Black History Month may have ended, but always a good time to take a journey into the “map cave” at the Los Angeles Public Library and explore the history of black communities in Los Angeles. In a video released last week by the library (episode two of a series that began in 2014) congenial map librarian (and proud Compton College grad) Glen Creason goes into the archives to find records of a city that was once so segregated that separate guidebooks were published for black Angelenos.

The video contains some fascinating historical tidbits about nightlife along Central Avenue in the early Twentieth Century, as well as an old African American vacation spot near present-day Magic Mountain. Here’s hoping we won’t have to wait another year and a half for episode three.

Los Angeles Black History

L.A. Stories From the “Map Cave” – Black Los Angeles