Watts Riot Research Paper

Watts Riots During the summer of 1965 in Watts, CA (a section of south central Los Angeles) a riot broke out and devastated the community of Watts destroying homes, business and millions of dollars’ worth of property. Some call it a riot, some call it a tragedy, and others may even call it a rebellion or a revolt. One thing for sure it was a statement made by the people of Watts. It roots stemmed poverty, low employment, frustrated citizens and terrible living conditions. These issues had plagued the city years before the riots. The citizens of Watts felt that a riot was necessary to bring attention to their situation. According to CBS news the riot could have been prevented if law enforcers moved in quicker and sealed off the area where the

Many of the new residents who populated Watts were drawn by the lure of jobs in the war industry. When blacks first started coming to Los Angeles it was struggle to find housing due to it being segregated. Some settled in the Little Tokyo section of Los Angeles but a majority moved in traditionally segregated areas of Central Avenue (which later became home to many black owned businesses and where a lot of destruction from the riot took place) and the City of Watts. Other blacks settled in housing projects that were built by the federal government. One of the first housing projects that was built around the time blacks started to settle in Los Angeles was the Nickerson Gardens and it is the largest public housing development west of the Mississippi River. By 1946 black represented two-thirds of the population in Watts. This is important because prior to blacks coming to Los Angeles for the jobs the war brought the African American population was only a third of what it was in the year 1940. So soon the city of Watts will have to accommodate its growing population with jobs and housing. This lead to the building of more housing projects including the Jordan Downs, the Hacienda Village, and the Imperial Courts. These housing projects were originally semi-permanent units for war workers and later became permanent

At the time of the riots Marshall was in between the ages of twelve and thirteen. During the interview with Marshall he mentioned that he went to school where he was one of the few black students. So as the riots were going on while he was in school the white students would come up to him and ask him what was going on in his city. Jokingly he mentioned that he was a spokesperson for city of Watts. He also mentioned at the time he himself did not quite understand what was going on. Marshall also had direct experiences with the riots. For the duration there was a curfew for everyone. Since his parents couldn’t always keep of all nine children in the household because his parents worked at different times of the day. So when one parent was working at night one would be at home getting rest as a result of this Jeri would sneak out of the house at night. One night He snuck out during the riots either after the riots ended or on the last day he could not recall exactly but he does remember encountering a halftrack that pointed the gun and him and told him to go home. I ended the interview with two questions the first question was did you feel that there was another way that the riots could have been handled? He replied “When you mix low employment, poverty, and frustrated citizens your end result will be riot, if there were any jobs people would have money, and if people