Rochester Voices: Latino Oral HistoriesThis local project comprises 31 interviews of Rochesterians with roots in a variety of Latin-American countries, including Puerto Rico, Cuba, Mexico, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, and Colombia. The interviewees, whose stories span from the 1950s to the 2010s, have varying levels of connection to their Latino heritage, and each person gives a unique perspective on what it is like being a Latino-American in Rochester.
In 2011, Dr. Isabel Córdova, Associate Professor in History & Political Science at Nazareth College, initiated a student project to record and preserve the oral histories of Latinos in the Rochester area. Her colleague in the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature, Dr. Hilda Chacon, contributed similar student projects to the collection.
They then shared the interviews with the Rochester Public Library who administers and operates "Rochester Voices," a project of the Local History & Genealogy Division of the Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County.
