-
This interview highlights the challenges of running a small business in San Bernardino, which Raul Raya and his family have done for several generations. Raya discusses Ybarra’s Market, the transformations he has seen in the city, and the impacts of freeway construction on both the business and the larger Westside San Bernardino community. He explains that due to the construction of the 215 freeway in the 1960s (originally named 395), and the placement of exits directing the flow of people away from the Westside, businesses like his declined. Mt. Vernon Avenue -- once the city’s commercial and business corridor along historic Route 66 -- became desolate in the years and decades following the freeway’s opening. The freeway blocked cross traffic. He mentions that before the freeway and before the closures of the Norton Air Force base and Kaiser Steel, his family-owned business was doing well. The loss of jobs due to those closures made it hard for families, and his shop, to survive economically. The interview also discusses the 10 Freeway, which was one of the only routes to San Bernardino, and the importance of Route 66 to the city. Raya says that as time passed after the freeways were completed, those businesses began to shut down and numerous small stores such as his own were forced to sell. Raya further discusses the amount of work and money that has been invested into the store to maintain and follow code enforcement, and how the low profit margins make it difficult. As the interview ends, Raya discusses his belief that the city did not think of them before the freeway construction nor did they after, and as a result, the local businesses declined with little chance to prosper.
-
The childhood house of Janice Wilson was located at 24618 Norman Road. Janice's family moved to this house when she was only 4 or 5 years old in the mid-1950s, having previously lived in a tiny shack in Los Angeles. A unidentified women stands on the front steps of the house.
-
A group of women dressed up as if for church in a color photo, possibly a church mission group. Mrs Marshall is in the back in light blue dress, light blue in front right is Mrs Wilcots, dark blue Mrs Henchen. Other women not yet identified.
-
2024.012.028 Family reunion at Beatrice Wilcots' house on Norman Road. "Sister Beatrice Wilcots, left, arrived at St. Mark’s in 1959, having followed her husband, Rev. D.E. Wilcots, who came prior to that. Sister Wilcots served as a Sunday school teacher, VBS teacher, and as president of the missionary society. She said that Christ is all she needs or wants in life, and He is who she depended on. She advised people to accept Christ early so they would have Him to direct their paths." (Truck Valley Farms Scrapbook, 2019).
-
Miss MacDay's house on Norman Road, known for her field of blackberries that she allowed children to pick and eat.
-
Woman holding a big fish, perhaps as a gift to a neighbor. She is accompanied by a group of three men and an unidentified man is walking with their grandchild. Another unidentified man stands to the far right, holding a fishing pole and staring at the camera.
-
Smiling Pastor Freeman Williams and wife Mrs. Lucille Williams dressed in their formal church attire to attend St. Mark's Missionary Baptist Church in May of 1956.
-
4 children sit on the bumper of a 1940s car on a street in Norman road. They are barefoot. From left to right: Garfield Henchen, Janice Wilson, Larry Harper, and Michael Harper.
-
Churchgoers seated in pews of the St. Mark's Missionary Baptist Church honor Mrs. Blanchette (in usher uniform) as she is escorted down the middle aisle by two young unidentified women.
-
This image captures the January 1961 Women's Missionary Meeting. The women are gathered in a room, posing for the camera.
-
An unidentified woman stands in their backyard hanging laundry on Norman Road. Taken in February 1963.
-
A photo taken in February 1963 depicting a neighbor's house on Norman Road.
-
Sister Beatrice Wilcots is pictured in the middle, Effie Hinchen is standing, and Mrs. Thomas is on the right (Valley Truck Farms, 2019). They are at a February 1961 missionary meeting, likely celebrating a birthday given that two of the women are wearing party hats. The image reads, "FEB 61."
-
1940s car in front of a neighbor's house possibly on Norman road.
-
Father Garfield Hinchen holds both his granddaughters, Denisha and Tanika, while they watch their pigs eat. Sussie, the largest pig, is pictured in the center. The background depicts old scraps of wood pallets and posts around the property. This photo was taken on his property at 24618 Garfield Street. Garfield's one-acre land housed chickens, pigs, and crops like black-eyed peas, okra, and collard greens. He sold eggs and occasionally brought meat to a Mill Street location for processing, storing it in lockers for pickup. He also plowed fields by hand.
-
Father Garfield Hinchen with granddaughters Denisha and Tanika behind a chicken coop on his property at 24618 Garfield Street. Garfield's one-acre land housed chickens, pigs, and crops like black-eyed peas, okra, and collard greens. He sold eggs and occasionally brought meat to a Mill Street location for processing, storing it in lockers for pickup. He also plowed fields by hand.
-
Pastor Percy Harper posing with associate pastors in their formal church attire on the front steps of St. Mark's Missionary Baptist Church. Picture includes Left to Right Rev Llewelyn, Rev Williams, Pastor Harper, Rev Ruffan, Wilvis Brown, Minister Dennis Hackett.
-
Mission meeting in a home after the church stopped having mission meetings at the church and started meeting at different women's homes for mission groups.
-
Mr. William Bruce McMurray and Mrs.Imogene Garvin McMurray are dressed up for a portrait photo. Mr. McMurray is in a dress suit top and patterned tie and is wearing jeans. Mrs. McMurray is weating a patterned dress and also is wearing jewlery on her wrist, neck, and ears.
-
A young Ilene and Gregory have a pretend "wedding " at St. Mark's Missionary Baptist Church, part of a Tom Thumb wedding.
-
Oliver McMurray Sr. is leaning away playfully from someone offering him a stack of ribs
-
Oliver Sr. seated at picnic table in backyeard, with a woman eating a rib and a man with a cast on his arm. A man in a green shirt with a brown cap is eating out of a plate in the far left corner.
-
Oliver Jr and Oliver Sr. sit at a backyard picnic table for a barbeque in a backyard with a smoker in the background.
-
The McMurray family poses for a formal portrait. In the back Row (L to R): Linda, Danny, Wendell & Larry & Front Row (L to R): Chris, William (father), Darrel, Imogene (mother), Ilene and Larry. Not pictured William Earnest.
-
McDowell Cafe Calendar 1947. Ola McDowell and Willis McDowell moved to 787 Norman Road in 1942 and started a Barbeque restaruant on the southeast corner of Waterman and Central at 812 S Waterman. Here is an image of a restaurant calendar the family saved from 1947