Starting in May of 1968, the Black Student Center of the Claremont Colleges made demands to create a body for Black scholarship, financial provisions and institutional recognition for the Black academic community of the Claremont Colleges. Their efforts led to the foundation of the Black Studies Center the following year in 1969. The Black Studies Center was an autonomous body of the Claremont Colleges, which led the implementation of new curriculum focusing on Black scholarship. The Center also hired new Black faculty and staff, as well as innovated programming focusing on Black student admission and retention. The collection consists of organizing documents, statements, correspondence, promotional materials and newspaper clippings that archive and document the history of the Black Studies Center, from its early inception through its transition to the Office of Black Student Affairs in 1979. Many documents cover the Civil Rights activism and protests that occurred not just at the Claremont Colleges but other universities around the country as well.