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With that let me introduce you to our interviewer and author. Janice llamoca is an awardwinning journalist and producer and he are usa and she began her career as an entertainment digital curator and shifted her focus to audio sharing narratives about communities of color. During her time as radio producer she has taught history, Language Access and culture with compelling voices. Her work has been featured in the new york times, nprs hopes which, and more. Our author tonight is eric nusbaum, a former Sports Editor advice and in addition his work on sports, history and culture has appeared in espn magazine, sports illustrated, outside, the daily beast, dead spin and the best American Sports writing anthology. Eric was born and raised in la and has spentmany hours both attending games at dodgers stadium and sitting in traffic to reach those games as many of us have. He is here tonight to present erics book stealing home so id like to now turn it over to them. And of course, we get to the q and asession later so i will let you enjoy this. Thank you so much. Quite an entrance. Okay eric. Hey janice, hows it going . You are muted. Hold on. I can hear you. Technical difficulties on my side but i want to say congratulations on the book. Hows that going . Its a good feeling. I remember when the first box came to the door and opening it up and seeing the actual book in hardcover. It was surreal. It still kind of is. [inaudible] so i dont know what the intro is about, a quick intro about you but i wanted to give more about your career and life and how it all came together to have you write this book. This book was in my head before i even had a career. I was a High School Student and a man named Frank Wilkinson who was one of the central figures in the book spoke to my us history class at culver high and he told the story of his life and he was an official with los angeles who was kind of dramatically blacklisted in 1952 for his secret membership in the communist party. The reason that he was out of outed as a communist is he was trying to develop a Public Housing project in the land where dodgers stadium now sits. And his story kind of began with this phrase dodgers stadium does not exist and i was a kid who loved baseball and that was shocking to me. It always stopped me the power of that story and as i grew up and became a journalist and a writer, i never really let go. And i think on some level ive wanted to kind of add my contribution to the story of dodgers stadium and the communities that preceded it that whole time. When you heard that phrase , dodgers stadium does not exist , thats one thing to note but what did it actually feellike . When you got there. Let me give you a brief rundown and if you read the book i wont try to plug it but if you read the book youll see that he was a true believer in Public Housing and his belief was dodgers stadium should not exist because dodgers stadiumshould be the site of something called the legion park heights which would bethis grand Public Housing project. He didnt get into the community too much and as i learned more about them , i came to have a much deeper understanding of kind of the real tragedy in the story which is that families lost their homes and ultimately saw their land sold by the government to a private businessman and that theres a lot of drama andins and outs of how that happened but thats what happened. We had a conversation earlier and talked about diving into this topic and it seems its something where you brought it justice and theres a sense for you not to just make it into an article but made into a book, what was the decision to affect that for you . Part of it was i dont think i could have fit everything into an article. I really wanted to tell the story as completely as i could. Within the reasons, within reason and within a single volume. I wanted to kind of unspool fred as long as the work would be and when youre writing a magazine article, even along magazine article, a feature cover story article, really far of a certain length and a certain kind of focus, usually on one or two subjects and if you get beyond that it gets confusing and doesnt do the subject justice and the subject of this book really needed kind of a longer telling on the page but also more time and more researchto be told right. And as a journalist, you only have so much time to get to your next story and hit your deadline and i couldnt have sent in enough work as a reporter and researcher to turn this into a magazine story. Going from there and hearing how you made this reference, in the book theres a lot of history whether its about mexico, the us in general and you talk about other historical tension between mexico and the us. But you also talked about people in different chapters, different people involved in the story but you specifically focus on key objectives and Frank Wilkinson. How did that decision, for you . When i first started i didnt quite have that specific focus. I had a broader idea and vision for the book probably but on one level as a storyteller, you have the best way to tell a story is through peoples lives, these individuals and something about those two lives in particular really stuck out to me. She was just a really remarkable person who lived a life that in many ways was pretty normal. She was a mother and a grandmother, she worked hard and took care of her family. She was an immigrant also ends up kind of rubbing up against these big historical forces that kind of fling her life around and theres something about her that kind of resoluteness that caused her to resist those forces in a way thatother people didnt. And not cause a couldnt or didnt want to or whatever it was. There was Something Different about her personality that drew me in. When you hear about the story of dodgers stadium you see theimages family getting evicted from their house. And i was curious what was it about this family and their journey that led them to be violently evicted by sheriffs deputies where that didnt happen to most of their neighbors . And it was frank. So frank was really the inspirationfor this book in many ways. He was a person who took the story in my head. He wasalso just a fascinating character. He lived a life that felt like something out of a movie. He was bit by a coyote as a child and traveled to europe in the 30s. He went from being a conservative methodist in Beverly Hills to being a radical communist. He had multiple kind of second acts in his career. He ended up, after the book is over he goes to jail, federal prison to protest the american activities committee. Frank, he was a handful and also he was somebody whose ambition and career were similar, i dont know if they were thrown into kind of chaos by forces beyond his control and i was curious about that. David has gone through it anddenied it. They all have lives in a way, parallel lives. From arizona to california. Theres still a part. But also doing things that you gave away in the book when you take their lives. And learning what another person in another year. And theres intersection that happened. What do you see those lives come together during your research. I knew early on that the book was going to center on this sort of Inflection Point where their lives meet and that was going to be 1949 or 50 when the Housing Authority is evicting people which is where were going tolive. The legion park heights, i knew that was going to be of the place where they met and i knew that their lives were going to go in Different Directions after that. So a lot of the work of the book was first of all, getting their timeline down to where they were and what they were doing and what the focus was on and then being alan singh how to tell the stories in a way that you cared enough to visit both of them with the understanding that they would be eventually have this sort of tragic meeting again. I think its fascinating learning about the history and seeing lives. The chapter in these books, i also saw the stories in the thoughtful way that you do, digitally for centuries to reach out to family members and build that portrait of them. And the people and the situations. Is not so difficult that it was impossible some members of her family wanted to speak about her and some people want to speak about her and some of them didnt. I dont think i reached out to every single person. I know i didnt because theres too many. And its a testament to her that she was a memorable person who kind of left an impression on those who knew her. Just her grandchildren, some who were gracious enough to meet their needs. My background is more a reporter than it is a historian doing that stuff is probably more natural than going to an archive for me but its still, im an outsider. And ron and her family were really mistreated by reporters in the 50s when this was allhappening. So i think if there is this trust, i was justified. And when you were speaking to the family members. On the other communities, did you sense that that came back as telling their stories or even specifically in that era . I did not legacy of being self throughout their generation. I think so, even to people who have a more forgive and forget attitude there still paying. If you your home and your family loses its own, thats painful. So for some people its really visceral and decade later, theres still really hurt over it. There was not a lot of amends made by anybody for what happened in these communities. And the experience of being sort of mistreated by government and by business and then sort of having toget on with your life. Of without the community that you build that you love is really, its a heavy experience and ive never experienced itmyself. I cant speak to the specificity of their pain, but when you go through somethinglike that it doesnt just go away. Also, also greatgrandchildren, so for that, pulling generations andfeeling how impactful it was in your life. There is greatgrandchildren that have gone on, man wells for outdoing activism over it. As a group called end of the blues that rendered displacement and activism and i mean, they feel it to the inherited trauma i think is the phrase. Thats the one that i heard you its not, these type of events whether its Dodger Stadiumfor a Public Housing project or anything else , they have a lingering effects on communities. While he was doing the research for this book you thought you were writing, i have no idea the revelation to you. I was struck repeatedly by how common this is going to be bad but i felt like i criticize the media earlier and im a member of the media but i was struck by how sort of transparently onesided and kind of propagandist the l. A. Times was in the 50s and a lot of the newspapers. The families are notorious, they were notorious for using the paper as a kind of politicalcudgel. But like reading the actual articles and seeing how sensationalist and blatantly untrue a lot of the stuff that they published was just advanced the political agenda of the owners. It was something that left an impression forsure. Definitely, especially being a member of the media. I grow up with the l. A. Times and i love the paper. The l. A. Times right now is amazing but reading about the times in the 50s and reading those articles was mind blowing. There are, in the writing ofthis book. It was a new experience. Its one thing about this book that i love was getting this chance to speak with people about their lives and getting the trust of some of these to sell the stories, thats a great thing and its a sacred thing and its hard to overstate. Responsibility and i feel when somebody sits down with me so my favorite memories from running the book are probably sitting in somebodys dining room or kitchen with just hearing them tell their stories. A few of the people i interviewed have passed away area and i started writing the book and thats heavy as well. A guy named camilo regarding in the book, and its fascinating to get to see us, but im also grateful that i got the time and i got the chance to tella little bit of their story. One reason, its a historical book and usually there are images that are historical in the spaces in the book and you have suspicions, you want to talk about that . The illustrations are by a guy named adam and their incredible i feel like i should take the book down im going to hold something over it to show you. So i thought about doing photos in the book. But one thing about getting photos in a book, is that you have to get the rights to put them and so some of those are restricted and others you have to pay for those as an author outofpocket. And i thought if im going to be paying for photos using the book, i really wanted something that was going to be special and different and give an impression and maybe create moreemotional residence for the reader. So i asked adam if he would kind of draw the book for me a littlebit. And he did and it came out great. Hes really excited about that. I think seeing the pictures and my kids like the pictures in this book it makes it feel tangible tothem. I think for me, giving this preface to let you know, we talk at the beginning just kind of how everything came together. Theres something that stuck out to me a lot. Im going to talk aboutreal quick. You follow Dodger Stadium and of course all these things obtain from these people and how has that experience, how have experience from the end of the making of this book, how has it helped with that struggle. Ive changed anything for you. I think itself. Its become, that struggle is sort of the question of the book. And i kind of came to believe that the struggle with that kind of question that i love the dodgers and not as much as like i care so much about bayview but as an institution and a part of my life and i love the city of la and i wanted to explore that a little bit and i think if you love something its okay to be critical ofit. Its not even okay, its good to do that. Its good to say i love isnot right. You can do that with the city living, la has a lot of problems and i dont think anybody who lives there would tell you otherwise and if youre a fan of the dodgers its okay to say this iswrong and this wasnt right. And with this book its much more about the city of la and this county and the region and us history and is about a Baseball Team but i think that question of whether you can love a place and have problems with it at the same time is kind of extended from being dodgers stadium to being i guess los angeles. Thats something you have to do and i feel like you write about los angeles in a beautiful way but also how this happens to venues that were affected by this. Thank you. To bring everything to the present, what can the dodgers do inyour opinion as a journalist . What can they do to reconcile what happened . What i would say is the dodgers are not like the guilty party in this book. This is not a bookcriticizing the dodgers. Its critical of the dodgers, yes really its about a failure of government more than anything else. And i think the dodgers and the city of la and the county government, state government, federalgovernment, there should be an acknowledgment of what happened and that it waswrong. That would be a basic first step. But im not a member of those communities. Im not somebody who was evicted by an domain to build a Public Housing project only to see my house , baseball stadium. So its not for me to say what they should do but i think just saying something would be a good start. And i think that i know there are, there has been a small attempt at this but. 20 years ago in the year 2000 when the dodgers were owned by fox they had a small private ceremony at a church in 10 canyon and they extended a little olive branch to some community members, but it was very much a onetime deal and now, the dodgers dont talk about this. Its not really on the agenda for theteam. For whatever reason. And in the investigation of this book you had done, were you able to go to places or things that are no longer there . Its interesting because you go up to legion park where you go to the hills around Dodger Stadium and some of the roads are still there. Its a little streets are still there but theyre not the same. The construction of Dodger Stadium really changed the landscape geographically of what that area was going to look like so i went to a few times, theres all the desperados picnic people who live in the community will go every july and have a picnic at legion park. And talk to some of the elders there and you say where was the one so. The truth is that they can give you a generally where things were but the hills are not the same. The dodgers moved hundreds and thousands of tons of dirt to rebuild the stadium. Theres no access roads, freeway entrances and its just a very different looking place in a different feeling place that was then. There are veterans who would say, as you were then , if you note that they stayed around the area in los angeles or have a completely left . When you look at la a lot of people moved to Lincoln Heights or Loyal Heights or just nearby areas. I think some people even glottal canyon, just really other parts of la, long beach. It wasnt like we were spanish in the country but they kind of got ignored back into the city where everybody else was. And it wasnt the same. I think everybody would say that yes. They went back to whatever neighborhood it was and we didnt know our neighbors and we didnt have the same sense of unity we had before and i think u