Latino Baseball History Project: How the LBHP started

• The Latino Baseball History project started as a collaborative effort between the Baseball Reliquary and California State University, Los Angeles in 2004 under the title “Mexican-American Baseball in Los Angeles: From the Barrios to the Big Leagues.”

· Mr. Terry Cannon, Director of the Baseball Reliquary and then Acting Dean of the John F. Kennedy Library at Cal State, Los Angeles, Cesar Caballero were the founders.

· It started with Terry Cannon’s idea of creating a library exhibit as part of a class assignment.

· Since there was no collection to exhibit, a call was made for the general public to contribute exhibit materials, such as pictures and artifacts.

· A reception was held at the library at CSULA to kick-off the project. (Saturday, early April 2005)

· Historians, a baseball personality, and community leaders were invited to the event.

· It was at this event that Cannon, Caballero, and others articulated the need to collect historical materials to document the Mexican American baseball experience.

· Some of the speakers included Dr. Francisco Balderrama, Professor of Mexican American Studies at CSULA; and Bobby Castillo, Dodgers Pitcher during a World Series.

• Baseball players and their families came forward and offered materials for the exhibit.

• Instead of just a couple of exhibit cases, nine large exhibit cases were filled with images and artifacts on two floors of the library.

• Hundreds attended the exhibit opening.

• The LA Times was so impressed with the event that it ran a full-page article on the front page of the newspaper on its Sunday Edition.

• Everyone involved felt that we had hit a “homerun.”