Summary: The Second Great Migration

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Watts, Los Angeles first started off as a predominantly all white neighborhood. When Los Angeles because a manufacturing hub for WWII and jobs rapidly became available and with not enough of workers to fill these jobs, African Americans seen this as an opportunity for work. A huge amount of African Americans came from Shreveport, Houston and New Orleans migrated to California. This movement is called the Second Great Migration. African Americans housing selection was tremendously small because of racial covenants and redlining. They were forced to find homes in the Watts area and surrounding areas. With racial tensions high, this caused whites to relocate to better housing locations; thus leaving the area to become less desirable which caused …show more content…
During this time, blacks were seen as inferior. Blacks faced social stratification. They suffered from lack of resources, wealth, power, and lack of mobility. The Watts area also suffered from heavy policing which caused racial discrimination from police and police brutality. There was this notion that blacks were troublemakers so they needed more supervision compared to their white counterparts. On August 11, 1965 Watts would never be the same. This is the day that Watts Riots/Rebellion occurred. It started because built of tensions between police and Watts’ African American residents. The last straw was when Marquette Frye, an African American, was arrest for reckless driving. An incident broken out which led to Marquette, his brother, and mother all being arrested. The neighborhood watched how it all went down and was outraged by what occurred. That was the last straw for the residents. Several days of looting, assault, arson, protest, property damages, and much more soon followed in the Watts area. It lasted for 5 days. It was considered the city’s worst rebellion/riots until the Rodney King riots in