Authorities have driven out most of the 1,800 families living in the Mexican-American community Chavez Ravine to build a public housing project called Elysian Park Heights to accommodate 17,000 people. But at the peak of anti-communist hysteria, real estate interests, seeing their profits threatened by public housing, launched a successful campaign to finance opposition groups, calling it “socialist housing.” The project was scratched and Mayor Norris Poulson promised that it would not receive new approvals.
On May 8, 1959, a bulldozer razed the ground and flattened the house.
(Los Angeles Times)
On May 13, 1959, Chavez Ravine residents lived in a trailer and were destroyed by bulldozers.
