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Consider This from NPR

How One LA Neighborhood Reveals The Racist Architecture Of American Homeownership

Consider This from NPR

NPR

Daily News, Society & Culture, News Commentary, News

4.26.2K Ratings

🗓️ 10 May 2021

⏱️ ? minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Property ownership eludes Black Americans more than any other racial group. NPR's Ailsa Chang and Jonaki Mehta examine why. They tell the story of LA's Sugar Hill neighborhood, a once-vibrant black community that was demolished to make way for the Santa Monica Freeway.

Their story is part of NPR's special series We Hold These Truths.

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Transcript

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0:00.0

Hey, real quick before today's episode, we are always trying to make this podcast better and

0:04.6

more useful. And we're looking for a bit of feedback from you on how we can do that. So,

0:10.0

we have a quick anonymous survey set up at npr.org slash spring survey. We want to hear from everyone.

0:18.0

If you're a newer listener or even if you've been listening for a while and may have taken one of

0:22.3

these surveys before, it only takes a few minutes and it is a huge help to us. So again, that is

0:28.2

npr.org slash spring survey. Thanks.

0:35.5

Rod Nickerson grew up in a charming little pocket of central loss analysts called Sugar Hill.

0:41.3

The street was very wide. We had the old style lanterns. There were all kinds of like craftsman

0:50.0

houses, five, six, seven bedrooms. So we're talking about big houses. Ross brother Van says

0:57.2

they used to walk around selling lemonade. We got our wagon and we'd go up and down the street

1:02.2

selling limits. Sugar Hill was named after a wealthy black section of Harlem. In the 1940s,

1:09.6

the LA version was much the same. Home to doctors, oil barons, even Hollywood stars like

1:16.1

Hadi McDaniel from Gone with the Wind. If you don't care what folks says about this family, I

1:21.0

do. I have to tell you that you're all this lady but the way she's in front of folks like a bird.

1:27.2

On screen, she may have played a housekeeper or an enslaved person, but in Sugar Hill,

1:32.9

she hosted extravagant small rays in a sprawling mansion. People like Duke Ellington and Ethel

1:39.3

Waters which show up in perform. If you drive around LA today, there are a lot of neighborhoods

1:46.0

that still look like something out of the golden age of Hollywood. Sugar Hill is not one of them.

1:56.8

On a recent afternoon, I stood with Ross and Van on an overpass looking down at the

2:02.0

Santa Monica Freeway where their childhood house used to be. Where the freeway is now

2:08.5

right here, this overpass? Right there with that sign says quarter next three exit. Lift it up.

2:14.6

Our house is right about there. Consider this. That freeway built over Sugar Hill almost 60 years

...

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