Students Discover History for Fair Competition : Education: Ninth annual San Diego-Tijuana International History Fair focuses on area’s immigrants.

Two Jamul eighth-graders had good reason to be nervous as they performed a series of dialogues on African-American history in San Diego.

From a few rows away, Dr. Jack J. Kimbrough, a pioneer in San Diego’s civil rights movement, watched intently as Jean Johnstone-Emory and Nia Sabrena-Rucker, both Oak Grove Middle School students, performed parts of his life at a history fair.

In the late 1940s, Kimbrough, a dentist, led a series of successful sit-ins at San Diego restaurants that helped end the widespread practice of refusing service to black people. He later founded San Diego’s Urban League and became president of the city’s NAACP chapter.

Asked his opinion of the young women’s performance, Kimbrough, now 82, quietly pointed to his right eye, then his left as if to draw tears. “It was such a long, long time ago,” he said. “As you see the childrens’ performance, you realize the things that you’ve done have made an impression on their lives.”

All over San Diego State University’s Montezuma Hall, students from more than 50 county and Baja California junior and senior high schools showed off their projects Friday while anxiously awaiting the final judging of the ninth annual San Diego-Tijuana International History Fair.

About 175 projects were chosen as semifinalists from among thousands of essays and projects throughout San Diego County and Baja California.

This year’s fair, called “Immigrants and Our Rich Cultural Diversity,” focused on the contributions of immigrants to Southern California and Tijuana. From the history of women in San Diego to housing in Tijuana, each colorfully decorated exhibit represented efforts ranging from three days to more than two months, students said.

“It’s very important for the students because they learn to research history on their home town and compare it to that of San Diego,” said Consuelo Ayala, Tijuana schools’ history coordinator for the fair.

Most students echoed Ayala’s sentiments, saying they were impressed by what they learned researching the entries.

“We knew that the Salvation Army donated clothes and stuff like that,” said Lance Siraton, 14, from Oak Grove Middle School. “But we didn’t know they put on weddings, have rehabilitation centers that deal with drug and alcohol addictions, and find missing people,” he said. Siraton and partner Tim Shaw, also 14, took first place for their miniature replica of the Salvation Army Headquarters building in New York and bilingual photo display on the organization’s history.

“My father is a lawyer, but I never realized how important they were in the history of San Diego,” said Akilah Weber, 12, a Gompers Secondary School seventh-grader and daughter of city Board of Education president Shirley Weber. Akilah Weber’s paper on the history of black lawyers in San Diego won the competition’s top essay award.

Saythong Phovasavanh, 13, also a Gompers Secondary School seventh-grader, won first place for her Laotian dance, which celebrates the new year. Dressed in a rose-colored, two-piece, traditional Laotian outfit, she threw flowers to the audience from the the stage of SDSU’s Casa Real.

“I never joined a big event like this before, so I’m very excited whether I win or not,” she said.

After the African-American history presentation received a long ovation, its creators spoke of their research.

“We’d heard about black people in Watts and the South,” said Sabrena-Rucker.

“But we never heard anything about blacks in San Diego,” said her partner, Johnstone-Emory. “I was just really interested in it and wondered why isn’t there anything written about it.”

Inspired by their teacher, Janet Mulder, the pair spent weeks looking at old newspapers at the public library and conducting interviews.

Although they began work on their presentation in early January, Sabrena-Rucker said, they only just finished preparing yesterday. “My friend said we’re living proof that procrastination really works,” she laughed.