Pomona Valley and Claremont (Circa 1920)
Essence of the Sun
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I’m originally from LA and spent my high school years in Claremont, California. It’s a town in the Pomona Valley, an hour east of downtown LA off Interstate 10. An hour east of Claremont, through the pass of the two great mountains of San Gorgonio and San Jacinto and the California desert where I’ve spent much of my time.
Claremont is up against the San Gabriel Mountains, about an hour east of downtown LA (on the best traffic day). It’s on the left side of I-10 heading East. Little distinction of towns outside the window of a car I always saw the trip from LA to high school. They blended together going east: Monterey Park, Rosemead, Baldwin Park, West Covina, El Monte.
The most excitement in that trip I used to take from LA to Claremont was when I-10 entered a new phase of it’s life east and was no longer level and looking out on shopping malls, but now snaking through hills. Higher and higher. And then, coming into the Pomona Valley: Lucerne, Pomona and Claremont. All pretty much at the same time on the green and white I-10 signs.
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Our high school was in the hills above Claremont in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. When I went to downtown Claremont, my favorite places were the record shop (where you could find anything), the soda shop and a bookstore where I first my a copy of In Cold Blood. One day, I walked a few blocks east of downtown Claremont. And, entered a new world. I had heard about the seven colleges of Claremont but knew little about them at the time. I just walked. And walked through the colleges of the Claremont system.
I lived a number of years in the east. But now, here in Claremont, it seemed a slice of the east had been lifted off the old map and placed here in Claremont. It was an amazing experience for me. Walking around the colleges in the system.
As a native of LA, it seemed impossible that such a type of unique environment could be placed in southern California. Just miles west on I-10 to towns like Monrovia and Baldwin Park.
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The unique structure of the Claremont Colleges system is based on the Oxford University colleges. I know a good amount about the Oxford system as my wife went to Oxford.
There are many things to be said for the Oxford structure of education. A consortium that is the model for Claremont colleges.
The big question, in my mind, is whether we should be looking at structure of educational systems versus the ideology of them.