SF State-produced documentaries tell stories of the first Black Marines
The Montford Point Marines were the first 20,000 African Americans trained to be servicemembers in the 1940s
To commemorate Black History Month, a San Francisco State University documentary team will debut four shorts about the first Black servicemembers in the U.S. Marine Corps. Each of the short films will be available on YouTube.
The films are oral histories with surviving members of the Montford Point Marines, 20,000 African Americans trained between 1942 and 1949 in Jacksonville, North Carolina. The first recruits began one year after U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt outlawed racial discrimination in war industries, allowing Black men and women, although only in a segregated fashion.
San Francisco State History Professor Trevor Getz, who produced the films along with Cinema Professor Daniel L. Bernardi, emphasizes the lasting legacy of the Montford Point Marines and the lessons that can be learned from them.