Class on History of Civilization--in the Valley

Tell Bobbette Fleschler that there “ain’t no culture in the Valley” and she’ll tell you to sign up for her new Cal State Northridge extension course that disproves it.

Saying she got tired of continually hearing about a “desolate community” filled with nothing but Valley girls, Fleschler, 31, a 1981 CSUN history graduate and president of the San Fernando Valley Historical Society, decided to do something about it.

“But in order to prove your point, you have to do the research and find out what actually does exist and come up with a good answer to such accusations,” she said. “What I found is there has been a rich life here.

“Valley history parallels a lot of major themes that have occurred elsewhere in California, including growth and development, railroad participation, dividing up the area into a suburb, and how in just this one little place it has all occurred,” Fleschler said.

Titled “A History of the San Fernando Valley,” Fleschler’s non-credit course, will meet once a week for six weeks beginning Sept. 20. It will work its way from Indian culture to the arrival of Spanish explorer Gaspar de Portola in 1769 to the present and possibilities for the future.

Indian Settlements

It is the pre-Spanish Valley that residents are least aware of, she says, explaining that few people realize that there were major Indian settlements, predominantly in what is now the city of San Fernando, the Topanga Canyon area and the Chatsworth hills.

“But you won’t find them in the plain of the Valley,” she said, explaining that even then “there wasn’t sufficient water.” Part of the course will deal with what remains of Indian sites and the issue of removing artifacts.

The history course includes ranchos, the eventual Americanization of the Valley, various land booms and busts in the late 1800s, the continual search for water, and the emergence of early communities such as Van Nuys and Owensmouth (now Canoga Park).

Other discussions will cover the 1920-1945 slow-growth era--1930 population density maps for Chatsworth indicate two people per acre.

During that time, “there’s the development of Lockheed in Burbank and wartime industry,” Fleschler said. “But the rest of the San Fernando Valley went through a very quiet period.

“People from the motion picture industry came out here and developed horse ranches, but we maintained a very rural personality,” she said. “It was very laid-back and peaceful, almost idyllic.”

Things changed remarkably in the next period, after World War II and the emergence of suburbia, freeways and shopping centers from 1945 to the 1960s.

There have been courses in Valley history offered by Valley, Mission and Pierce colleges, Fleschler said, but she believes that this is the first university-level course, as well as the first to include a discussion of the tools a historian uses to uncover and make history more accessible.

“We’ll look at deeds, grant deeds and incorporation papers and see what they can reveal to somebody researching history,” she said. “Another lecture will focus on photography and how a photo can reveal considerable information to someone who knows how to use it.”

Fleschler says she plans to include an oral history segment where residents who have lived here many decades will share and record their impressions of the Valley and how it has changed.

‘Long History Here’

“I think there is a move for a sense of community awareness and preservation, what with all the freeways crisscrossing and the Porter Ranch development,” she said. “But on a day-to-day basis, we do take for granted our life out here.

“I hope to be able to show not only that there is a long and interesting history here, but also that students will go away with a sense that it is at their fingertips. It’s right in their streets and communities, and they can actively participate both in uncovering it and preserving it.”

A field trip is scheduled Oct. 28 as a finale to the course, and although Fleschler says she doesn’t have the exact itinerary worked out, it should include Indian artifacts and abandoned attempts by early railroads to find a westward mountain pass. Other sites will be determined by the class.

The CSUN extension class will meet from 7 to 10 p.m. Wednesdays. The fee is $65. For information, call CSUN at (818) 885-2644.