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Chronicling America is a searchable digital collection of historic newspaper pages through 1963 sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress.
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Also, see the Directory of U.S. Newspapers in American Libraries, a searchable index to newspapers published in the United States since 1690, which helps researchers identify what titles exist for a specific place and time, and how to access them.
In 1958, public housing plans for the Chavez Ravine area of Los Angeles were abandoned in favor of creating a baseball stadium. As a result, Chavez Ravine's predominantly low-income Hispanic communities were evicted.
The U.S. Government had already spent $4.5 million on the land for public housing. Efforts to block stadium construction plans led to one of the largest non-presidential election turnouts in L.A. history with over 60% of registered voters casting ballots. Read more about it!
The information in this guide focuses on primary source materials found in the digitized historic newspapers from the digital collection Chronicling America.
The timeline below highlights important dates related to this topic and a section of this guide provides some suggested search strategies for further research in the collection.
| May 29, 1957 | National Baseball League officials approve the relocation of the Brooklyn Dodgers if they request and receive consent by October 1, 1957. |
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| September 29, 1957 | Los Angeles shows interest in the Dodgers and makes official announcement of the move. |
| October 7, 1957 | Los Angeles city council vote 10-4 in favor of the stadium. |
| November 14, 1957 | The "Committee to Save Chavez Ravine For The People" successfully gathers 51,787 signatures to force a public referendum election of the Chavez Ravine deal. |
| June 3, 1957 | Election on Proposition B is held. Results show 62.3 percent of the city's 1,105,427 registered voters cast ballots in the heaviest non-presidential election turnout in Los Angeles history at that time. Proposition B passes in favor of the Stadium. |
| 1958 | California Superior Court Judge Arnold Praeger ruled the Chavez Stadium contract was illegal. However, the State Supreme Court upheld the Chavez Stadium agreement, allowing the stadium construction to proceed. |
| May 1959 | Chavez Ravine residents are evicted. |
| October 1959 | Walter O'Malley, president of the Dodgers, presents a map with plans for the stadium to be surrounded by other commercial operations, but the city council contends the Chavez Stadium contract limits the land to strictly baseball purposes. |
| April 10, 1962 | The Los Angeles Dodgers play their first match at their new ballpark with 52,564 fans in attendance. They are defeated by Cincinnati, 3-6. |
