This collection contains the personal papers of Joseph León Helguera, professor of History at Vanderbilt University for 28 years, specializing in Latin American History. A majority of the collection is unprocessed, but a series on the United States Peace Corps-Colombia project circa 1960-1962 is processed and consists of two boxes.

The series on the United States Peace Corps-Colombia project contains primary sources related to the training program for the project. This seven-week training program in the summer of 1961 for the first group of Peace Corps volunteers to be sent to Colombia took place at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. The materials include lecture notes, examinations, schedules, and lists of volunteers. In the correspondence files are many letters to Professor Helguera from the Peace Corps volunteers, including those who were selected for service in Colombia and those who were not, and his replies. Also part of this series are materials relating to the United States Army’s Caribbean school at Fort Gulick in what was then the Canal Zone in Panama. This school’s purpose was to conduct military courses for Latin American students. Dr. Helguera visited there, courtesy of staff member Major Russell Rumsey in 1962. The materials in this series will be of special interest to those working in topics relating to the first Peace Corps volunteers sent to Colombia.