Charless Darden News Today

Presidential hopeful makes comment after Senate Republican leader, 81, froze and was unable to speak this week. Plus, search for answers as Antarctic sea ice at historic lows

African Americans helped build the iconic beach town, historian Alison Rose Jefferson details as California weighs reparations

The hidden history of Santa Monica’s Black coastal enclaves.

In the 1940s, Nick Gabaldón, an athletic, handsome student at Santa Monica High School, would often escape class to Bay Street Beach, a half-mile stretch of shoreline roughly between Pico and Bicknell Streets, by the Casa Del Mar hotel. Derisively called "the Inkwell" by some white Angelenos, Bay Street Beach was a haven for people of color. Here, Gabaldón would bodysurf for hours, impressing two white lifeguards who loaned him a rescue board. With this heavy, 13-foot board, Gabaldón taught ...