P. M. , with in conversation, an author who will be presenting her book. Please feel free to subscribe to our newsletter. Please go online to do that. This evenings Virtual Event will end with a q a. youre interested in reporting, you can click on the purchase button to purchase at home, directly below the viewscreen, the link will redirect you to a site where you can continue your checkout process with our audiobooks and ebooks for those interested. With that let me introduce you to our interviewer and author. Janice is an awardwinning journalist and producer at npr. She began her career as an entertainment digital curator and over the past five years she has shifted to audio sharing narratives about communities of color. During her time as radio producer she had Language Access and culture and humanize her stories and her work has been featured in the new yorktimes , nprs post it, and more. Our author tonight is eric nusbaum. He is a former Sports Editor device and in addition his work on sports, history and culture has appeared in espn magazine, sports illustrated, outside, the daily beast, dustbin and best american sportswriting anthology. Eric was born and raised in la and he has been many hours of attending games at Dodger Stadium and sitting in traffic to reach those games as many of us have. They are here tonight to present erics book stealing home so id like to turn it over to them and when we get to the q and a section ill let you know so please enjoy it, janice, eric, please enjoy. Okay eric. A janice, hows it going . You are muted. [inaudible] its a really 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. Thats the book behind you. It should be busy. So im going to go over these quick intros about you but i just want what about your career and how it all came togetherfor you to write the 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 a housing official for the city of los angeles who was kind of dramatically blacklisted from 1962 for his secret membership in the communist party. And the reason he was 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 kinda began with this phrase dodgers stadium should not exist and i was the kid who loved baseball and that was shocking to me. And it always stuck with me, the power of that story and as i grew up and became a journalist and a writer, i never really let it go. And i think on some level ive wanted to kind of had my contribution to the story of dodgers stadium and the communities that preceded it that whole time. When you heard that phrase dodgers stadium should not exist , thats one thing to know but to realize that historybehind it. He gave us a very brief rundown and if you read the book, you will see that he was a very true believer in Public Housing. He was dodgers stadium should not exist because private stadiums should be part of something called allegiance apartheid which would have been this grand 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 land sold by the government to a private businessman and that, theres a lot of drama and ins and outs and how that happened but thats kind of what happened. We had conversations earlier and we talked about. [inaudible] i guess the decision for you not just to make it into anarticle but to make it into a book, what was the decision like for you . Part of it was that i dont think i could have fit everything into an article. I really wanted to tell the story as completely as i could. Within reason and within a single volume. I wanted to kind of unspool the fred as long as it could be and when yourewriting a Magazine Article , even along Magazine Article, a feature cover story type article, they really are, they have a certain length and a certain kind of focus, usually one or two subjects and if you go beyond that it can be confusing and it doesnt do the subjects justice and i knew that the subject of this book really needed kind of a, they needed a longer telling on the page but also more time and more research to be told right. And as a journalist, you only have so much time to get your next story and hit your deadline and i couldnt have done enough work as a reporter and researcher to turn this into a magazine story. And going from there and hearing how, in the book theres a lot of history whether its about baseball, mexico, the us in general and also you talk a lot about the historical tension. But you also write about people in different chapters. What are the people involved in the bigger story but specifically the book is focused in on two characters, anna and Frank Wilkinson, how that decision, not for you and kind of focus in on their stories. When i first started i didnt quite have that specific of a focus. I had a broader kind of idea, vision for the book probably. But on one level, as storyteller you have the best way to tell a story is through peoples lives, these few individuals and something about those two lives in particular really stuck out to me. She was just a really remarkable person who live a life that in many ways was pretty normal. She was a mother and grandmother. She worked hard and took care of her family. She was an immigrant but she also and the kind of rubbing up against these big historical forces that kind of lame her life around and theres something about her thats kind of cost or two resists those forces in a way that other people didnt and not because they couldnt or didnt want to, whatever it was. Theres Something Different about her personality that drew me in and when you hear about the story of Dodger Stadium you often see the images of 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 sheriffs deputies where that didnt happen to most of their neighbors. And it was frank. So frank was really the inspiration, the book in many ways, he was the person who put the story in my head. He was also just a fascinating character. He lived a life that felt like something out of a movie. He was bit by a coyote as the child. He traveled europe in the 30s. He went from being a conservative methodist you in Beverly Hills to beinga radical communist. He had multiple second acts in his career. He ended up kind of after the book is over he goes to jail, federal prison. A process that happened in the Unamerican Activities Committee and frank, he just was a handful and also he was somebody whos kind of ambition and career were similar, i dont know, thrown into chaos by forces beyond his control and i was curious about that. When you were in the book going through it and devouring it, i could see their almost parallel lives in a way. Theres still a part but also you have scenes in the book where you take one person in another year into that moment where there are intersections that happened. [inaudible] i knew early on that the book was going to center on this sort of Inflection Point where their lives meet and i was going to be in 1949, 50 when Housing Authority is evicting people from where or got a so to build legion park heights. I knew that was going to be the place where they met and then i knew that their lives were going to go in Different Directions after that. So a lot of the work of the book was getting their timelines down, being where they were and what they were doing and what the focus is on and then be balancing how to tell the stories in a way that you cared enough to get the both of them with the understanding they would eventually have this sort of tragic meeting, i guess. And i think its fascinating about the history. [inaudible] it was not very difficult in that it was impossible. Some members of her family wanted to speak about her and some people in the community wanted to speak about her and some didnt. I dont think i reached out every singleperson. I know i didnt, there was too many. Its a testament to her that she was a memorable person who kind of left his impression on those who knew her. Including her grandchildren, some of whom were gracious enough to speak with me. My background is more a reporter and it is a historian doing that stuff is probably more natural than going to an archetype for me but its still, im an outsider. And her family were really mistreated by reporters, in the 50s when this wasall happening. So i think if there was this traffic ithink it was pretty justified. And when we were speaking to family members and Even Community members , did you sense that that change came back as they were telling their stories or even specifically that era, that legacy of throughout their generation. I think so. I think even for people who have a more forgive and forget attitude there still tame, if you lose your home and your family loses their home, thats painful. For some people its really visible and later, theres still really hurt over it. There was not a lot of mens made by anybody. For what happened to these communities and the experience of being sort of mistreated by governments and by business and then having to get on with your life, without the community that you built, that you love is really a heavy experience and ive never experienced it myself so i cant see to the specificity of their pain but when you go through Something Like that, it doesnt just go away. And also, youve spoken to grandchildren, all the greatgrandchildren. Absolutely. [inaudible] there were greatgrandchildren that were in activism over it, a group called the blues that had rendered activism and i mean, they feel it. They inherited trauma i think is the phrase that i heard. Its not. These events whether its Dodger Stadium or a Public Housing project or anything else lingering effects on thecommunity. Theres something that happened in research for this book that you were like i had no idea. [inaudible] i was struck repeatedly by how, im a member of the media but i was struck by how transparently onesided and propagandists that l. A. Times was in the 50s and a lot of the newspapers. The Chandler Family is notorious, they were notorious for using the paper as a political cudgel, 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, that was something that left an impression for sure. Definitely, especially as a member of the media. Im in love with the l. A. Times and i love the paper. I think the l. A. Times now is amazing but reading about the l. A. Times in the 50s and reading those articles was mind blowing. [inaudible] it was an interesting experience. One thing about this book that i love was getting the chance to speak with people about their lives and getting people to tell their story. Its hard to overstate the responsibility that i feel when nobodys sitting down with me so my favorite memories from writing the book are probably sitting in somebodys tiny room or kitchen with them andjust hearing them tell their stories. A few of the people i interviewed had passed away. And since i started writing the book and heavy as well. A guy named amelia in the book, dining ali wrote in the book and its fascinating to get to see the new product but im also grateful that i got their time and i got the chance to tell a little of their story. Usually there are any additions that are historical in the book. I remember those illustrations, do you want to tell a little bit about that . Illustrations are by a guy named adam galassi, hes a friend of mine in their incredible. I should get the book downim going to put something over to show you. So i thought about doing photos in the book. But one thing about getting photos in the book and is that you have to get the rights to put them and so some of the photos were trickier than others. You also have to pay for it as an author outofpocket if im going to be paying for photos to use in the book, i really wanted to something that was going to be special and different sort of give an impression and create more emotional residence to the reader. So i asked adam if he would kind of draw the book for me a little bit. And he did and it cannot break. Hes really excited about that, seeing the picture and also my kids like the pictures in the book. It makes it feel accessible to them. I think for me, kind of really letting you know, talking in the beginning about how everything came together to get this book. Theresone thing that stuck out to me a lot. You read that Dodger Stadium was often full of pain for so many people and how that experience from end to end of the making of this book. How that startle started and how to change anything for you . I think itself. I think its become that struggle is sort of like a question of the book. And i kind of came to believe that to struggle with that question. I love the dodgers and not as much as like i care so much about what trades they make which i do but as an institution 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 of it. Its not even okay, its good to do that. Its good to say i love this but its not right. You can do that with your religion or your family or the city you live in. I love la to la has a lot of problems out and i dont think anybody who lives there and tell you otherwise so if youre a fan of the team and an institution like the dodgers its okay to say this is wrong and this wasnt right. With this book is much more about the city of la this county and kind of the region of us history and it 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 kind of extended from just being Dodger Stadium to being i guess los angeles. [inaudible] i feel like you write about los angeles in a very beautiful way but you bring to life something that happened with government and people that were affected by this. Thank you. Bringing things to the present, what could they do. [inaudible] what i would say, the dodgers are not like the guilty party in this book, this is not a book criticizing the dodgers. Its critical of the dodgers but really its about time that the failure ofgovernment more than anything else. And i think the dodgers and the city of la and county government, state government, federal government, there should be an acknowledgment of what happened and that it was wrong. That would be a very basic first step. But im not a member of those communities. Im not somebody who was evicted by Eminent Domain to fill a Public Housing project only to see my housebecome a baseball stadium. So its not for me to say what they should do but i think just saying something would be a really good start. I know that. [inaudible] i think 20 years ago in the year 2000 when the dodgers were owned by fox a had a small private ceremony in a church in one canyon and they extended a little olive branch to some humanity members but it was very much like a one time deal and now, the doctors dont really talk about this. If not really on the agenda for theteam. For whatever reason. And in the making of this book i said that you had, were you able to go toplaces that you wrote about that are no longer there . Its interesting because you go to legion park or the hills around Dodger Stadium and some of the roads are still there and the little streets are still there but theyre not really the same, the construction of Dodger Stadium changed the landscape geographically of what that area was going to look like so i went to a few times the desperado picnic who people who live in the community will go every july and have a picnic at allegiance park and you talk with some of the elders there and you say where was soandso and the truth is that they can give you generally where things were but the hills are not the same. Dodgers moved hundreds and thousands of tons of dirt to rebuild the stadium. There access roads and freeway entrances and its a different looking place and different feeling place and it was then. [inaudible] did you notice they stayedaway around the area in los angeles . A lot of people moved to Lincoln Heights or Laurel Heights for just nearby areas. I think some people even while, other parts of la, long beach. It wasnt like they were banished from the country they kind of got your back into the city where everybody else was. And it wasnt the same. I think everybody would say that we went back to whatever neighborhood it was and you didnt know our neighbors and we didnt have the same sense of community we had before and i think losing the sense of community that sense of pride was one of the big losses in addition to gus physical loss the home. The loss of community, i know is something that was a big loss. [inaudible] the community was mostly evicted and kind of like 52 and 53 Housing Project was scratched. So it was empty and it sat empty for a long time except for a few families so people like kids, High Schoolers would come back on friday night to hang out in their empty neighborhood. Could you imagine doing that western markets such a strange feeling thats what it was like. I dont know. [inaudible] i think they were entertained and enjoy the book first of all and that they come away with some slightly maybe the per understanding of this story and las history and a sense of how people and institutions around us interact and how you know, ki