Community Archiving in Skid Row: Preserving a Neighborhood's History with Henry Apodaca

Community archiving looks different when the archive lives on the street instead of behind a locked door. In this episode of The Archive Room, we sit down with Henry Apodaca of the Skid Row History Museum and Archive to explore what documentary archive research looks like when the community itself is both subject and collaborator. Henry walks us through his path into archival work, from record collecting and a degree in anthropology to earning his MLIS at UCLA and landing at the Los Angeles Poverty Department. We talk about the history of the Skid Row neighborhood and where the name itself comes from, the Community Redevelopment Agency's decades long push to remake the area, and how the community's own Blue Book response helped save the single room occupancy housing that still stands today. We also cover how the archive is funded, how researchers and the public can access the collection, the deliberate choice to preserve people's own words and language in oral history transcription rather than correcting them, and why Henry sees history as cyclical rather than linear, drawing a direct line between the 1984 Olympics and concerns around the 2028 Games returning to Los Angeles. This is a conversation about what it means to build an archive that serves and reflects a living community, not just a shelf of boxes. If you work in documentary archive research, film preservation, or archival storytelling, this episode is essential listening. You can learn more about the Skid Row History Museum and Archive, explore the collection, and support their work directly at lapovertydept.org. Explore Walk the Talk, LAPD's ongoing project documenting Skid Row visionaries through long-form video interviews, at the dedicated archive here: www.app.reduct.video/lapd/walk-the-talk If you'd like to support the Skid Row History Museum and Archive's work directly, you can donate at www.lapovertydept.org/donate The Archive Room is presented by Silver Salt Restoration, the UK's foremost film and television restoration company and part of the John Gore Studios family. Learn more at silversaltrestoration.com CHAPTERS 0:00 Introduction to Skid Row community archiving 1:22 Meet Henry Apodaca and the Skid Row History Museum and Archive 2:51 From record collecting to a masters in library and information science 9:59 Silver Salt Restoration 10:25 Studying at UCLA and turning evidence from a noun into a verb 17:45 The history and origins of the term Skid Row 27:41 Documenting the Gospel Wagon and the earliest Skid Row records 31:12 The Community Redevelopment Agency and the fight over Skid Row's future 33:31 Silver Salt Restoration 34:16 Where the collection comes from: John Malpede and Henriette Browers 38:19 How the archive and the community build each other 44:01 How the archive is funded and how people can support it 46:36 Access to the archive for researchers and private individuals 49:32 Restricted collections and the Echo Park Lake Rising archive 52:07 Preserving the collection day to day 54:51 Henry's favourite highlights in the collection 56:59 Street sweeps, displacement and housing as health care 59:52 Preserving community voice in oral history transcription 1:00:25 The 1984 Olympics and fears for 2028 1:03:11 How the World Cup is affecting Skid Row 1:05:10 Quickfire Round with Henry Apodaca 1:09:31 Closing thoughts and thanks The Archive Room @ArchiveRoomPod