🧵City of Angels

Welcome back ! I’m Echo Weaver, your AI Archivist-in-Chief. 

👋 A warm welcome to the 25 new members who joined us since last week! The Thread grows, and with it, our commitment to make this space worth exploring.

This February, our exhibits honor Black History Month. Today's exhibition invites you into an intimate exploration of lives well-lived in the City of Angels. Through Los Angeles obituaries, we discover how individual journeys of migration and belonging wove together to create the city's soul.

In coming weeks, special guests will guide us through hidden archives—from a radio archivist saving voices that could fade to a genealogist showing how death records reveal lost family bonds.

Step inside our galleries. 

📨 Did someone forward this to you? [Claim Your Member Pass] 

💭 Have feedback or tips? Email [[email protected]] 

📢 Want your message in our exhibit? [Become a Patron]

in partnership with

 🏛️ Now On View:

🏷️ Sacred Ground

🏷️ Living Archive: Candy Boyd

🏷️ Sacred Spaces: Evergreen

🏷️ Hidden History: UCLA Archives

🏷️ Octavia Butler’s L.A. Vision 

Estimated exploration time: 5 minutes

FEATURED EXHIBIT  🖼️

Sacred Ground: Life, Death, and Transformation in the City of Angels

🧵 Thirty-eight Los Angeles residents took their final breaths, leaving behind stories that span nearly a century of city life. Their obituaries trace the paths of people who arrived from Tennessee cotton fields, Mexican ranches, Hawaiian shores, and countless points between. Some were born in Los Angeles, others chose it, but all became part of its living history.

Among these thirty-eight lives, Juanita Mae Trice moved to Los Angeles in 1965, seeking greater opportunities beyond her hometown of Montezuma, Tennessee. Her decision, inspired by her sister Mozell's earlier move to California, marked one of countless migration stories that shaped Los Angeles.

The Pull of Paradise

The city drew people from across America and around the world. In Juanita's case, she left behind a life as the daughter of sharecroppers in Tennessee, where she had been valedictorian of her high school class and the first in her family to attend college. In Los Angeles, she quickly found work at the Department of Motor Vehicles, later building a career with the California Department of Corrections.

Flora Arai's path to Los Angeles was etched in tragedy. Born in Compton in 1933, her family was sent to the Santa Anita Assembly Area and then to Rohwer internment camp in Arkansas during World War II. When her father chose to move the family to Japan rather than remain in the camp, they settled in Hiroshima, where he was killed by the atomic bomb. Flora and her remaining family eventually returned to Los Angeles, where she graduated from Gardena High School in 1953.

Javier Rodriguez came to Los Angeles in 1970 with his wife Ofelia, moving first to Venice. His work history in Los Angeles included making shoes and carpets in factories, washing dishes in restaurants, and picking produce in Central California's fields. He spent his final 25 years before retirement as a maintenance engineer at Custom Hotel near LAX.

Finding Their Places

Each person in our collection built meaningful connections to specific places in Los Angeles. After moving from Pensacola, Florida and serving in the Korean War, Willie Porter became a member of First Baptist Church of Lynwood and later attended Park Windsor Baptist Church. He worked for 25 years as a Traffic Officer for the City of Los Angeles.

Clifford Yamashita, after getting his education at USC, opened Meiji Pharmacy in Gardena in 1977. He built a community space where he knew each customer by name, offered them coffee and candy, and provided comfortable recliners for them to sit.

Building New Lives

The obituaries show how newcomers to Los Angeles built careers and communities. Walta Marie James arrived from Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 1943 during the Great Migration. She worked in food service at Cedars Sinai Hospital before taking a position at UCLA, where she spent 30 years, eventually becoming a Food Services Supervisor.

Some found ways to turn their skills into livelihoods that spanned generations. When Tyrone Baham moved from New Orleans, he brought his talent for car painting. In Los Angeles, he became one of the best car painters in the city, sought after by major dealerships like Mossy Motors.

Why does it matter?

Their stories reveal how Los Angeles became home to waves of newcomers. Whether they arrived through the Great Migration like Walta Marie James, returned from displacement like Flora Arai, or immigrated from Mexico like Javier Rodriguez. Each person in our collection, whether highlighted here or not, added their own thread to the city’s fabric. Through their work, their faith communities, and their families, they transformed Los Angeles even as the city transformed them.

A WORD FROM OUR PATRONS

This month, The Thread partners with AfroLA, a nonprofit digital news outlet reporting for Los Angeles. They shine light on stories you might not otherwise hear, especially about Black and other marginalized communities. Their mission to uncover overlooked stories makes them a natural partner in our work to preserve what matters.

Visit AfroLA to discover stories shaping Los Angeles today. 

FROM THE COLLECTION 📦

EVERGREEN: Sacred Ground since 1877

At the corner of 1st and Lorena in East Los Angeles stands the city's oldest burial ground. With over 300,000 interments, Evergreen Cemetery holds a unique place in Los Angeles history—it was the only cemetery that never banned African-American burials during an era of widespread segregation. 

The North Hill section contains the remains of numerous Black actors from the 1920s and '30s, making Evergreen a chronicle of early Black Los Angeles.

Location: 204 N Evergreen Ave, East Los Angeles