Kallas, Linda. Interview December 22, 2022.
Arts education
Basket making
California State University San Marcos
Death and remembrance
Education -- Native Americans
Illustration of books
Luiseño Indians
Pablo Tac Elementary School (Oceanside, Calif.)
Valley Arts Festival (Oceanside, Calif.)
Women artists
Oral history interview of Linda Kallas, December 22, 2022. Interview conducted by Diania L. Caudell. Linda Kallas is a retired middle school art and drama teacher who has collaborated with other local artists and authors on a variety of endeavors, including illustrating "Mel and the Blue Arrow" written by Mel Vernon (Luiseño). Kallas and Vernon also collaborated on a Luiseño/English coloring book and on an arts integrated curriculum taught at Pablo Tac Elementary School in Oceanside. Kallas is also on the committee for the Valley Arts Festival that celebrates Luiseño culture each November at Heritage Park, Oceanside. In her interview, Kallas talks to Diania Caudell about topics such as family, school, higher education, post-college life, and her various art and cultural projects.
Linda Kallas
California State University San Marcos University Library
Diania Caudell
In copyright
English
Oceanside (Calif.)
Kallas, Linda. Interview transcript, December 22, 2022.
Transcript of oral history interview of Linda Kallas, December 22, 2022. Interview conducted by Diania L. Caudell. Linda Kallas is a retired middle school art and drama teacher who has collaborated with other local artists and authors on a variety of endeavors, including illustrating "Mel and the Blue Arrow" written by Mel Vernon (Luiseño). Kallas and Vernon also collaborated on a Luiseño/English coloring book and on an arts integrated curriculum taught at Pablo Tac Elementary School in Oceanside. Kallas is also on the committee for the Valley Arts Festival that celebrates Luiseño culture each November at Heritage Park, Oceanside. In her interview, Kallas talks to Diania Caudell about topics such as family, school, higher education, post-college life, and her various art and cultural projects.
Melissa Martin
Knowles, Cheryl (Cheryl Dinning). Interview May 16, 2013
Afghan War, 2001-2021
Gay military personnel -- United States
Iraq War, 2003-2011
LGBTQ+ life
United States. Navy
Interview with Cheryl Knowles (Cheryl Dinning), Petty Officer First Class, United States Navy. In her interview, Dinning discusses her enlistment, basic and advanced training, and four deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Knowles also discusses life in the Navy, including shipboard life, as well as what it was like serving in the Navy as a lesbian during the Don't Act, Don't Tell era, an how if forced her to lead a double life and impacted her ability to be her genuine self and to grieve the loss of her daughter. This interview was conducted as part of the CSUSM Veterans Voices project, facilitated by the California State University San Marcos History Department, from 2012-2013. Veterans Voices (originally called War at Home and Abroad) documents, preserves, and makes accessible the experiences of CSUSM's student veterans. This interview was conducted with a "self-interviewing" protocol, a process drawn from a technique known as Digital Storytelling, which invites the narrator to self-author the interview, telling their story from their perspective, in their own words, and in their own manner. Narrators were provided a list of topics and interview guidelines emphasizing that they could use all, some, or none of the topics as they fashioned their stories about military service and related experiences, thus allowing each narrator to decide what they deemed to be historically important.
Cheryl Knowles (Cheryl Dinning)
Knowles, Cheryl (Cheryl Dinning). Interview transcript, May 16, 2013.
Gay military personnel--United States
Great Lakes Naval Training Center (Great Lakes, Ill.)
United States. Navy -- Recruiting, enlistment, etc.
Transcript of interview of Cheryl Knowles (Cheryl Dinning), Petty Officer First Class, United States Navy. In her interview, Knowles discusses her enlistment, basic and advanced training, and four deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Knowles also discusses life in the Navy, including shipboard life, as well as what it was like serving in the Navy as a lesbian during the Don't Act, Don't Tell era, and how it forced her to lead a double life and impacted her ability to be her genuine self and to grieve the loss of her daughter. This interview was conducted as part of the War At Home and Abroad (WAHA) project, now called the CSUSM Veterans Voices project. WAHA was conducted by the California State University San Marcos History Department in collaboration with the CSUSM Student Veterans Center (now the Epstein Family Veterans Center) from 2012-2013. The project aimed to document, preserve, and make accessible the experiences of CSUSM's student veterans. Portions of this interview were edited, including the removal of the interviewer from the recording.
Anthony Mino
California State University San Marcos. History Department
CSUSM Veterans Voices oral histories (external link)
Afghanistan
Dubai
Iraq
San Diego (Calif.)
Labrado, Ed. Interview November 17th, 2025.
United States. Army
United States. Army—Officers
United States. Army. Signal Corps
Vietnam War, 1961-1975
Cold War
University of California, Santa Barbara
Patton, George S. (George Smith), 1885-1945
United States. Army. Army, 3rd
United States. Army. Armored Division, 6th
United States. Army. Reserve Officers' Training Corps
Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (United States)
Camp Roberts (Calif.)
M1 rifle
World War, 1914-1918
Korean War, 1950-1953
M14 rifle
M16 rifle
Fort Gordon (Ga.)
Fort Monmouth (N.J.)
Cryptography
Missiles
Fort Ord (Calif.)
Funeral rites and ceremonies
Noncommissioned officers
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Warsaw Pact (1955-1991)
North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Bank of America, National Association
Nike Hercules missile
Nuclear weapons
Ramstein Air Base (Germany)
Kennedy, John F., 1917-1963—Assassination
Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962
United States. Army—Deserters
Nuclear warfare
Deterrence (Strategy)
Peace Corps (U.S.)
Edwin Joseph Labrado Jr. was a captain in the U.S. Army Signal Corps. He was deployed in Europe during the Vietnam War. Labrado was born and raised in Santa Barbara, where he graduated from UCSB and completed the Army's four-year ROTC program. After graduation, he was assigned to the Army Signal Corps and later deployed to Europe. In Europe, he served as a battalion signal officer for a Nike Hercules missile battalion that had nuclear warheads. Some of his other responsibilities included communications training, military funeral honors, and the inspection of firing batteries. In this oral history interview, Labrado reflected on the Cold War, the US anti-Vietnam War movement, and how Americans treat veterans after military service.
Ed Labrado
Jason Beyer
Europe
Santa Barbara (Calif.)
Port Hueneme (Calif.)
California
Ventura (Calif.)
Georgia
New Jersey
Monterey (Calif.)
Oakland (Calif.)
Russia (Federation)
Soviet Union
Germany (East)
Germany (West)
Korea
Vietnam
Isla Vista (Calif.)
France
Germany
United States
Ukraine
Nagasaki (Japan)
Labrado, Ed. Interview transcript, November 17, 2025.
Lacea, Jan Michael Letigio. Interview November 8th, 2024.
Jan Michael Letigio Lacea served in the Navy for eight years. He was frocked Petty Officer First Class HM1 (Hospital Corpsman First Class) before he left the service. Lacea described his service in the Philippines for Operation Enduring Freedom, and he reflected on his own identity as a Filipino American immigrant. He also recounted his return to civilian life, attending graduate school at CSU San Marcos, the support he received from the CSUSM Veterans’ Center, and the life lessons he learned from military service.
Lacea, Jan Michael Letigio. Interview transcript, November 8, 2024.
Camp Pendleton (Calif.)
Marine Corps Air Station Miramar (Calif.)
Missouri State University
Operation Enduring Freedom, 2001-2014 -- Philippines
San Diego State University
United States. Navy -- Hospital corpsmen
Veterans -- United States
Great Lakes (Ill.)
Jan Michael Letigio Lacea
Adel Bautista
Marilyn Huerta
Justin Gans
San Marcos (Calif.)
Fallbrook (Calif.)
Cebu City (Philippines)
Springfield (Mo.)
Okinawa (Japan)
Louisiana
San Antonio (Tex.)
Zamboanga (Philippines)
Manila (Philippines)
Boracay (Philippines)
Bohol (Philippines)
Arkansas
Marawi (Philippines)
North County San Diego (Calif.)
Lacea, Jan Michael Letigio. Photographs, Various dates.
Ten photos related to the oral history of Jan Michael Letigio Lacea. Photograph #1 depicts Lacea with U.S. Navy Hospital Corpsman, Randy Ferrer (Korean Army Medical Rep) in Daegu, Korea, 2014. Photograph #2 depicts Lacea posing with Corporal Mark Geppelt at the Marine Corps Ball, Camp Butler, Okinawa, Japan, 2013. Photograph #3 depicts Lacea posing with Hospital Corpsmen, Cody Goddard, Dillon Vick, and Gabriel San Pedro at the 2014 Navy Corpsman Ball, Camp Butler, Okinawa, Japan, 2014. Photograph #4 depicts Lacea posing with Sergeant Johan Lacea celebration Sergeant Lacea's promotion to E-5, Camp Butler, Okinawa, Japan, 2014. Photograph #5 depicts Lacea and Philippines soldiers during Exercise Balikatan, Tarlac, Philippines, 2012. Photograph #6 is a family photo of Lacea, Sergeant Johan Lacea, and Corpsman Howell Lacea at Camp Pendleton, California, 2011. Photograph #7 depicts Lacea deploying to the Philippines on a C-130 plane flying from Okinawa, Japan, Zamboanga, Philippines, 2012. Photograph #8 depicts Lacea and Lance Corporal Josue Alegarbes in deployment to the Philippines in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, Zamboanga, Philippines, 2012. Photograph #9 depicts Lacea and wife, Jazmin Lacea, on their wedding day in Seaport Village near the U.S.S. Midway Museum, San Diego, CA, 2018. Photograph #10 depicts Lacea with Lance Corporal Jonathan Flores, and Philippines soldiers preparing to destroy ordinance in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, Zamboanga, Philippines, 2013. Click on the thumbnails to view the full images in more detail.
California State University San Marcos. Cross-Cultural Center
Civil rights
Education, Higher
Human rights
Racism -- California -- Irvine
Student Success
University of California Irvine. Cross-Cultural Center
Floyd Lai served as Director of the Cross-Cultural Center at California State University from 2011 to 2023. In this Interview, Floyd discusses the growth and development of the CCC in conjunction with other student organizations. As a self-identified Chinese American, Lai addresses how his personal, educational, and professional background have informed one another.
Floyd Lai
Madeleine Meyer
Irvine (Calif.)