HISTORIC PLACES TELL ONLY PART OF SAN DIEGO'S STORY.The people who lived here—their families, traditions, possessions, photographs, documents, memories, and descendants—explain, enrich, and complete it.
For more than a decade, Connie Rascon Gunther has dedicated herself to ensuring that stories like this are never lost.
As chairperson of Descendants of Early San Diego (DESD) since 2013, Connie has transformed a grassroots organization into an innovative center for historical research, genealogy, education, and cultural preservation. Building on a tradition that began in 1978, when descendants first gathered in Old Town San Diego, she has helped carry that vision into the digital age.
 |
Descendants plaque in Presidio Park |
Recognizing that decades of invaluable family research existed in scattered paper files and on disconnected genealogy websites, Connie assembled a dedicated volunteer team to create something entirely new—a sustainable digital archive preserving the interconnected histories of San Diego's earliest families.
The result is an extraordinary online genealogy database documenting more than ten generations of descendants whose roots reach back to California's Spanish and Mexican periods, with records dating to 1769. Thousands of historical documents, family records, photographs, and verified genealogical materials have been digitized, organized, and made publicly accessible, ensuring that these irreplaceable resources will remain available in perpetuity to descendants, historians. educators, and anyone else who is interested in San Diego past and present.
Under Connie's leadership, DESD has expanded far beyond genealogy.
Each year, descendants gather to celebrate their shared heritage through educational programs, historical storytelling, research workshops, and presentations exploring subjects ranging from DNA research to the future use of artificial intelligence in genealogy. The organization continues its longstanding partnership with Old Town San Diego State Historic Park, conducts public genealogy workshops, participates in Día de los Muertos programs at El Campo Santo Cemetery, and works with museums and preservation organizations throughout the region.
Connie understands that preservation is not only about protecting historic buildings. It is also about preserving the stories, traditions, and cultural heritage of the people and families who gave those places meaning.
Her own family, the familia Rascon, has lived in the San Diego region for more than ten generations, with roots extending to California's earliest Spanish settlement. Yet she has never viewed that history as something to keep private within her family. Instead, she has devoted countless volunteer hours to helping others discover their own connections to San Diego's past, believing that preserving family history strengthens communities and enriches our understanding of the region's diverse cultural heritage.
Through her leadership, DESD has become a model of how technology, volunteerism, scholarship, and community engagement can work together to preserve living history. By digitizing fragile records, encouraging historical research, supporting new authors, fostering intergenerational storytelling, and making genealogical resources freely available, Connie has ensured that San Diego's earliest stories will continue to be discovered, shared, and celebrated.
Her inspiring work affirms that historic preservation extends well beyond adobe walls and historic landmarks. It lives in family stories, cherished photographs, handwritten records, shared traditions, and the people, like Connie Rascon Gunther, who carry those histories forward.
|
