To research a Pomona street, begin with a question small enough to answer. Who occupied one block during a particular decade? When did a house become a shop? Why does a street name appear differently on an older map? A focused project turns scattered discoveries into a story you can support. You do not need an elaborate archive at home. You need a defined place, a few dependable sources, and a method for recording where each claim came from.
Choose a block, a time window, and one question
Write down the current street name, cross streets, and side of the block you want to study. Add a reasonable starting period, such as two decades rather than a full century. Your question can change as evidence accumulates, but these boundaries prevent every interesting discovery from becoming a new project. Take a present-day walk if practical, keeping observations separate from assumptions about the past.
Record visible building numbers, corner locations, unusual lot shapes, and structures that may help you recognize older views. Do not enter private property or photograph people as research subjects without considering their privacy. A sketch made from the sidewalk can be enough to organize the first stage of investigation.
Check whether the address meant the same place
The Library of Congress property-record guide notes that street names, numbering, and boundaries may change. Treat an old address as a clue that needs locating. Cross streets, neighboring occupants, parcel descriptions, and a recognizable corner can help connect it to the present map. Avoid assuming that the same number always identifies the same building.
Create a small identity note for each location: current address, older forms encountered, source date, and confidence in the match. If two records may describe different properties, keep them separate until you have evidence joining them. This simple habit prevents an attractive but mistaken chain of ownership or occupancy.
Define what would count as an answer, too. A question about a shop’s occupancy needs different evidence from a question about the construction of its building. Keeping those goals separate saves considerable searching.
Move from a street name to a set of sources
Search the Pomona Public Library Digital Collections using the street name, intersections, nearby landmarks, and businesses associated with the area. Try spelling variants and abbreviations. A useful photograph may be cataloged under a store, parade, or family rather than the street visible in its background. Keep promising results even when their relevance is not yet clear.
Consult Cal Poly Pomona’s Pomona Valley Historical Collection guide for a regional research starting point. A collection description helps identify possible material; it does not guarantee that a particular address or person appears. Note the collection name and any box, folder, or item identifier supplied with the record.
Investigate the name without inventing its origin
Cal Poly Pomona’s Pomona bibliography lists Harry A. Faull’s 1952 article, “From Pathways to Freeways,” on the origins of the city’s street names. That is a useful research lead. Read the article and examine its evidence before adopting a particular explanation; a bibliography entry alone cannot confirm a street-name story.
Ask different records different questions
Maps can help establish location and relationships. Directories can help identify listed residents or businesses. Newspapers can supply announcements and public discussion. Property and building records may document transactions or alterations. These sources overlap, but they do not answer identical questions. Match each record to the claim you want to test instead of treating every dated document as proof of a building’s age.
When possible, compare two sources created for different purposes. Agreement between an advertisement and a directory can be useful; two websites repeating the same unsourced sentence offer much less independent support.
Read a map as a dated document
Check the map’s title, date, coverage, and legend. The Library of Congress Sanborn interpretation guide explains the importance of symbols, colors, and changing addresses. A map is evidence for what its makers recorded, using their conventions, at a particular time. It may leave out the very detail you hoped to find.
Distinguish a first appearance from a beginning
The earliest directory entry you locate is the earliest entry you have found, not necessarily the first year a business operated. Likewise, absence from one map or search result does not automatically prove absence on the ground. Missing editions, incomplete coverage, spelling differences, and cataloging choices can all interrupt a research trail. State the limit plainly rather than filling it with a guess.
Build an evidence log you can check later
Add present-day observations to the log as well: a patched curb, an altered entrance, or a change in paving may suggest a question for older photographs. Record what you can see without assigning an unsupported date to it.
Give every useful source a row in a notebook or spreadsheet. Record its date, title, repository, identifier or page, link, relevant detail, and the question it addresses. Add a separate column for interpretation. This keeps what a record says distinct from what you think it means and makes it easier to explain a conclusion to someone else.
Consider a hypothetical case: a directory lists a grocer at an address, while a later photograph shows a different shop sign. Those records support a change in documented occupancy between two dates. They do not establish that the building was replaced. A building record or comparable image might answer that further question. The Library of Congress guide to business photographs and maps suggests complementary kinds of evidence.
Listen to memories and identify their perspective
Residents’ recollections can reveal routines, informal place names, and experiences absent from official records. Ask open questions and obtain permission before recording or publishing an interview. Note when the conversation occurred and whether the person witnessed an event or heard about it later. A remembered detail deserves attention, while dates and sequences may still benefit from comparison with contemporary sources.
Preserve disagreement in your notes. If one resident remembers a corner shop closing before another does, the difference may concern a change of ownership, a new business name, or separate parts of the property. You do not need to resolve the conflict immediately. Write down the competing accounts, identify a record that could clarify them, and explain what remains open in the finished article.
Write a street history with visible foundations
Organize the result around your original question. Begin with the place and period, explain the strongest findings, and show how the evidence supports them. The Library of Congress analysis guides encourage observation and questioning rather than instant conclusions. Identify unresolved contradictions; they can become useful directions for later work.
For a house-focused project, continue with Reading Pomona’s Historic Homes. For visual evidence, use our then-and-now comparison guide. Keep your notes with the finished account and return to our research hub as the project develops. A trustworthy street history can remain unfinished: clear evidence and clearly named questions make it useful to the next researcher.
Image note: All three images are AI-generated illustrations, not archival photographs or verified views of specific Pomona sites.