Crenshaw, Los Angeles

Map of the Crenshaw District in western South Los Angeles.
Mural of African-American Progress, Crenshaw Boulevard

Coordinates: 34°01′05″N 118°20′26″W / 34.01810°N 118.34064°W / 34.01810; -118.34064

Crenshaw, also known as The Crenshaw District, is a neighborhood[1] and district in the southwestern area of the city of Los Angeles, California. It derives its name from Crenshaw Boulevard, one of the city's principal thoroughfares. The Crenshaw business corridor along this street is the center of African American commerce in Los Angeles.[2]

Crenshaw is bordered by Chesterfield Square on the east, Hyde Park on the south, View Park-Windsor Hills on the west. It includes Leimert Park. The district's boundaries are roughly Van Ness and Arlington Avenues on the east, Exposition Boulevard on the north, La Brea Avenue near Baldwin Hills on the west, and roughly Stocker Street & Slauson Avenue on the south. The Crenshaw Strip is the area directly on Crenshaw between Exposition Boulevard on the north and Vernon Avenue on the south.

Education

The area is part of the Los Angeles Unified School District. Crenshaw High School, which is south of Martin Luther King Boulevard and east of Crenshaw Boulevard, is the local public high school.

Charter schools in the area include the KIPP KIPP Academy of Opportunity[3] middle school, Celerity Nascent Charter School[4] the New Design Charter School (built in 2004), View Park Preparatory High School,[5] and View Park Preparatory Middle School.[6]

Neighborhood

Crenshaw is a largely residential area of single-story houses, bungalows and low-rise apartment buildings, with an industrial corridor along Jefferson Boulevard, and several commercial districts.

After courts ruled segregation covenants to be unconstitutional, the area opened up to other races. A large Japanese American settlement ensued, which can still be found along Coliseum Street, east and west of Crenshaw Boulevard.[7] African Americans started arriving in the 1960s, and by the 1970s were the majority.[8]

Since the 1970s, Crenshaw, Leimert Park and neighboring areas together have formed one of the largest African-American communities in the western United States. Crenshaw suffered heavy damage from both the 1992 Los Angeles riots and the 1994 Northridge earthquake. Crenshaw has significant middle-class areas, and some areas with some poverty rates such as Baldwin Village.

In 2006, the population of Crenshaw was around 27,600. Recently, there has been some increased middle-class Black migration to cities in the Inland Empire as well as cities in the Antelope Valley sections of Southern California. Despite the demographic shift, Blacks maintain their status as the neighborhood's largest ethnic group, with African-Americans forming 63.34% of the population, followed by Whites and Latinos (any race) at 30%,[2] White (not Latino), 16.89%; Asian, 4.38%; American Indians, 0.43%; Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islanders, 0.20%; other races, 9.20%; two or more races, 9.32%.

Transportation

The Crenshaw/LAX Line is an under-construction light rail line that will run generally north-south including along Crenshaw Boulevard connecting the district with Leimert Park, Inglewood, and LAX.[9]

Notable places

Googie architecture of the Holiday Bowl.

The Crenshaw Square sign, a local landmark, had been in serious disrepair for years. In 2007, it was replaced by a modern illuminated red-and-green sign.

Santa Barbara Plaza was a shopping center in the district. This aging center was in disrepair and is a failed redevelopment project was demolished in 2011. It is currently building a new Kaiser Permanente.[10]

The West Angeles Church of God in Christ, on the corner of Crenshaw and Exposition, is home to Bishop Charles E. Blake.

The Crenshaw Christian Center was never in the Crenshaw District, but was originally located on Crenshaw Boulevard in Inglewood. It is now in Central Los Angeles.

Demographics

In the post-World War II era, a Japanese-American community was established in Crenshaw. There was an area Japanese school called Dai-Ichi Gakuen. Due to a shared sense of being discriminated against, many of the Japanese-Americans had close relationships with the African-American community.[7]

At its peak, it was one of the largest Japanese-American settlements in California, with about 8,000 residents around 1970, and Dai-Ichi Gakuen had a peak of 700 students.[7]

Beginning in the 1970s the Japanese American community began decreasing in size and Japanese-American businesses began leaving. Scott Shibya Brown stated that "some say" the effect was a "belated response" to the 1965 Watts riots and that "several residents say a wave of anti-Japanese-American sentiment began cropping up in the area, prompting further departures."[7] Eighty-two-year-old Jimmy Jike was quoted in the Los Angeles Times in 1993, stating that it was mainly because the residents' children, after attending universities, moved away.[7] By 1980, there were 4,000 Japanese ethnic residents, half of the previous size.[7] By 1990 there were 2,500 Japanese-Americans, mostly older residents. By 1993, the community was diminishing in size, with older Japanese Americans staying but with younger ones moving away.[7] That year, Dai-Ichi Gakuen had 15 students.[7]

Notable residents and natives

See also

Crenshaw Boulevard

References

  1. ↑ The Mapping L.A. project of the Los Angeles Times combines Baldwin Hills with the Crenshaw District to form an area it calls Baldwin Hills/Crenshaw. The Thomas Guide for Los Angeles County (2004) lists each neighborhood separately (page n).
  2. 1 2 Robinson-Jacobs, Karen (May 2, 2001). "Noticing a Latin Flavor in Crenshaw". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  3. ↑ http://www.kippkao.org/
  4. ↑ http://www.celerityschools.org/
  5. ↑ http://vpphs.icefla.org/
  6. ↑ http://vppms.icefla.org/
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Brown, Scott Shibuya (October 3, 1993). "Crenshaw: Littler Tokyo : Although their children are grown and gone, older Japanese-Americans still evince pride, loyalty in their changing community.". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  8. ↑ Kurashige, Scott (January 30, 2014). "Growing Up Japanese American in Crenshaw and Leimert Park". Communities. KCET. Retrieved 17 January 2016.
  9. ↑ Sumers, Brian (January 21, 2014). "Metro breaks ground on new $2 billion L.A. Crenshaw/LAX Line". Daily Breeze. Retrieved 31 January 2016.
  10. ↑ Urban renewal project in L.A. begets blight instead - By Ted Rohrlich, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer 10:38 PM PDT, April 27, 2008
  11. ↑ Axelrod, Jeremiah B. C. (Occidental College). "The Shifting Grounds of Race: Black and Japanese Americans in the Making of Multiethnic Los Angeles." The Journal of American History, 12/2008. p. 909-910. Cited: p. 910.

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