South Colton

Soundscape: Colton, 2024

by Henry Apodaca and A People’s History of the I.E.

Narrators

Henry Vasquez, interviewed by Henry Apodaca and Anthony Victoria. A People’s History of the I.E. Dec. 17, 2023. Vasquez’s maternal and paternal grandfather moved to S. Colton around 1905, and worked at Portland Cement Co. Vasquez continues to be involved in community issues and is a chair of the Native American Community Council of San Bernardino and Riverside.

Frank Acosta, interviewed by Henry Apodaca and Audrey Maier. A People’s History of the I.E. Dec. 13, 2023. Acosta was a longstanding teacher in the Colton Unified School District and continues to be active in preserving Colton’s History.

Dr. Tom Rivera, interview with Charles Cervantes. South Colton Oral History Project. 2024. Special Collections & University Archives, Pfau Library, California State University, San Bernardino. Dr. Rivera, Frank Acosta, and Henry Vasquez organized the South Colton Oral History Project at California State University San Bernardino, which represents 30 interviews.

Oscar Colunga, interviewed by Audrey Maier. A People’s History of the I.E. February 10 and 11, 2024. Colunga grew up in Colton on both the south and north sides of the city. He is a retired respiratory therapist who continues to preserve his own family history.

Transcript

Henry Vasquez [00:00:07] Tahualtapa is Hill of the Ravens in the Luiseño creation story my Pechanga cousin gave me. It goes back to like 10,000 years ago.

Henry Vasquez [00:00:20] South Colton was for a long time the Mexican side of town, and the railroad tracks—this is before the freeway—railroad tracks was the dividing line. We crossed into North Colton to do some shopping, where there were maybe 2 or 3 businesses that allowed the Mexican population to shop.

Frank Acosta [00:00:44] Having the tracks there and then the freeway. It just, you know, solidified the division for for a long time. Well, the main the main impact was that it created a de facto segregation of North and South Colton.

Dr. Tom Rivera [00:01:06] We were very lucky in Colton, and particularly South Colton, because the Portland Cement gave our grandfathers and our fathers jobs. So, there was a stable job for those that worked there.

Dr. Tom Rivera [00:01:22] My grandfather belonged to the Union, he belonged to the Progresistas, and he belonged to the Trabajadores Unidos. And the Trabajadores Unidos had their headquarters at the Portland Cement plant, because we had a lot of Mexicans also that came from Mexico to work at cement plant.

Frank Acosta [00:01:39] There were disputes with the cement company over wages. But in 1917 there was a strike. Or I guess what happened was the cement plant gave a raise to their white employees, but not the Mexican. And so there was a strike. And the, the owners of the cement plant and the newspapers, they colluded. They didn't see that there was anything wrong with the wages that they were paying.

Henry Vasquez [00:02:09] Both my grandfathers and father worked there, so it was a dirty, heavy job. My father's father crossed the border in Texas, coming to California, and it was in 1905. He made his way to Colton and worked at the cement plant for a long time. And then he had an accident in the '30s, and, it messed up his leg. I think he worked in the area where they did the blasting, because that's how he had his accident. He just put up with the pain for the rest of his life, and he lived to be about 90, I think.

Oscar Colunga [00:02:53] The mountain wasn't that far away, but you could hear a siren going off to warn the crew, the people that were working on the mountain. Because you could see trucks, like when they stopped and the siren would go off because we were far away, the sound didn't reach us. But visually, you could see from a distance this puff go up in the air. And then you could hear, you know, seconds later, depending on how far you were away, a kaboom. And that would float all over Colton, all this dust. Cement dust. Very fine powder. Very fine powder. I think a lot of that cement dust was not good for the residents around there. And I remember, a lot of my aunts, because they were living closer to that than we did, just constantly cleaning the windowsills. And of course, and then my mother had asthma, and at times it was real, real bad. But it didn't help any that there was so much going on there. Because there was, like I said, ranching and farming and orchards and just, I mean, just very fine dust. Just the cloud of dust, which was there constantly. You know, all these years, you know, just there.