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Old 06-20-2010, 12:13 AM
 
67 posts, read 113,078 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by subzero97 View Post
Weird? Im just curious to your age. Because if youre over 30 you should know what the fear was. Youve seen the videos in high school of the civil rights movement, you should be aware of the hard time in the 50s and 60s and racism towards minorites.

Blacks were not accepted into white communities because of racism. They had laws where you couldnt sell your home to Blacks Mexicans or Jews, especially in the more afluent areas. They picked against it and wanted no part of minorities in their communities.

Blacks started moving into Compton in the mid 50s, Emmitt Till was killed by Whites in the 50s for whistling at a White woman. Also Rosa Parks was forced tog ive up her seat in the 1950s. I say that to let you know, that racism was still alive and kicking in the 50s.

When Blacks started being buses to Pasadena, alot of White students dropped out. They wrote an article, "Where did all the White Students go?"

The 1st few Blacks who moved into Compton were good citizens, and some of the Whites embraced them, others didnt. but the police brutality in areas like Watts and Los Angeles started an uproar that led to Blacks getting violent. Remember these were Blacks from the South who expereinced racism 1st hand.

These actions only help create anger from Blacks towards Whites. I think youve seen the videos in class rooms, guys walking away being hit with battons and sprayed with water holes.

But you shouldnt find it weird, its in all the history books.

Things are better now, but they werent back then.
Well I'm 17 going to be 18 next year lol.
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Old 07-04-2010, 02:38 PM
 
Location: Compton Ca.
7 posts, read 40,069 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by steveb112 View Post
Well I'm 17 going to be 18 next year lol.
I see then youre lucky to not have grown up in such time. I was lucky to not have grown up in the times my parents experienced.
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Old 07-04-2010, 02:45 PM
 
Location: Compton Ca.
7 posts, read 40,069 times
Reputation: 13
Segregation was a Law my friend. no getting around it. You were arrested for breaking such laws.

Its the reason every law for buying a house or getting a loan speaks about not judging based on race color or gender.

This is included in almost every document known to man in the US. Because they would not sell the Blacks for those reasons.

It doesnt ease the blow by saying it wasnt a Law, it happened and was enforced so there is no denying it. You were arrested if broken, it was a law.

The Home Discolosuer Act was added in the 70s because of the discrimination shown in the housing market.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ferretkona View Post
Just for everyone's info the following was not in Compton:
Rosa Parks was in Montgomery, Alabama.
Emmett Till was in Money, Mississippi
3205 Los Feliz was 20 miles from Compton.
I see that subzero97 is showing the general mood in the 50's.
No real law about not selling homes to Blacks Mexicans or Jews, it just didn't happen. That "good ole boy" mentality.

I used to frequent a few stores in Compton in the 70's. Quite a few white friends lived there and the area was not bad at all (not saying they made a difference). A few of my teachers lived in Compton and we would visit them as well. I was in Compton the day I heard Marvin Gaye was killed, listened to a lot of Motown in the 70's.

I seen great changes in Compton in 1982 or so, friends had to hire armed guards for their stores. It looks as thou the town is getting better now, rising home values allowing people to care and have pride in their homes. A lot of the undesirables are moving to Riverside county.
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Old 07-04-2010, 02:51 PM
 
Location: Compton Ca.
7 posts, read 40,069 times
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Background

African Americans and other minorities found it nearly impossible to secure mortgages for property located in redlined zones.[2] The systematic denial of loans was a major contributor to the urban decay that plagued many American cities during this time period. Minorities who tried to buy homes continued to face direct discrimination from lending institutions into the late 1990s. The disparities are not simply due to differences in creditworthiness.[3] With other factors held constant, rejection rates for Black and Hispanic applicants was about 1.6 times that for Whites in 1995.[4] Fairness in lending was improved by the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, passed in 1975. It requires banks to disclose their lending practices in the communities they serve. In the 1970s, the private sector fight against mortgage discrimination began to be led by community development banks, such as ShoreBank in Chicago.[5]
[edit] Contemporary mortgage discrimination

Several class action mortgage discrimination claims have been filed against lenders across the country, alleging that lenders disproportionately targeted minorities for high cost, high risk subprime lending, which has resulted in disproportionately higher rates of default and foreclosure for minority African American and Hispanic borrowers.[6]
FHA loans, a Federal Mortgage program, went to the white majority and reached few minorities. In a study done in Syracuse, between 1996 and 2000, of the 2,169 FHA loans issued only 29 or 1.3 percent went to predominantly minority neighborhoods compared with 1,694 or 78.1 percent that went to white neighborhoods.[7][8] Mortgage discrimination played a significant part in the real estate bubble that popped during the later part of 2008, it was found that minorities were disproportionately steered by lenders into subprime loans.[9]
In 1993 President Bill Clinton made changing the Community Reinvestment Act to make mortgages more obtainable for lower and lower-middle class families. The changes ushered in during the Clinton Presidency encouraged banks to make mortgage loans to people who otherwise would not have qualified for them. In 1998 the Federal Bank of Boston issued a report entitled “Closing the Gap: A Guide to Equal Opportunity Lending." The 30 page document was intended to serve as a guide to loan officers to help curb discriminatory lending [10] "Closing the Gap," instructs banks to hire based upon diversity needs, sweeten the compensation structure for working with lower income applicants, encourages shifting high risk, low income applications to the sub prime market, by saying "It should be noted that the secondary market [Subprime Market] is willing to consider ratios above the standard 28/36," and "Lack of credit history should not be seen as a negative factor."
While, "Closing the Gap" was not an industry-wide mandate, it illustrates the efforts banks took to meet public pressure to overcome perceived mortgage discrimination. Under the Clinton administration community organizers pressured banks to increase their loans to minorities even though many minority applicants could not qualify for traditional 30-year fix mortgages. Karen Wegmann, the head of Wells Fargo's community development group in 1993 told the New York Times, "The atmosphere now is one of saying yes." [11] The same New York Times article echoed "Closing the Gap," writing, "The banks have also modified some standards for credit approval. Many low-income people do not have credit-bureau files because they do not have credit cards. So lenders are accepting records of continuously paid utility bills as evidence of creditworthiness. Similarly, they will accept steady income from several employers instead of the length of time at one job."
  • /The following paragraph is highly biased and the NY Post, a Rupert Murdoch tabloid, is not a credible source for anything/*
Because of looser loan restrictions many people who could not find themselves qualifying for a mortgage before now could own a home. Under pressure from activist organizations such as ACORN, several of whom were allies of President Barack Obama [12], then President Bill Clinton, and influential Democrats in Congress like Barny Frank,[13], banks began loans to people who should not have qualified for loans. Because banks were pressured to loan to minorities and low income applicants, and because the applicants were low-income who had rented homes from generations the banks could reap profits by selling products loaded with fees because the applicants did not either know, or care to read the fine print that would eventually raise their mortgage payments [14]
Minorities willingly entered sub-prime mortgages in far great numbers than whites and represented a disproportional percentage of foreclosures,[15] [16] The resulting wave of minority foreclosures tipped a fading housing market into a dive and contributed to the economic fall of 2008/2009.
Recently, the NAACP has submitted a lawsuit concerning alleged injustices in the lending industry.[17] An analysis, by N.Y.U.’s Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy, illustrated stark racial differences between the New York City neighborhoods where subprime mortgages were common and those where they were rare. The 10 neighborhoods with the highest rates of mortgages from subprime lenders had black and Hispanic majorities, and the 10 areas with the lowest rates were mainly non-Hispanic white. The analysis showed that even when median income levels were comparable, home buyers in minority neighborhoods were more likely to get a loan from a subprime lender.[1] Discrimination motivated by prejudice is contingent on the racial composition of neighborhoods where the loan is sought and the race of the applicant. Lending institutions have been shown to treat black and Latino mortgage applicants differently when buying homes in white neighborhoods than when buying homes in black neighborhoods.[18] An example of this occurred in the 60's and 70's on the near northside of Chicago. Thousands of blacks, Latinos, and poor people were systematically dislocated and prevented from acquiring loans by realtors and lending institutions with the blessings of the city's urban renewal program.[citation needed]
[edit] Equal Credit Opportunity Act

Under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (“ECOA”), a creditor may not discriminate against an applicant based on the applicant’s race, color, or national origin “with respect to any aspect of a credit transaction,” 15 U.S.C.A. § 1691.
[edit] Fair Housing Act

Under the Fair Housing Act (“FHA”) (Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968), it is “unlawful for any person or other entity whose business includes engaging in residential real estate-related transactions to discriminate against any person in making available such a transaction, or in the terms or conditions of such a transaction, because of race, color, ... or national origin.” 42 U.S.C.A. § 3605. Section 3605, although not specifically naming foreclosures, discrimination in “the manner in which a lending institution forecloses a dlinquent or defaulted mortgage note” falls under the realm of the “terms or conditions of such loan.” Harper v. Union Savings Association, 429 F.Supp. 1254, 1258-59 (N.D. Ohio 1977).
[edit] FDIC

Consistent with many jurisdictions throughout the country, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”), based in part on a study conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, issued a “Policy Statement On Discrimination In Lending” on April 29, 2004, emphasizing the breadth of prohibitions on discriminatory conduct in lending under the ECOA and the FHA. The FDIC Policy Statement explained that “courts have recognized three methods of proof of lending discrimination under the ECOA and the FH Act,” including: “Overt evidence of discrimination,” when a lender blatantly discriminates on a prohibited basis; evidence of “disparate treatment,” when a lender treats applicants differently based on one of the prohibited factors; and evidence of "disparate impact," when a lender applies a practice uniformly to all applicants but the practice has a discriminatory effect on a prohibited basis and is not justified by business necessity.
FDIC Policy Statement, p. 5399 (April 29, 2004).
[edit] Civil Rights Act of 1966

In addition to ECOA and FHA, the Civil Rights Act of 1966, as amended, provides that “[a]ll citizens of the United States shall have the same right, in every State and Territory, as is enjoyed by white citizens thereof to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property.” 42 U.S.C.A. § 1982.
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Old 07-05-2010, 07:03 PM
 
1 posts, read 8,428 times
Reputation: 20
Well I was born in Marther Luther king jr Hospital in 1980, and grew up in Compton CA, and I remember growing up hearing the sirens alot especially around our neighborhood I wish I could remember names of places, I also lived in lynwood a great portion, south gate, watts, crenshaw, huntington park this is where I hang out the most with friends, and sometimes we would go hangout at Downy mall's just to get away from all the crap that was going on in our hood's, we also lived in long beach, we moved around alot because of all the violence going on at that time, I remember walking out of my aunt's apartment with a friend and as we were coming down the stairs this car stop's 2 latino guys get out the car jump the fence of this apt's across the street and start shooting at this car, the car pulls out and the shaved heads latinos ran after them shooting no regards of kid's and people mind you this happend around noon when preschool and kindergarden gets out mid day, for me it was normal to see this happening, then I also remember the big riot that happend in the 80's middle 80's I believe. They burnt grocerie store's to the ground people running with stolen merchandise beating each other up, it was one of the most unforgetable day's of my life including the big earthquake during that same time it was unbelieveable, I also got to experience watching Snoop Dog, Dr.Dre, Ice Cube and other's always raping, making beats and chillin outside there home's I must of been about 7-8 year's old and they must of been in their late teen's early 20's, it was fun, I am Latina and I am now 28 yr's old and reside in Arizona where it gets up to 130 degrees
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Old 07-10-2011, 02:08 PM
 
2 posts, read 15,948 times
Reputation: 16
Default Compton in the 50s and 60s

I grew up in Compton in the 50s and 60s. It was a comfortable town then, full of families both black and white who had worked in WWII war industries and been in the service. The historical town of Compton, established around 1890 had plenty of building area for the new Californians. It was segretated, many black families lived in west Compton and Willowbrook, many white and Hispanic families lived in east Compton and the area now known as Rancho Dominguez. Compton High School was pretty much on the border between the two halves of Compton which stayed a mixed area for years. All Compton citizens shopped in downtown Compton and went there for events like the annual Christmas Parade. Our City Hall and Health Department were in the middle, on Santa Fe Avenue. Right down the middle of Compton ran the Pacific Electric Company trolley, aka “The Red Car” from Newport & Seal Beach to Los Angeles.

I lived in the area now known as Rancho Dominguez. I went to Kelly elementary, Whaley Jr High, and Dominguez High School. Our neighborhood was a mixed Hispanic and white area. We played together and attended school together. My mother, who had grown up in Paramount and Long Beach had the same experiences, by the way. In 1964, Centennial High School lost one of their best football players, an African American, to Dominguez because his father had found a nice house to buy in Dominguez’s district. I was surprised to hear talk of people planning to sell their house. That was the first I’d ever heard of people being opposed to anyone moving based on ethnicity. What a shame for such a great town. As mentioned earlier on this board, there began a real-estate panic. This was also because of the rise of L.A. gang activity which was beginning to spill over to Compton (Google “Piru Street Gang”) I tend to think it was this early gang activity which upset the integration of Compton, rather than ethnicity alone. The same thing was happening next door in North Long Beach. This lasted until the late 1990s.

Now my old neighborhood is looking good again. The graffiti and trash is gone from the alleys, houses have been painted, new fences built and new gardens planted. Rising property values have helped, I’m sure. I hope that the people of Compton will realize what a great little area they have. It’s free of the coastal “marine layer” fog, close to transportation and freeways, and full of parks and schools. It’s made up of small neighborhoods which foster getting to know one another.

I loved growing up there and am glad others may have the same opportunity.
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Old 09-05-2011, 05:17 PM
 
2 posts, read 16,071 times
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I was born in 1946 in a Women's and Children's Hospital in Compton, on Long Beach Blvd near Lynwood. I lived in Compton until my junior year, but continued to attend Dominguez High School until graduation. The town was always racially devided by the Alameda tracks. There was always much hushed talk about when "they will move over" on our East side of town. I grew up hearing racist talk, but never agreed with it. I was on the student council in 1964 and remember when our Faculty Adviser called a special meeting to discuss the enrollment of the first black student at Dominguez. The fear was that this could become another Little Rock. The quiet sophomore boy oriented to the school just fine without incident, and we were all relieved. Nothing needed to be done, and he seemed to be very accepted. My cousin lived on the West side by the Compton Airport. The talk at our dinner table was that a house on her block sold to "coloreds". The next time we visited, every house on the block haf a for sale sign, this was known as "white flight". Compton High was integrated, Dominguez was not. We played our football games at Ramsaur Stadium, Compton's campus. It was uncomfortable and many were fearful. We also lost every game. For many dicussions on the old Compton as told by the "kids" were grew up there, visit my group on Facebook, "50'-60's Compton, California", where you will also find hundreds of photos.
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Old 09-05-2011, 05:27 PM
 
2 posts, read 16,071 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by GrewupinCompton View Post
I grew up in Compton in the 50s and 60s. It was a comfortable town then, full of families both black and white who had worked in WWII war industries and been in the service. The historical town of Compton, established around 1890 had plenty of building area for the new Californians. It was segretated, many black families lived in west Compton and Willowbrook, many white and Hispanic families lived in east Compton and the area now known as Rancho Dominguez. Compton High School was pretty much on the border between the two halves of Compton which stayed a mixed area for years. All Compton citizens shopped in downtown Compton and went there for events like the annual Christmas Parade. Our City Hall and Health Department were in the middle, on Santa Fe Avenue. Right down the middle of Compton ran the Pacific Electric Company trolley, aka “The Red Car” from Newport & Seal Beach to Los Angeles.

I lived in the area now known as Rancho Dominguez. I went to Kelly elementary, Whaley Jr High, and Dominguez High School. Our neighborhood was a mixed Hispanic and white area. We played together and attended school together. My mother, who had grown up in Paramount and Long Beach had the same experiences, by the way. In 1964, Centennial High School lost one of their best football players, an African American, to Dominguez because his father had found a nice house to buy in Dominguez’s district. I was surprised to hear talk of people planning to sell their house. That was the first I’d ever heard of people being opposed to anyone moving based on ethnicity. What a shame for such a great town. As mentioned earlier on this board, there began a real-estate panic. This was also because of the rise of L.A. gang activity which was beginning to spill over to Compton (Google “Piru Street Gang”) I tend to think it was this early gang activity which upset the integration of Compton, rather than ethnicity alone. The same thing was happening next door in North Long Beach. This lasted until the late 1990s.

Now my old neighborhood is looking good again. The graffiti and trash is gone from the alleys, houses have been painted, new fences built and new gardens planted. Rising property values have helped, I’m sure. I hope that the people of Compton will realize what a great little area they have. It’s free of the coastal “marine layer” fog, close to transportation and freeways, and full of parks and schools. It’s made up of small neighborhoods which foster getting to know one another.

I loved growing up there and am glad others may have the same opportunity.
Hey GrewUpinCompton, I also went to Kelly and Dominguez. Maybe we knew each other? I was in those Compton Parades with the Kurtze Cuties, from the dance studio next to the Tower Theatre. I am surprised that you were sheltered from the extreme bigotry I heard. I thought it was in every home. My own parents were from the Mid-West and did not tolerate anyone who was not white. I consequently dated Mexican boys, rebel that I was. The Wilson Plunge was where you also saw it, some kids or parents were bothered by integrated swimming. White flight was the downturn of Compton, not integration. People sold out cheap just to get out. Our town is essentially gone, the town we knew, with Downtown wiped out, Jerry's Barbeque, our beloved hangout, The Tower Theatre, Bishops Drug Store, I could go on. Only the school's remain. Dominguez is a mess, and it does make a lot of alumni angry. We buried class memories and they were dug up by who knows, but not us. Our class donations of tiled school markers are gone. The tile D over the gym is a badly painted Don. But towns do get old and run down for various reasons. Come join our FB group, 50's 60's Compton, CA!
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Old 09-13-2011, 12:09 PM
 
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Hello grimmgirl3,

While I do not deny that the things you describe did exist, I suspect they did not affect everyone in the same way. My dad came to California after the family farm was lost during the dust bowl/depression My mom was a third generation Californian who attended Compton High School at one time. Dad worked with people of all colors and his midwestern views became modified as he got to know his co-workers. Hard times during the epression influenced him to raise his children as though we all are in this world together.

My parents resisted the "white flight" syndrome until things grew so gang-influenced that a family member was stabbed at Dominguez during school hours. They were sad to leave the beautiful home that they had built and spoke fondly of it and their neighbors for years afterward. Dad continued to work with others from Compton, many of them black, who were also relocating because of the gang activity and family safety issues.

I still contend it was the growth of gangster culture that took Compton into its dangerous years. (I worked in Wilmington and saw the Latino gangs growing also.) We just might have transitioned through more complete racial integraion otherwise. Now we'll never know, but isn't hindsight always better than foresight?
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Old 03-05-2012, 06:19 PM
 
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Cool Neighbor from Compton

Hi neighbor,
I was born in 1947 in Long Beach and lived in Compton from 1950 until 1956 when my Dad was transferred to Texas. I lived on Spring St. just south of Rosecrans, so roughly 1 block away from you. I did most of the same things you did, including walking to Mayo School (K-4) and also to "downtown" Compton. At the age of 8 and 9, can you imagine a kid doing that today? One of my classmates was Annette Mayo who was a granddaughter (or maybe great-) of the namesake of the school
.
My family wasn't going to church when I was little, but something drew me to that same Brethren Church you attended. Maybe we attended vacation Bible School together.

We also had only one Hispanic family on our block, but I remember the Plunge at Wilson Park being fully integrated. My family was from the midweest and very tolerant, so I heard none of the rants you heard. But imagine my shock when I moved to Dallas in 1956 and saw "Colored Only" and "Whites Only" on both water fountains and restrooms at the Sears Store near us. And I couldn't sit at the back of the bus that took me to downtown Dallas because it was reserved for the "coloreds." I may have been young, but I knew that wasn't right.

Thank you for reminding me about Wilson Park and the great Mayo carnivals -- and Monty Montana. Yes I remember that too. I cried to leave Compton and California also. Twenty six years later I moved back to California and live north of San Francisco.



Quote:
Originally Posted by pkatsuda View Post
I was born in LA and lived in Compton from 1947 to 1956 when my dad took a job in Ventura County and moved the family north.

I went to Mayo School from K thru 2nd grade and my memories of Compton & going to school there are wonderful. We lived on North Rose Avenue near Rosecrans and went the the Brethern Church. I remember roller skating at an open-air skating rink across the vacant lot from our neighborhood. There was a an old building in that lot that was refered to as "The Rock Crusher" which we were never allowed to go near. As very small kids we were allowed to play and roam the neighborhood and even cross busy streets when out bike riding. We rode our bikes to the "Plunge" at Wilson Park where we learned to swim. As 1st & 2nd graders we were also allowed to ride our bikes along the RR tracks to downtown Compton. We bought 5 cent cones at Tastee Freeze on Rosecrans and shopped at the dime store next door. From the beginning of Kindergarten we walked the 8-10 blocks to and from school each day.

The homes in our neighborhood were mostly craftsman style and several had really neat guest houses in the back. Our neighbors were very white working class. I believe that we had only one hispanic family on our street (The Hernandez Family) and I don't even remember there being any African American kids in the whole school. Keep in mind that I was very young at the time and my world was not very big.

I can remember the "Milk Man" delivering products to the little cubby by our kitchen door and if we asked politely he would sometimes give us kids crushed ice out of the back of his truck. Of course there was the Good Humor ice-cream man and Jimmy who delivered bread and wonderful donuts for the Helms Bakery.

Though at this very young age I had no idea what racial tension was, I can remember very racist remarks that my dad made about non-whites. Considering he was from a small town in Colo., rarely got into the car without a beer & whiskey, smoked like a chimney and threw burning butts out the car window along with all kinds of trash I guess it was not all that unusual.

I remember really neat school carnivals at Mayo and Monty Montana brought several black and white Pinto horses to the school and did a show on the playground......those were the days....... I remember being very sad when we moved away...........
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