Saturday, May 12, 2012
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Honors Final Paper
Los
Angeles in the 1960’s
For
my 2012 Senior project for English class, the goal was to create a ‘Literary
Atlas’, that detailed a specific time and place. What I chose to research was
Los Angeles in the 1960’s – I felt that it would be a momentous and interesting
decade, and I was right. To further my knowledge of this subject, I read four
books; “Listen to the Lambs” by Johnny Otis, “Helter Skelter” by Vincent
Bugliosi, “Blue Jean Baby : One Girl’s Trip Through the 1960’s LA Music Scene”
by Sally Parmer, and “The Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy : The Conspiracy
and Coverup” by William Turner and Jonn Christian. Some of the books focused on
crime and facts, while others centered on adventures and anecdotes. All of
these novels, however, were written in or about the 1960’s, and – read together
– they gave a decent impression of what living in the Los Angeles during the
1960’s was like. Based on my research up until this point, it seems to me that,
while 1960’s brought revolution and innovation to Los Angeles, it also brought fear.
The
fear wasn’t obvious, though – at least not at first. In fact, the first thing
you’d probably notice about the sixties was the fashion. Styles such as mod
(coming from Britain, along with The Beatles) and hippie (including psychedelic
colors and crazy patterns) became increasingly popular, and items such as the
bikinis, stilettos, and miniskirts became trendy. The trendsetters of the time
era included Jacqueline Kennedy, who was largely responsible for the
popularization of the pillbox hat, and Audrey Hepburn, who made skinny jeans
popular. Of course, you’d also see quintessential sixties gear, such as
tie-dye, bellbottom jeans, and go-go boots. During this time period, men’s hats
went out of fashion, and long hair (and afros) became the popular and common
hairstyles. For women, beehives and pageboy cuts were among the popular ‘dos. Parmer’s
book, “Blue Jean Baby”, gives a good look at the fashions of the 1960’s in
saying, “I now drew a heavy black line over green eyes, wore Erace ccover-up
like lipstick, and ironed my hair stick-straight on the ironing board, often
laying the iron down on my hand. (It was painfully obvious who ironed their
hair; we sported blisters on the tops of our left-hand fingers.) … I analyzed the completed image in the hallway
mirror and compared it to a Vogue magazine photo of Jane Asher, Paul McCartney’s
girlfriend.”
The
1960’s were a revolutionary time, regardless of where you lived. The energy of this time period could be felt
everywhere. Movements were endless; everyone found something to fight for. Feminism,
anti-war (because the Vietnam War went right through the sixties), gay rights,
and Hispanic rights were all, among many others, spoken for during this time.
Not to mention African American rights – Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous ‘I
Have a Dream’ speech took place in 1963. Hippies were born, and became an
example of the social, sexual, and musical revolutions happening across America
– Woodstock took place in 1969, and drugs became much more common. Groupies were
a big part of the music culture, in pursuit of up-and-coming bands at the time,
such as The Rolling Stones and The Beatles.
While
all of this excitement and advancement was felt in Los Angeles, there was
something else mixed in with it – that aforementioned ‘fear’. Every single one
of the books that I read, in some way or another, dealt with fear. Fear of not
fitting in, fear of being rejected, fear of discrimination, or just fear for
your life. This abundance of fear in Los Angeles during the 1960s made for more
dramatic revolutions, and came about from more vicious happenings. It appears
that, despite the new fashions and music and advances, the fear was still
there. If you were living in Los Angeles in the sixties, I believe that fear
would be a part of your life.
Chronologically
speaking, it seems that one of the first apparent fears being realized during
the 1960’s in Los Angeles was the fear of revolt, and revolt they did. In the
summer of 1965, the city of Watts broke out in riots, resulting in 34
deaths, and over 3,000 arrests. Johnny Otis’ novel, “Listen to the Lambs”,
spoke on this subject, in saying, “Like
any other spot on earth whose inhabitants are perpetually locked in mortal
combat with poverty and affliction, Watts is shot through with visual evidence
of its plight. And even when the blemishes and the squalor cannot be readily
picked up by the eye, they can be felt. You can almost cut with a knife the
rage that this imposed ugliness generates. In the more densely populated and
consequently shabbier neighborhoods, this grim and unlovely emotion pervades
the atmosphere like a noxious gas. But, on the other hand, in Watts, as in any
other spot on the earth where the human spirit refuses to yield, there is a
deep and startling beauty.” I really enjoyed this quote, from the second I read
it in the book. I felt it not only gave an explanation to why the riots
started, and analyzed them, but was put forth in a really beautifully worded
way. The Watts riots fit in perfectly with the feel of the sixties – fight against
the system, and change what you don’t like. However, they were the worst that
Los Angeles city had seen (up until the mid-90’s), and what mainly resulted was
a lingering fear.
More
fear was inflicted upon the area with the murder of Robert F. Kennedy in 1968,
at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. Kennedy was in town campaigning, when
he was assassinated. Paul Schrade, a friend of Robert Kennedy’s, who was also
shot during the incident, stated, "He knew it was
life or death politically that night, and it became a death." While this
may have been the only one in Los Angeles during the 1960s, there were
certainly other assassinations around the country, and around the world. Malcolm
X was killed in 1965, and Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968, not to mention the
assassination of Robert Kennedy’s older brother, President John F. Kennedy, in
1963. While I’m sure all of these murders shook up the country, it’s easy to
imagine that Robert Kennedy’s murder especially put fear into Los Angeles. Not
only was the assassination in their town, but it was also an assassination
filled with conspiracy theories and plots. It’s much easier to be afraid of
something when you’re not exactly sure what happened.
Of
the events I read about and researched over the course of this project, the one
that probably instilled the most fear into Los Angeles was the Manson Murders. In
Vincent Bugliosi’s novel, “Helter Skelter”, he directly talks about the fear
resulting from these murders – “Sometimes fear can be measured. Among the
barometers: In two days one Beverly Hills sporting goods store sold 200
firearms; prior to the murders, they averaged three of four a day. Some of the
private security forces doubled, then tripled, their personnel. Guard dogs,
once priced at $200, now sold for $1,500; those who supplied them soon ran out.
Locksmiths quoted two-week delays on orders. Accidental shootings, suspicious
persons reports – all suddenly increased.” I thought that this quote was an
especially powerful one; both interesting and filled with information. Murders
weren’t commonplace in the sixties – no more common than they are now – and that’s
why the Manson murders continue to stand out today as horrific crimes. At the
time of them, at the end of the 1960’s, in 1969, I can only imagine the ripple
it sent through the Los Angeles community, and I feel that this quote from “Helter
Skelter” illustrated it very well.
There’s
no doubt that the 1960’s were a unique and revolutionary time – it’s easy to
look back, today, and see the fashions and popular culture that were abundant
then. In the center that is Los Angeles, however, an unseen component was added
to the mix. Through the texts I’ve read, and the research I’ve done, the
invisible element was fear – if you lived in Los Angeles in the 1960’s, you
would have experienced, in some way or another, fear.
Works
Cited
Almendrala, Anna. "Robert F.
Kennedy's Assassination Remembered By Paul Schrade." The Huffington
Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 04 June 2011. Web. 10 May 2012. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/04/robert-f-kennedys-assassination-anniversary_n_871407.html>.
Bugliosi, Vincent, and Curt Gentry. Helter
Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders. New York: Norton, 1974.
Print.
Otis, Johnny. Listen to the Lambs.
New York: W. W. Norton, 1968. Print.
Parmer, Sally. Blue Jean Baby:
One Girl's Trip through the 1960s L.A. Music Scene. Charleston, SC: urge,
2009. Print.
Turner, William W., and Jonn G.
Christian. The Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy: A Searching Look at the
Conspiracy and Cover-up, 1968-1978. New York: Random House, 1978. Print.
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