We invite CSUDH students, faculty, staff, visiting researchers, and community members to explore primary sources in the Gerth Archives & Special Collections!
We are now accommodating in-person visitors Monday-Friday, 9:00am - 4:30pm.
LIB South 5039, 5th floor
Adult oversees children tending crops near Spanish-American Institute in Gardena, California, approximately 1922.
Postcard from James H. Osborne Collection showing Ladies Aid Society members gathered on steps of Gardena Methodist Episcopal Church in early 1900s.
Postcard from the James H. Osborne Photograph Collection showing Torrance High School in the 1920s.
Postcard from the James H. Osborne Photograph Collection showing Torrance Business District in the 1920s.
Post card from the James H. Osborne Photograph Collection showing families posing in front of ornate Redondo Beach Bath House, approximately 1920.
Postcard from the James H. Osborne Photograph Collection, showing La Venta Inn, the first structure built on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. Postcard is date 1936.
These collections document, and illustrate the South Bay of Los Angeles County, both the region in total and many of the individual towns that have been founded on former Rancho San Pedro lands.
South Bay History Collection (1923-2005) includes of brochures, flyers, newsletters, directories, reports, papers, newspapers, and newsclippings related to the communities of Carson, Davidson City, Gardena, Hawthorne, Lakewood, Lawndale, Lomita, Long Beach, Lynwood, Manhattan Beach, Palos Verdes, Redondo Beach, San Pedro, Terminal Island, Torrance, Wilmington, and Los Angeles.
South Bay Photograph Collection (ca. 1880-1967) consists of color and black and white photographs, negatives, postcard-backed photos, and tin-types. Subjects of the photographs include people, businesses, churches, houses, schools, farming, transportation, and natural disasters.
James H. Osborne Photograph Collection is an online assemblage of photographs, postcards, ephemera, and memorabilia gathered by James H. Osborne, a resident, educator, and historian of Los Angeles County's South Bay. Osborne's family has lived in the South Bay since the end of the 19th century, and he has been an enthusiastic collector of all things related to his home region.
Judson Grenier Photograph Collection (1870-1980) consists of photographs used by Dr. Judson Grenier of California State Dominguez Hills for educational and research purposes. Photographs of paintings, dioramas, landscapes, and people depict the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area from its foundation through the 1980s.
Gardena Valley Chamber of Commerce Collection (1950-2004) consists of scrapbooks, documents, publications, photographs, videotapes, and other material related to the history and activities of the Gardena, California, Chamber of Commerce from 1950 to 2004.
Charles H. Eilers Collection (1872-2009) contains materials related to Charles “Carl” H. Eilers (1875-1948) and his family. The Eilers owned and farmed Rancho San Pedro Lands between Dominguez, Alameda, Del Amo, and Santa Fe streets in what was to become Carson, CA from 1889 to 1958. Included in the collection are deeds and title papers, tax reports, receipts, statements, court papers and legal documents, ledgers, correspondence, photographs, newspaper articles, and books.