According to the 2020 Census, out of a population of 95,558, Filipino Americans make up almost 21%, the largest Asian ethnic group. It is one of the few cities to celebrate Filipino American labor leader Larry Itliong.

Local dignitaries attending the launch event included local politicians, writers and faculty. The Filipino Cultural School Rondalla Ensemble provided a musical performance of traditional Filipino music.

The Filipino American Digital Archive will become part of the Gerth Archives, which is recognized for its extensive list of individual special collections documenting the people and cultures that make up the South Bay region of Los Angeles. 

“The Gerth Archives is pleased to coordinate another community history project,” says Williams. “FADA has already allowed the Archives to include local Filipinos in the archives. We will continue to gather source material for this important history that is local, national, and international in scope.”

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