Bridges That Carried Us Over Project: Documenting Black History in the IE

02/27/2026

02/23/2026

Calling all IE teachers and educators!! 📣✨
Visit us on February 28th from 9:30 AM to 12:00 PM to learn about local history lesson plans and resources for K-12 Ethnic Studies and History-Social Studies Classrooms created by the IE Stories Team.🌟 Meet with the teachers who created these lessons and explore local archival materials that you can incorporate into your lessons.📚🙌

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11/08/2025

.We continue our celebration of Frances Grice who just was honored with the naming of a new Child Development Center at San Bernardino High School. We are blessed to be able to still hear her voice in an archival recording online at Bridges and to continue to work to preserve stories of her advocacy.

Frances Grice, Bonnie Johnson and Valerie Pope launched the Community League of Mothers in 1965, fighting for equal education and to end school desegregation in San Bernardino schools. She built Operation Second Chance and the Public Enterprise Center, a state of the art training program and facility on Baseline Frances Grice mentored a generation of political leaders and advocates in the city of San Bernardino and consistently challenged the city and the school district to invest in all the city's young people.
Her full interview transcript is now posted on the archive and you can listen to her voice here https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/bridges/12/ We are also continuing to document the story of the League of Community Mothers and Operation Second Chance, so if you have photos or documents that will help us bring this historic time period to life, please send us a message.

11/06/2025

Here is another great event in Riverside lifting up Black and Brown history and artists in the I.E. Come out to celebrate all the great work in Riverside's art walk tonight 6-9

This Thursday is the opening of Black and Brown in the IE and Beyond. Curated by Duan Kellum and Xochitl Flores. Honored to be apart of this exhibit and in the company of amazing community creatives/artists.

I’d be happy to see you there too!

Come on down to 6-9pm for the reception/celebration! 🎉 ✊🏽

11/06/2025

✨Join us during Artswalk for the opening of a new Pop Up Exhibition: East Meets West!!✨ Thursday November 6th at 6:00 PM. Don't miss a performance by expert storyteller Alyce Smith Cooper as she weaves together a tapestry of stories from Eastside Riverside and Westside San Bernardino.🌟 Enjoy some refreshments and view new photographic works by Eastside and Westside artists Bryan “June” Garcia, Gilbert Gonzales, Sonny Pacheco, and Mario Rojas.

09/18/2025

Today we celebrate a great interview with Gwen Dowdy Rodgers who currently serves on the San Bernardino County School board. In this interview from 2016, she shares stories about her family and experiences growing up in San Bernardino. She shares how her background in finance, youth ministry, and advocating for foster youth gave her the connections and realization she was meant to work for the public. Rodgers describes how she came to the decision to run for the San Bernardino City Unified School District Board, what she hopes to accomplish, and how her values always lie in the success of the young people she hopes to influence. Hear her oral history at https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/bridges/72/