About The Project
The Central American Heritage Markers in LA (CAHM-LA) is an online story map that documents the lesser-known history of Los Angeles, showcasing the sites and people that matter most to Central American communities. This is an on-going project that depends largely on collective memory work by community members aligned with the project's goal of making visible our cultural contributions and resilience. As a community we are moving CAHM-LA forward and documenting Central American diaspora history.
“This work is personal for our community.
It’s about preserving and promoting our community’s contributions over time
and re-imagining our sense of belonging,”
said Claudia A. Portillo, CAHAAS Co-founder.
In May 2025, the Central American Heritage Markers in LA project was made possible by the support from Latinos in Heritage Conservation, a Nuestra Herencia Grant Program. This is a three-part, cultural mapping and preservation project under the umbrella of a larger initiative by the Central American Historical and Ancestral Society (CAHAAS). The co-founder of CAHAAS, Claudia A. Portillo together with Cindy Mata, director of the UCI History Project (UCIHP), Mariana Ramirez also with UCIHP, and CSULA Anthropology professor, Dr. Ester E. Hernández are the core team members that completed the first phase of CAHM-LA. Stay tuned for the second phase.
Resource Guide
CAHM-LA is a dynamic resource for researchers, educators, policymakers, historic preservationists, and Central American communities. The story map aims to preserve and amplify Central American contributions to the cultural and historical fabric of Los Angeles, while inviting ongoing collaboration and future updates. It functions as both an educational tool and a living archive, encouraging community participation and intergenerational knowledge-sharing.
This resource guide for educators includes insight into the development of the mapping project, a case study, and questions for students for each category. We suggest assigning student groups a category to explore and reflect on each record using the questions provided.
Community Spotlight
Acknowledgments
This mapping project has been developed by the
Central American Heritage Markers LA
(CAHM-LA) core team:
Principal Investigators:
Claudia A. Portillo, M.A.
Ester E. Hernández, Ph.D.
Education Consultant:
Cindy Mata, M.Ed., M.A.
&
Esri ArcGIS Consultant:
Mariana E. Ramirez, Ph.D.
CAHAAS is grateful for the support from community members for this very important undertaking and would like to thank all who participated in nominating sites and stories for this project.
Special thanks to the focus group (see contributors page) and
Museum of Social Justice for getting this project off the ground.
Citations for each record on map can be found in separate REFERENCE page.
When referencing material from CAHM-LA, please credit:
Central American Heritage Markers LA,
Central American Historical and Ancestral Society (CAHAAS),
Los Angeles, California, 2026.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
(CC BY-NC 4.0).
For permissions beyond the scope of this license, including commercial use,
please contact us at team@cahaas.org.
Supported in part by Latinos in Heritage Conservation's Nuestra Herencia Grant Program,
a sponsored project of the Social Impact Fund and funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
