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Great Wall Institute: The Process of the Great Wall of Los Angeles

1992 To Protect and Serve - POLICE BRUTALITY and institutional racist violence toward African-Americans

By Noni Olabasi Moe Hair Salon 3406 11th Avenue Los Angeles. This history of the Black Panther Party was originally selected as one of SPARC’s Great Wall Unlimited: Neighborhood Pride Murals. However, after opposition and political the conservative City Arts Commission, the mural was turned into an independent project and funded with private donations. The left side focuses on personal and institutional racist violence toward African-Americans. Depicted are images of the Klan and Bobby Seale bound and gaged, as he was during the Chicago 7 Trail of the late 1960s–above him is judge Julius Hoffman who presided in that case. Huey Newton and Angela Davis are also portrayed. The right side of the mural emphasizes the Panthers’ social projects, such as the Free Breakfast Program. From the mural: We want an immediate end to POLICE BRUTALITY and MURDER of Black People! We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace. All power to the people! A special thanks is offered to Hair Expressions and the community for their war and loving support.

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Contents of this path:
1. 1987-90 Operation Hammer Samuel Momodu (BlackPast): “Operation Hammer, a law enforcement program by the Los Angeles Police Department that began in 1987 was ostensibly an attempt to crack down on gang violence in Los Angeles, California. Many critics, however, saw the operation as racial profiling because it targeted the city’s African American and Hispanic youth. The origin of Operation Hammer can be traced back to the 1984 Summer Olympics which were held in Los Angeles, California. Under the supervision of Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) chief Darrel Francis “Daryl” Gates, the LAPD expanded gang sweeps during the Olympics ostensibly to protect the tens of thousands of outside visitors and Los Angeles residents expected to attend the games. Many of the events were scheduled for the Los Angeles Colosseum located in South Central Los Angeles, a major area of gang activity. The main areas the LAPD targeted were South Central and East Los Angeles and the tactics used included mass arrests and detention of suspected gang members.”-
2. 1990 Justice for Janitors Article: https://www.kcet.org/shows/departures/justice-for-janitors-day-marks-25th-anniversary-in-l-a -A critical chapter in U.S. labor history - On this day, back in 1990, over 400 striking janitors, primarily Central American immigrants, members of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 399, demonstrated peacefully in an effort to improve the living standards for their families by unionizing their employer International Service System (ISS), the contractor responsible for servicing most of L.A.'s office buildings at the time. The demonstration followed two weeks of intense organizing efforts by janitors and took place in Century City, a region in west Los Angeles that houses corporate office towers of the wealthiest businesses in the country. At first, the rally appeared to be another event in line with the organizing efforts of the strike, yet, this particular rally propelled the janitors' struggle to the national spotlight when members were confronted and injured by fifty police officers who were equipped with batons. In total, 38 janitors were injured during the incident, and many were arrested during the altercation. The violent images quickly began circulating across media outlets across the country and led to an increased public support for the janitors cause. Rather than back down after the confrontation, janitors remained on the streets and were eventually joined by over 2,500 supporters and prominent leaders, including Jesse Jackson, who publicly decried the meager wages janitors were earning at the time -- some as little at $4.50 per hour. The janitors' dedicated efforts, coupled with the widespread community support and the public outrage over the police brutality, resulted in janitors receiving an increase of wages over $2 per hour, full family health coverage, and the ratification of a union contract with ISS. "Our efforts that day and all of the efforts leading up to that action, represented a fight for dignity and respect," explained Jose Garcia, a janitor who was present at the march on June 15, 1990, and still services the industry today. "On this day we finally had a voice on the job and we were able to show the nation and the world that we were on the side of justice." Garcia further explained that prior to this victory, janitors in Los Angeles did not have any control over working conditions, low wages, and were subjected to numerous abuses by employers. Since then, unionized L.A. janitors earn between $12-$14 per hour, and form part of SEIU-United Service Workers West (USWW).
3. 1991 American Baptist Churches (ABC) Settlement Agreement
4. "Marc Chagall Comes Back to Venice Beach" by By Christina Schlesinger (1991) Located at Israel Levin Center Venice Boardwalk. The mural employs imagery from the Russian-Jewish painter Marc Chagall superimposed onto the Venice Beachfront. At the far left a rabbi is holding a torah on which is written, in Hebrew, the 5th Commandment, “Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother.” A Chagall bird leaps from the flames and leads the viewer’s eye into the main section of the mural, where various characters and images from Chagall are placed onto the Venice Beach and boardwalk. A rabbi with a small rabbi standing on top of his head, indicates the many generations of teachers in Jewish history. Next to the fiddler on the roof the viewer sees the non-Chagallian character, an angel on roller blades representing contemporary Venice beach. He stands beneath a candelabrum of seven candles, referring to the seven-branched menorah and the extensive use of light in Jewish religion and culture. At the other end of the mural is a poem about overcoming obstacles called “Roots.” It is written by 95-year-old Dora Bayrack.
5. 1991 Rodney King is seen leaving LA County Jail on March 7 On March 3, 1991, King's savage beating by Los Angeles police was caught on tape by a bystander watching from his balcony. LA had a long history of police brutality, but now we were all witnessing it first-hand on our TVs. Watching the beating was especially jarring for me because King and I had grown up in the same Pasadena-Altadena community. We'd gone to school together. We weren't close, but I knew him — who went by Glen, never Rodney — as a gentle, friendly kid. The four police — Sgt. Stacey Koon and officers Laurence Powell, Theodore Briseno, and Timothy Wind — went on trial the next year. Adding to public anger, the trial was moved from LA to Simi Valley, a predominantly white "cop town" northwest of the city.
8. 1992 LA RIOTS
9. 1992 To Protect and Serve - POLICE BRUTALITY and institutional racist violence toward African-Americans By Noni Olabasi Moe Hair Salon 3406 11th Avenue Los Angeles. This history of the Black Panther Party was originally selected as one of SPARC’s Great Wall Unlimited: Neighborhood Pride Murals. However, after opposition and political the conservative City Arts Commission, the mural was turned into an independent project and funded with private donations. The left side focuses on personal and institutional racist violence toward African-Americans. Depicted are images of the Klan and Bobby Seale bound and gaged, as he was during the Chicago 7 Trail of the late 1960s–above him is judge Julius Hoffman who presided in that case. Huey Newton and Angela Davis are also portrayed. The right side of the mural emphasizes the Panthers’ social projects, such as the Free Breakfast Program. From the mural: We want an immediate end to POLICE BRUTALITY and MURDER of Black People! We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace. All power to the people! A special thanks is offered to Hair Expressions and the community for their war and loving support.
11. 1992 Chinese Student Protection Act
12. "Freedom Won't Wait" by Noni Olabisi (1992)
13. "Calle De La Eternidad" By Johanna Poethig (1993) Located at BBF Broadway Building 351 South Broadway (at 4th St.) ARTIST Johanna Poethig was raised in the Philippines through high school and has lived in Chicago, San Francisco and Oakland since coming to the United States. Poethig received her BFA at the UC Santa Cruz and her MFA at Mills College (in Oakland, CA). Her public art works intervene in the urban landscape, in neighborhoods, on freeways, in parks, hospitals, schools, homeless shelters, cultural centers, advertising venues and public buildings. ABOUT THE MURAL “The architecture of the building really affected me because it’s so high off the ground and so much of the background is all those buildings reaching to the sky. Also, the whole context of being in Broadway, in a very Latino neighborhood, is so important to me. I started to look for symbols and artifacts from pre-Columbian America. The arms that are reaching to sky based on Peruvian gold work. The Aztec Calendar contains text by Octavio Paz about time and place. It’s trying to bring poetry to the idea of being at home and in exile at the same time. In the middle of a commercial LA landscape you have something that is talking about connecting us culturally and historically to our past and present.” -Johanna Poethig
14. 1993 Bill Clinton signing the National Voter Registration Act (Motor Voter Act)
15. "Breaking Bread/ Not Somewhere Else, But Here" By Daryl E.Wells (1993) Located at National Council of Jewish Women 543 N. Fairfax Ave., Los Angeles, CA West LA. This mural emphasizes the themes of community service, social actions and education that the National Council of Jewish Women of Los Angeles endorses. Wells depicts influential and prominent women of varied ethnic backgrounds building community and sharing struggles through the act of “breaking bread” together. Furthermore, it is both homage to the women it depicts and also a gesture to the community in support of multiculturalism. The women depicted from left to right are: Betty Friedan (author and activist), Barbara Boxer (senator), Hannah Senesh (poet and holocaust rescue mission fighter), Dolores Huerta (United Farm Workers Union co-founder), Lee Krasner (artist), Barbara Jordan (congresswoman and civil rights worker), Emma Goldman (anarchist and labor rights activist), young woman of the Ethiopian Jewry, Aung San Suu Kyi (elected president of Burma, was put under house arrest), Lillian Hellman (playwright), Rigoberta Menchu (Guatemalan human rights activist and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize) and Hannah Solomon (founder, National Council of Jewish Women). “Not Somewhere Else But Here” has been written about by scholars and art historians since the 1990’s. Paul Von Blum, a respected art historian, published an important article on it with the University of Wisconsin shortly after its creation.
16. "Return to the Light" By Charles Freeman (1993) Located at Carlota Park Apartments 227 East Avenue 41 Highland Park. ARTIST: Freeman is a self-taught artist. He moved to Los Angeles in 1974 while active in the Black Panther Party as an organizer. SUBJECT: The mural depicts to prevalent social ills: the senseless killing of young people and homelessness. The shaman in the center represents a healthy state of wholeness. Cesar Chavez represents vision being focused. The elderly are symbols of rich experience and wisdom. The spirits of Pancho Villa and Zapata are there to signify strength and courage. The mural’s title refers to the role of the spiritual in finding solutions.
18. 1994 Crime Bill that Fed Into the Mass Incarceration Crisis
19. 1994 VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN ACT Through the original bill, which passed in 1994, VAWA created the first U.S. federal legislation acknowledging domestic violence and sexual assault as crimes, and provided federal resources to encourage community-coordinated responses to combating violence. Up for renewal every five years, each VAWA reauthorization builds on existing protections and programs to better meet the needs of survivors. Reauthorized in 2000 it created a much-needed legal assistance program for victims and included responses to dating violence and stalking. In 2005, VAWA created new, holistic responses programs to meet the emerging needs of survivors and communities, such as prevention, landmark housing protections for survivors, funding for rape crisis centers, and culturally- and linguistically-specific services. VAWA 2013 enhanced access to safety and justice for Native American and LGBTQ survivors.
20. 1994 Proposition 187
22. 1998 Alex Sanchez founds Homies Unidos
23. 2022 Strike Law
Contents of this path:
1. 1969 Free Breakfast Program The Free Breakfast for School Children Program was a community service program run by the Black Panther Party. Inspired by contemporary research about the essential role of breakfast for optimal schooling, the Panthers would cook and serve food to the poor inner city youth of the area. Initiated in January 1969 at St. Augustine's Church in Oakland, the program became so popular that by the end of the year, the Panthers setup kitchens in cities across the US, feeding more than 10,000 children every day before they went to school. Bobby Seale believed that "no kid should be running around hungry in school," a simple credo that lead FBI director J. Edgar Hoover to call the breakfast program, "the greatest threat to efforts by authorities to neutralize the BPP and destroy what it stands for. source
6. FBI Wanted Poster Angela Davis, Black Panther Party, American, 1966 - 1982
8. 1969 UCLA philosophy department hired Angela Davis
10. 1969 Bunchy Carter and John Huggins murdered on UCLA Campus https://dailybruin.com/2019/01/17/throwback-thursday-fifty-year-anniversary-of-bunchy-carter-john-huggins-shooting - The two Black Panther leaders were members of the Black Student Union, as well as a part of the High Potential Program, a program meant to increase opportunities in higher education for minority students. Tension between the Black Panthers and the US Organization was at the heart of the shooting. The US Organization and the Panthers were, at the time, vying for control of black student organizations at the collegiate and high school level. Simultaneously, the FBI was attempting to stoke tensions between the two groups through efforts that included its largely illegal surveillance program, COINTELPRO. In January 1969, the two groups backed different individuals for the role of director of the newly created Afro-American Center, now known as the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies. The US Organization put forward a black psychologist with minimal background in academia as its choice. Chancellor Charles Young initially was willing to accept the choice, until a dispute arose over salary. Then, BSU announced it had reservations and wanted a different candidate, one with both an academic background and commitment to the black community. On Friday, Jan. 17, 1969, about 150 BSU members met in Campbell Hall to talk about the qualifications for the director. After the adjournment of the meeting, Harold “Tuwala” Jones entered the room and Huggins confronted him about the harassment of a fellow Panther. As a fight broke out between the two, Carter tried to intervene. Then Claude “Chuchessa” Hubert came in and shot Huggins in the back. Huggins, who was armed, fired a couple of shots back as he fell, wounded. Carter attempted to find cover behind a chair but was also shot by Hubert. “Chuchessa shot through the chair and killed him instantly,” recalled J. Daniel Johnson, a student who was present in the room, in 2008. In seconds, it was all over and two men were dead. After the shooting, university police worked in 12-hour shifts until Wednesday, Jan. 22. Police issued a bulletin announcing George Stiner and Larry Stiner as suspects, after witnesses had identified them at the scene of the shooting. George Stiner, who was also a BSU member and a part of the High Potential program, surrendered to police on Monday afternoon. His younger brother Larry surrendered later that night. The brothers eventually received life sentences based on charges of conspiracy to commit murder. Hubert, the suspected murderer of the two men, was never caught. In its private communications, the FBI reacted to the murders with some satisfaction. “It would appear that the above activity will even further split the factions of the US Group and the BPP,” reads a memo from an FBI special agent in charge office in San Diego dated Jan. 20. Chancellor Young issued two statements following the incident. “Personally we are deeply grieved by the death of these two young men who were our students,” his first statement said. “The tragic events of last Friday have in no way diminished our resolve to offer broader educational opportunities on this campus,” he added in the second statement. Reactions from campus members were generally somber. “They were doing well, they were capable and potential leaders … it was a terrible thing,” said Thomas Robischon, a faculty advisor to the High Potential Program. Unsurprisingly, most students the Bruin reached out to, especially black students, did not want to speak to the paper so soon after the shooting. According to the an article from Jan. 21, white students largely wanted to keep themselves out of the matter, with their reaction being summed up by student Mike Shatzkin, in quintessential 60s fashion: “It’s none of my dad-gummed business.” Huggins’ body was sent to his family in New Haven, Connecticut, while the funeral for Carter was held on Jan. 24. Among those in attendance were James Baldwin and Kathleen Cleaver. The campus community quickly recovered following the incident, with BSU resuming meetings on Jan. 31. The High Potential Program resumed classes on the Tuesday after the shooting. Half a century later, the program still lives on. UCLA consolidated it with the Educational Opportunity Program in 1971 to create the Academic Advancement Program. The AAP currently serves over 5,000 students from underrepresented groups at UCLA. And Campbell Hall still serves as the hub for this program. But for years after the shooting, there was no marking or sign to denote that such an incident had taken place in Campbell Hall. But the shooting hasn’t completely dropped out of the student body’s collective memory. Since 1999, family and friends of Carter and Huggins, and other students have gathered annually at Campbell Hall to remember the two. In 2010, students hung a plaque in front of Room 1201 in honor of them. And students have called regularly for Campbell Hall to be renamed Carter-Huggins Hall. So far, UCLA administration has ignored such requests. After all, they were just activists, not rich megadonors filling UCLA’s coffers. So for now, the stone in front of Campbell Hall will continue to memorialize Carter and Huggins. -
12. 1969 John Huggins and Bunchy Carter, two LA Black Panthers, murdered on campus at UCLA
14. 1969 Free Breakfast Program Bill Whitfield serving free breakfast to children in April 1969. The Panthers' breakfast program started in January 1969 at St. Augustine’s Episcopal Church in Oakland. Ruth Beckford-Smith, a parishioner who taught Haitian dance at the church, volunteered to be one of the program’s co-organizers. Eleven children ate at St. Augustine’s on the first day. By the end of the year, the organization fed 20,000 kids in 19 cities across the country in the morning before they went to school.
15. Free Breakfast Program Panthers serving children free breakfast, Sacred Heart Church, San Francisco. Between 1969 and 1971, the Panthers established 36 breakfast programs across the country from Kansas City to New York City. It’s estimated that over time, the Panthers fed 50,000 across the country through their program. "The Panthers are feeding more kids than we are," one US government official reportedly admitted. With each mouth fed, it became increasingly difficult for government officials like Hoover to portray the Panthers in a negative light.
16. Free Breakfast Program Boys eat during a free breakfast in New York, winter 1969. Their work ultimately inspired amendments to the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 and served as the blueprint for establishing the government’s School Breakfast Program as a permanent program in 1975. According to the Food Research and Action Center, on average 13.2 million children received a free meal through that program each day during the 2013-'14 school year
17. Free Breakfast Program A Panther serving breakfast to a group of youngers. Billy X Jennings, a former Panther who now serves as the party’s archivist, worked at the original breakfast program at St Augustine’s. “Every office was required to send two people to learn how it ran so you can open one in your area,” he said. Jennings would work at St Augustine’s early in the morning before heading to class at Laney College. Soon after, the breakfast service expanded to 23 locations around Oakland
18. Free Breakfast Program Children at the Black Panthers’ free breakfast program, 1971. “This is one of the biggest and baddest things we ever did,” Jennings said. “And it’s still functioning across America … That’s what a vanguard party does. We set examples for people to follow.” Though the breakfast program is the most famous of the party’s Survival Programs, more than 60 others directly addressed the needs of the black community that were being systematically ignored.
19. Health Clinics "Testing for sickle cell anaemia, Late 1960s or Early 1970s, Oakland, California. As Fred Hampton is often quoted as saying in an undated speech, “First you have free breakfasts, then you have free medical care, then you have free bus rides, and soon you have FREEDOM!” The Black Panthers’ emphasis on providing community health services grew out of a deep distrust in minority communities towards the traditional health care system, which they saw as potentially dangerous to themselves and their families"
20. Health Clinics "Boston’s Franklin Lynch PFMC, located in a trailer parked on a city street. Clinics varied by chapter and according to each chapter’s resources. This mission was frequently manifested as activist-run no-cost or low-cost clinics, such as the Panthers’ PFMCs. Consistent with the period’s anti authoritarian zeitgeist, activists encouraged patients to have a voice in the medical encounter and urged laypeople to claim the mantle of expertise by taking a hand in their healthcare—and, sometimes, in producing medical knowledge as well. The democratization of both medical practice and biomedical knowledge, often in the clinic setting, was a tactical cornerstone of radical health politics"
21. Health Clinics
22. Health Clinics "A flyer announces the opening of the Bobby Seale PFMC in Berkeley in April 1971. With the formal establishment of a national network of PFMCs, health politics came to have an integral role in the Party’s plan to “serve the people, body and soul.” The plan to expand the clinic program was first announced by the Party’s minister of education Ray “Masai” Hewitt at a press conference in the fall of 1969. PFMCs were launched as early as 1968 in several cities, including Kansas City, Missouri; Chicago; and Seattle, with Portland following suit in 1969. The Los Angeles chapter’s Alprentice “Bunchy” Carter Clinic, located in the Watts neighborhood, opened in late December 1969. Soon after the clinic mandate was handed down, Panther clinics were launched in New York, Cleveland, Boston, Winston-Salem, and Philadelphia"
23. Health Clinics Healthcare services were coupled with other social services at the PFMCs, as shown on this flyer from 1970 advertising Los Angeles’s Alprentice Bunchy Carter clinic. The equipment necessary to operate the PFMCs was begged, borrowed, purchased, scavenged, and sometimes just appeared on the doorstep.136 Businesses, churches, and other organizations provided financial support for the Party’s health programs. Pharmaceutical companies donated drugs to the Black Panther clinics in Oregon.137 Corporate donations were similarly an important source of support for the Seattle chapter.138 Kupers, who helped shape the Los Angeles chapter’s Bunchy Carter People’s Free Medical Clinic, and Small sought donations from medical supply and pharmaceutical companies on behalf of the Panthers
24. Free Huey Huey P. Newton, in full Huey Percy Newton, (born February 17, 1942, Monroe, Louisiana, U.S.—died August 22, 1989, Oakland, California), American political activist, cofounder (with Bobby Seale) of the Black Panther Party (originally called Black Panther Party for Self-Defense). An illiterate high-school graduate, Newton taught himself how to read before attending Merritt College in Oakland and the San Francisco School of Law. While at Merritt he met Seale. In Oakland in 1966 they formed the Black Panther group in response to incidents of alleged police brutality and racism and as an illustration of the need for Black self-reliance. At the height of its popularity during the late 1960s, the party had 2,000 members in chapters in several cities. In 1967 Newton was convicted of voluntary manslaughter in the death of a police officer. His imprisonment sparked protests—and the popular rallying cry “Free Huey.” His conviction was overturned in 1970, and he was released from prison. In 1971 he announced that the party would adopt a nonviolent manifesto and dedicate itself to providing social services to the Black community, which included free meals for children and health clinics. In 1974 Newton was accused of another murder and fled to Cuba for three years before returning to face charges; two trials resulted in hung juries.
26. 1969 Black Panther LA Headquarters SWAT Raid
27. 1969 John Huggins and Bunchy Carter, two LA Black Panthers, murdered on campus at UCLA
28. 1969 LAPD launched assault on the LA Black Panther headquarters "In the early morning hours of Dec. 8, 1969, Bernard Arafat awoke to explosions rocking the library of the Black Panthers’ 41st and Central Avenue headquarters in Los Angeles. Above him, footsteps stomped across the roof. Then gunfire erupted. Arafat wasn’t a seasoned Panther. He was a 17-year-old runaway from juvenile hall whose parents had both died when he was 13. After years of committing small-time crimes, Arafat was taken in by the Panthers and gained a sense of purpose. He helped with the organization’s breakfast program, feeding hungry kids on their way to school. Arafat had never fired a gun. But as he listened to the sound of bullets and heard the screams of his fellow Panthers, he made a decision. “I found an automatic shotgun and defended myself.” Arafat didn’t know it then, but he was part of an experiment in policing. On that morning 50 years ago, the Panthers became the targets of the world’s first major raid by a Special Weapons and Tactics, or SWAT, team. More than 350 officers took on 13 Panthers, ostensibly to execute arrest warrants. The group they battled included three women and five teenagers." - Matthew Fleischer, LA Times
29. 1969 Los Angeles, Police officers hold two members of the Black Panther Party under arrest
30. 1970 Stokely: A Life As biographer Peniel E. Joseph writes in Stokely: A Life, the events in Mississippi “catapulted Stokely into the political space last occupied by Malcolm X,” as he went on TV news shows, was profiled in Ebony and written up in the New York Times under the headline “Black Power Prophet.” Carmichael’s growing prominence put him at odds with King, who acknowledged the frustration among many African Americans with the slow pace of change, but didn’t see violence and separatism as a viable path forward. With the country mired in the Vietnam War, (a war both Carmichael and King spoke out against) and the civil rights movement King had championed losing momentum, the message of the Black Power movement caught on with an increasing number of Black Americans. King and Carmichael renewed their alliance in early 1968, as King was planning his Poor People’s Campaign, which aimed to bring thousands of protesters to Washington, D.C., to call for an end to poverty. But in April 1968, King was assassinated in Memphis while in town to support a strike by the city’s sanitation workers as part of that campaign. In the aftermath of King’s murder, a mass outpouring of grief and anger led to riots in more than 100 U.S. cities. Later that year, one of the most visible Black Power demonstrations took place at the Summer Olympics in Mexico City, where Black athletes John Carlos and Tommie Smith raised black-gloved fists in the air on the medal podium. By 1970, Carmichael (who later changed his name to Kwame Ture) had moved to Africa, and SNCC had been supplanted at the forefront of the Black Power movement by more militant groups, such as the Black Panther Party, the US Organization, the Republic of New Africa and others, who saw themselves as the heirs to Malcolm X’s revolutionary philosophy.
32. 1970s Flier for "The Struggle for National Democracy in the Philippines" This flier advertises an event titled "The Struggle for National Democracy in the Philippines" which was sponsored by the Union of Democratic Filipinos and Liberation Books. A sideshow, songs and discussion are advertised. In this movement, Asian Americans, who had individually become involved with the causes of the times, drew together to address their own racial status and identity. They confronted enduring stereotypes of the unassimilable heathen, the Yellow Peril, and the perpetual foreigner. This generation of students faced the model minority myth, that Asian American students were expected to be hard-working, studious, and quiet even in the face of discrimination. While many sought to assimilate to mainstream Anglo-American cultural norms, they soon recognized that they could not assimilate fully into the white mainstream. The other racial model for Asian Americans was the Black Power movement, which rejected American racism and promoted Black autonomy, racial pride, and community control. For those African American activists, the ideologies of self-determination and cultural nationalism became realized through militant organizations, a flowering of Black arts and expression, and a reclamation of indigenous and ethnic histories. Some of the subsequent Asian American organizations, such as the Red Guard, modeled themselves partially after the Black Panthers, while others were more connected to diasporic movements, such as the Union of Democratic Filipinos, which was also involved in opposing martial law in the Philippines.
33. 1992 To Protect and Serve - POLICE BRUTALITY and institutional racist violence toward African-Americans By Noni Olabasi Moe Hair Salon 3406 11th Avenue Los Angeles. This history of the Black Panther Party was originally selected as one of SPARC’s Great Wall Unlimited: Neighborhood Pride Murals. However, after opposition and political the conservative City Arts Commission, the mural was turned into an independent project and funded with private donations. The left side focuses on personal and institutional racist violence toward African-Americans. Depicted are images of the Klan and Bobby Seale bound and gaged, as he was during the Chicago 7 Trail of the late 1960s–above him is judge Julius Hoffman who presided in that case. Huey Newton and Angela Davis are also portrayed. The right side of the mural emphasizes the Panthers’ social projects, such as the Free Breakfast Program. From the mural: We want an immediate end to POLICE BRUTALITY and MURDER of Black People! We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice and peace. All power to the people! A special thanks is offered to Hair Expressions and the community for their war and loving support.
34. Black Panther Party Service to the People Programs
35. Black Panthers from Sacramento, Free Huey Rally From PBS: "Newton had been charged with 1st degree murder, assault and kidnapping in October 1967. This brought the Black Panther Party into international prominence and made Huey a revolutionary icon during 3 years of rallies & protests by tens of thousands of people across North America to "Free Huey". As Roger points out though, once Huey was released, a new problem was created: "Yeah they freed Huey. Then Huey came out and they wanted Huey to free them and I keep trying to tell the people, I say people, that's the true power of the people, you freed me, you freed Huey, now why don't you all go ahead and free yourself? But see, they can't do that can they? They can't do that cause the people always have to create what they call a leader and a leader is everything that the people want to be but the leader is everything that the people can never be so then when the leader fails, he's gonna fail, he's just flesh and blood, he's gonna fail, when the leader fails then the whole construction of the concept of leadership fails and then it just becomes a matter of contempt. And that's when they assassinate you and then put your image on a postage stamp so they can keep lickin' you in the grave."
36. Free Huey Rally Newton was arrested on the day of the shooting on October 28, 1967, and pled not guilty to the murder of officer John Frey. The Black Panther Party immediately went to work organizing a coalition to rally behind Newton and champion his release. In December the Peace and Freedom Party, a majority white anti-war political organization, joined with the Black Panther Party in support of Newton.[42] This alliance served the dual purpose of legitimizing Newton's cause while boosting the credibility of the party within the community of more radical activists.[43] Under the leadership of the Black Panther Party and the Peace and Freedom Party, 5,000 protesters gathered in Oakland on Newton's birthday, February 17, 1968, in support of Newton. They garnered the attention of international news organizations, raising the profile of the party by astounding measures. The phrase "Free Huey!" was adopted as a rallying cry for the movement, and it was printed on buttons and T-shirts. Prominent Black Panther Kathleen Cleaver claimed the goal of the Free Huey! campaign was to elevate Newton as a symbol of everything the Black Panther Party stood for, creating something of a living martyr.[44] The trial, which began on July 15, quickly ascended beyond the scope of Newton himself, evolving into a racially-charged political movement. Over the two year course of Newton's original trial and two appeals, the coalition continued to offer its support until the charges were overturned and Newton was released on August 5, 1970.
37. PANTHER POWER Original Caption: PANTHER POWER---BLACK PANTHERS, TEENAGERS AND CHILDREN ALIKE, GIVE THE PANTHER BLACK POWER SALUTE OUTSIDE THEIR "LIBERATION SCHOOL" IN THE FILLMORE DISTRICT OF SAN FRANCISCO. DECEMBER 20, 1969. UPI B/W - By 1966, the civil rights movement had been gaining momentum for more than a decade, as thousands of African Americans embraced a strategy of nonviolent protest against racial segregation and demanded equal rights under the law. But for an increasing number of African Americans, particularly young Black men and women, that strategy did not go far enough. Protesting segregation, they believed, failed to adequately address the poverty and powerlessness that generations of systemic discrimination and racism had imposed on so many Black Americans. Inspired by the principles of racial pride, autonomy and self-determination expressed by Malcolm X (whose assassination in 1965 had brought even more attention to his ideas), as well as liberation movements in Africa, Asia and Latin America, the Black Power movement that flourished in the late 1960s and ‘70s argued that Black Americans should focus on creating economic, social and political power of their own, rather than seek integration into white-dominated society. Crucially, Black Power advocates, particularly more militant groups like the Black Panther Party, did not discount the use of violence, but embraced Malcolm X’s challenge to pursue freedom, equality and justice “by any means necessary.” Bettmann Archive/Getty ImagesPHOTOGRAPH.
39. The Black Panther Party
40. 1968 Eldridge Cleaver addresses an estimated 7,500 students at UCLA
41. 1966 Stokely Carmichael defines "black power" at the University of California's Greek Theatre in Berkeley
42. 1966 Stokely Carmichael, speaking with crowd at Will Rogers Park in Los Angeles

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2015-2016- SPARC's CITY WIDE MURAL PROGRAM
CityWide Mural Program
In Partnership with:
SPARC partnered with City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA) a new CityWide Mural Program. Inspired by the legacy of Los Angeles’ murals and the passing of a new city-wide mural ordinance in 2013, funding was designated by the City of Los Angeles for new mural production and the restoration of city-sponsored fine art murals. SPARC’s Mural Rescue Program will lead the initiative to restore and preserve 9 murals deemed ‘historically significant’ by the DCA.
1988 - 2002 Neighborhood Pride Program
“People often decry Los Angeles’ lack of an official center, a heart that feeds the arteries that run throughout its neighborhoods, but it is this lack of center that creates the opportunity for democratic process that is multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-lingual, multi-faith, multi-historical, in essence multi-centered. It is not that the City of Los Angeles lacks heart but that it has many hearts, beating simultaneously and inexhaustibly.” -Pete Galindo, former Neighborhood Pride Director
The Great Walls Unlimited: Neighborhood Pride Mural Program was conceived as a citywide extension of the Great Wall of Los Angeles. Begun in 1988, the program has since produced 105 murals in almost every ethnic community of Los Angeles. Over its fourteen-year history Great Walls Unlimited: Neighborhood Pride employed over 95 different established and emerging muralists from Los Angeles and around the country, trained hundreds of youth apprentices, collaborated with countless community based organizations, worked closely with the fifteen different Council Districts that make-up the city of Los Angeles, worked with minority owned businesses, scholars, and The City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs all to produce images that speak to the multi-ethnic communities that make up the city.

As the first program of its kind in the nation, Great Walls Unlimited: Neighborhood Pride has become one of the country’s most respected model mural programs setting a standard which has inspired other cities across the United States. Sadly, due to budget cuts and other issues outside of SPARC’s control, 2002 marked the final year of the Great Walls Unlimited: Neighborhood Pride program. In the final year fifteen new murals were completed, painting a colorful ending to the mural program that helped make Los Angeles the mural capital of the world. Today the Great Wall and Neighborhood Pride murals continue to be visited by members of the local communities and visitors from around the world. The murals have proven over time to be a valuable lens through which to see Los Angeles by residents, artists and social scientists alike. For scholars, these murals hold the visual keys that give the voice to those often not included in the traditional historical recordings.