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El Barrio Amado - Palo Verde through three generations
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Content
Copyright 2023 Emily Clarisse Bonilla
El Barrio Amado — Palo Verde through three generations
By
Emily Bonilla
A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC ANNENBERG SCHOOL FOR
COMMUNICATION AND JOURNALISM
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(SPECIALIZED JOURNALISM)
AUGUST 2023
ii
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Professors Dan Birman, Megan Chao, and Susy Garciasalas Barkley for
their guidance, editorial feedback, and constant, positive, thought-provoking support on this
thesis documentary project. Without their guidance, I would not have been able to execute and
fine-tune my documentary into the intimate, vital, and well-overdue storytelling needed to
understand my subjects and their life’s complexities. I would also like to thank Adela and John
De Nava, Adela Montalvo, and Vincent Montalvo for allowing me to sit in on some of the
toughest recollections of their family’s past. Recounting trauma is no easy task, but I thank them
for allowing me to wrap my head around merely a fraction of their pain from being uprooted
from their homes, robbed of generational wealth and a genuine community. Thank you for
granting me the privilege to present your firsthand accounts of the troubling past of the now
Chavez Ravine for the first time in nearly seven decades. I would also like to thank Dr. Meredith
Drake Reitan for her extensive knowledge of displacement in the city of Los Angeles. Thank you
to my second and third thesis committee members, Jeff Fellenzer and Willa Seidenberg for
encouraging me to dig deep into my storytelling abilities. Without the power of storytelling, I
would be nowhere. Without tenacity, I would be nowhere. Without being an unapologetic
storyteller, I would be nowhere. To the past residents of Palo Verde, La Loma, and Bishop, to the
city of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Dodgers, to those trying to erase the Latino, Mexican
American, and indigenous narratives from this nation’s history, thank you for encouraging me to
pursue this passion project. Para mi familia, I thank you for all the love, compassion, and
excitement you share with me for this documentary.
iii
To Tata, thank you for coming to this country to discover what America could bring to you, but
most importantly what you could, and continue, to bring to it.
iv
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements.........................................................................................................................ii
Abstract...........................................................................................................................................v
Reflection........................................................................................................................................1
Bibliography..................................................................................................................................11
Documentary Script.......................................................................................................................14
Script Bibliography........................................................................................................................25
v
Abstract
“El Barrio Amado — Palo Verde through three generations” is a documentary examining the
themes of home, community, displacement, gentrification, and a vital portion of the Mexican
American experience commonly left out of American history books and classroom curricula. The
word barrio is a slang term commonly used by people of Mexican descent that means
neighborhood, amado means loved. This documentary specifically focuses on three generations
of a family, the De Nava family and the Montalvo family, who experienced the loss of home,
generational wealth, and a promised “American Dream” by being forcefully removed from their
homes in the Palo Verde community, their barrio amado. This area of land is now home to prime
real estate in the north and northeastern part of the city of Los Angeles; today it is known as
Chavez Ravine. For the first time in their lives, Adela and John De Nava, their oldest daughter
Adela Montalvo, and grandson Vincent Montalvo recount their family’s stories, question the
past, revisit decades of trauma, and allow their stories to be told through the use of journalistic
documentary storytelling. This three-generation family lineage was at long last ready to present
their stories beyond their barrio, beyond Los Angeles. This documentary provides expert views
of what it means to value a community, its erasure, and conversations of proper compensation,
commemoration, and justified reparations. “El Barrio Amado — Palo Verde through three
generations,” asks the question, “What is the definition of home when physical, emotional, and
spiritual forms of home are forcefully taken from you?” The family is finally given a platform to
voice their answer; home is forever in Palo Verde.
1
Reflection
“El Barrio Amado — Palo Verde through three generations” is a documentary about three
generations of a family who were forcefully displaced from the place they call home, the Palo
Verde community. Today it is the area of land that immediately surrounds Dodger Stadium
known as Chavez Ravine
1
. I first paid attention to the topics of displacement and the former,
predominantly Mexican American community that inhabited this area by comparing it to the
time in which my grandfather, originally from Guanajuato, México, immigrated to America. He
immigrated to the U.S. in 1958 and would often travel from his Pasadena home to Downtown
Los Angeles for groceries at Grand Central Market — the only place where he could find
Mexican food products at the time. He would take the bus or drive through the oldest freeway in
the nation, Arroyo Seco Parkway
2
. This freeway curves around and has exits that lead to Solano
Canyon, and the once Palo Verde, La Loma, and Bishop communities … what today is
commonly referred to as Chavez Ravine. I always wonder if my grandfather, a Mexican man,
had any idea that each time he passed those ravines, people of his same ethnic descent were
being forcefully removed from their homes. As a Dodger fan, I wonder if he knew that people
who looked like him were being removed from their homes to build the stadium he regularly
visited for family outings; classic “Sundays at the ballpark” is how my family describes those
memories today.
Today, my grandfather is no longer physically with us, but I often wish I could have asked him
these questions, how informed was he of the social change in this particular community between
1
Masters, Nathan. “Chavez Ravine: Community to Controversial Real Estate.” KCET, June 21, 2022.
2
Zac. “A Short History of California’s First Freeway.” CalBike, August 12, 2018.
2
the late 1950s and mid-’60s? Had he known there was such a complex back story to the
construction of Dodger Stadium, would he have viewed his beloved Dodgers differently?
I came into this Master of Arts program knowing that excavating Chavez Ravine in a new light
would be the topic for my thesis, all thanks to my grandfather. I didn’t know, however, how to
go about this or what angle to take. If fact, I was scared that this story would sound redundant to
the articles and books that have previously been published about the Dodgers’ “ugly, violent
clearing” of the previous communities: Palo Verde, La Loma, and Bishop
3
.
I began by reading Don Normark’s “Chávez Ravine: 1949: A Los Angeles Story,” and
deciphered through its hundreds of black and white photographs and narratives paired with it
4
.
What caught my attention was the way community life was portrayed, children playing on a hill
overlooking the center of Los Angeles, mothers working in the homes, homes with white picket
fences, young girls peeking into Palo Verde’s Santo Niño Catholic Church. I found these
ordinary people to be extraordinary, from their smooth-skinned and prominent Mexican facial
features to the candid imagery of everyday life. These photos were documented at a time when it
wasn’t common to document the everyday lives of Mexican Americans, especially not enough to
fill up a book. What I wanted to know then was where were these people now, how are they
telling their stories to the new generations, and what can be done to preserve their history.
3
Shatkin, Elina. “The Ugly, Violent Clearing of Chavez Ravine before It Was Home to the Dodgers.” LAist, May 1,
2023.
4
Normark, D. (2003). Chavez Ravine: 1949: A Los Angeles story. Chronicle.
3
Searching for my subjects began through social media, via Instagram. I reached out to an
organization called Buried Under the Blue, a nonprofit organization made up of the direct
descendants of Palo Verde, La Loma, and Bishop communities
5
. There, I spoke with Vincent
Montalvo, a Lincoln Heights Neighborhood Council member whose job is to protect Angelinos
facing evictions, providing families in need with resources such as legal, medical, shelter, and
food. After sharing that he had been involved with city politics since the age of 14, I remember
asking Montalvo what he found most meaningful about his dedication to the community. If it
wasn’t for what his grandparents, Adela and John De Nava, and mother, Adela Montalvo, faced
— being forcefully evicted from their family homes in Palo Verde in 1959 — he would not be
the relentless community leader that he is today.
This motivated me to dig deeper. I asked Montalvo to meet his grandparents who are part of the
oldest living generation of former Palo Verde residents. That task was not easy. I learned that
communication with my subjects would come at a cost; they were overprotective of their stories
and who had access to them. I struggled to get in touch with Adela and John De Nava for nearly
two months because my only access to them was through their grandson. I could not, however,
solely rely on Montalvo any longer, and I knew the story I was after was a crucial one to tell. It is
not every day that you meet a family that was uprooted from their home 64 years ago, and
through the family lineage, the youngest generation is still fighting to protect people in the city
from similar circumstances that happened to their grandparents.
5
Buried under the Blue: Dodgers. (n.d.)
4
I began my journalistic investigation. I used my resources — LexisNexis — and found the
location where Adela and John De Nava currently reside. I had no other choice but to knock on
their door and face either being welcomed into their home or completely rejected and left with no
story. I had never faced a situation like this in my journalistic career. I was coming to the De
Nava’s as a stranger, but I wanted them to know that I was ready to take care of their story and
do it justice.
Thankfully, Adela and John De Nava welcomed me into their home … all be it with a lot of
hesitation. I had to be very careful to not overstay my time at their apartment, as John fought
recurring, unexpected illnesses. First a cold, then pneumonia, hospital visits, and then back to
their home of 25 years. Adela is his primary caretaker and only rests for what seems like minutes
before her husband is calling her for assistance. However, I knew that they held the stories of
their past near to them, and I had to balance that delicately with getting to know them as human
beings — as grandparents first, then as former residents of Palo Verde.
I visited them nearly every other week for more than two months, getting to know them little by
little. I learned that John is a WWII Army veteran and that Adela loved playing baseball as a
child — she was known as “Lefty” because of her strong pitching arm. John has a tattoo with the
initials “P. V.” inked between his left thumb and index finger, which stands for Palo Verde. His
darker complexion landed him the neighborhood nickname “Negro,” or in English, brown-
skinned. Adela makes blankets for animal shelters because she can’t stand the thought of cats
and dogs being cold in their kennels. Adela and John met in Palo Verde, and eloped on John’s
birthday in 1949 in Yuma, Ariz. — Adela was 15 … John was 8 years older.
5
These tiny details of their past allowed me to understand them as people and why they are who
they are. After about four weeks of personal interviews, I received permission from them to
begin recording footage for my documentary. It was then that I learned that Adela and John had
not shared their story of loss with the public for nearly seven decades. At times, I had to stop the
interviews because of how emotionally draining it was for the couple. Both Adela and John cried
during the process of revisiting past traumas, constantly questioning, “Why us, why were we the
ones left with nothing?”
The communities that comprised today’s Chavez Ravine were developed in the 1840s by Julian
Chavez, the first recorded landowner
6
. Beginning in the 1900s, Mexican American communities
began to populate the region. The three neighborhoods formed on the ridges between the
neighboring ravines. There was a local grocery store, a local church, and Palo Verde Elementary
School.
In 1958, the Brooklyn Dodgers moved to Los Angeles with the help of Dodger owner Walter
O’Malley and Los Angeles City Councilwoman Roz Wyman, clearing the communities of Palo
Verde, La Loma, and Bishop entirely to welcome in Major League Baseball’s migration to the
West Coast
7
.
6
Editor, Z. (2023, May 12). May 8, 1959: Mexican American communities evicted. Zinn Education Project.
7
Walter O’Malley : Features : Wyman’s historic efforts bring Dodgers to Los Angeles : Page 2. Championship
Rings. (n.d.).
6
“All the barrio was family, a big family, a happy family…everyone knew everybody,” Adela
repeats constantly. She remembers birthdays and baptisms, graduations, and Christmas’. Because
everyone didn’t fit in a single home, “We’d all be at the park to celebrate, the comadres and
compadres, everyone was there, a dream.”
Adela says that what hurt the most was her naivety at the time. There was no understanding of
the term eminent domain, which refers to the power of the government to take private property
and convert it into public use. Today she still doesn’t understand the term clearly, telling me
“What can you do when people have more power than you?”
This made me turn to an expert voice for more information. I found Associate Dean in the
Graduate School at the University of Southern California and adjunct associate professor in
USC’s Price School of Public Policy and School of Architecture, Dr. Meredith Drake Reitan
8
.
Originally from London, Dr. Drake Reitan has dedicated her research to telling the stories of
neighborhoods erased by urban renewal, specializing in areas of Los Angeles such as Bunker
Hill
9
and Chavez Ravine. Through our discussions, she explained how a city’s urban renewal and
eminent domain policies make it easy to calculate the market values of homes and land
properties. Still, she said it is not as easy to put a market value on lost communities.
My next task was to document Vincent Montalvo and his mother Adela Montalvo. Adela
Montalvo was just 7 years old when she remembers leaving Palo Verde with her mother and
father — Adela and John — and her twin brother John Jr. She shared how she passes by the site
8
About. Meredith Drake Reitan. (2021, December 10).
9
rss, A., Several, A. M., Pattison, A. G., & Cooper, A. K. (2021, December 25). On Bunker Hill.
7
of her old community frequently, equally filling her with childhood memories and hateful
resentment toward both the Dodgers Organization and the city of Los Angeles. I took the liberty
of asking her and her son if we could visit the site together and bring along old photographs to
point out where they were taken, and they agreed to revisit. I remember arriving with all of my
camera equipment and thinking “I cannot mess up this moment, this is a sacred place for them,
and they are giving me the privilege to understand their pain.” So, I just let the camera roll. I
didn’t ask any questions, I told them to talk amongst themselves about what the corner of
Malvina and Academy Road means to them. For Adela Montalvo, this is the street that lead to
her old home. All that physically remains is the street sign.
Documenting raw, emotional moments like these were eye opening. I let go of trying to control
the scene too much, I didn’t ask anyone to repeat what they said or did, I just let them be. This is
a sacred location for this family and as a journalist and storyteller, I wanted them to tell me their
truth without interruptions. The only way I guided the conversation was through eye contact and
head nods, and seemingly, they knew that I was providing them a safe space to tell their story.
The visit ended naturally with a sense of relief from both mother and son. This made me realize
that as a journalist, the most important thing is to just listen and absorb … be the sponge and take
it all in. It was a privilege to have shared those intimate moments with the Montalvo family and I
knew that this shoot would write itself out as the climax of my documentary.
I got to know more of Vincent’s story through our weekly phone calls, some lasting almost three
hours long, where we spoke about city policies from the past, their reforms, issues of indigenous
land back, monetary reparations, his mission as a city council member, and a plethora of family
8
stories. These countless hours of interviews made me realize that I was in a very special position.
As a direct descendant of Palo Verde residents, Vincent has been approached multiple times to
tell his story in documentary, radio, and print formats. He explained, however, that he is always
conscious of who is telling his story and granting me access to his family was more of a privilege
than I could have ever imagined. To this day, Vincent has turned down invitations to be
interviewed by producers for Netflix because he simply said they will tell a “white narrative” of
his family’s story — painting a negative image of Chavez Ravine as slums. He is waiting for the
“right” — Latino — representation to create a film, he reiterated and assured me that is why I
have been granted access to his family and their stories.
Montalvo recently appeared in an article for the New York Times, a detailed profile story written
by Latinx journalist, Jesus Jiménez that explains Montalvo’s family history and his resistance
toward the Dodgers organization
10
. After reading this narrative, I was thrilled that a Latinx
journalist was able to share Vincent’s family’s stories through his anecdotal accounts and be
published on a platform as large as the New York Times. I was more excited to find out that I
had reached out to former residents and documented their accounts of living in Palo Verde. To
this day, I am the only person outside of the De Nava and Montalvo family that has access to
firsthand accounts of life in Palo Verde. I am the only journalist who has sat with this three-
generation family lineage for countless hours and months to understand who they are as people,
where they came from, what they lost, and how they perceive life today. Though this was no
easy task, I am so lucky to have met this family and have the capacity as a journalist to reach into
the deepest crevices of my storytelling abilities to tell their stories to the public for the first time.
10
Jiménez, J. (2023, May 7). The land beneath this stadium once was theirs. they want it back. The New York
Times.
9
I chose the visual documentary medium because the stories of Palo Verde, La Loma, and Bishop
prominently exist in text form. I wanted viewers to place a face with a name, a whole family that
still exists and continues to mourn the loss of a life once lived in Palo Verde, a “heaven” as
Adela De Nava most commonly refers to it. Visual storytelling allowed me to document this
family unlike ever before. With the oldest generation — Adela and John De Nava — I often
worried about their age and being able to document them in healthy conditions. I view this
documentary as a visual time capsule … in truth, Adela and John may not be here for much
longer and this is the least I could do to remember them and their stories for generations to come.
Naturally, I was drawn to capture this emotional journey through a more intimate medium … a
camera … and becoming a documentarian in the process of telling this deep-seated story made it
all worth it.
But pointing a camera at one's face for hours can be exhausting, specifically when filming with
the De Navas. At 87 and 95 years old, I had to be strategic in documenting their home life;
getting comfortable with the camera took time. I wanted to always respect their boundaries. This
project marries many heavy themes and topics together and being mentally and emotionally
cognizant of other people’s mental health was top of mind. I have never handled a story as
delicately and carefully as I did this one.
As a storyteller, my goal has always been to find the unheard voices and pass them the
microphone … to tell the unabridged story. Producing this documentary has refined my trial and
error. Today, I see storytelling as one of the greatest — if not the greatest — gift and art form to
10
all of humanity. I do not know where I would be today if I had never mustered up the courage to
pick up a production camera for the first time, experiment with lenses, depths of field, filming,
audio, and editing techniques, and produce a story that will exist far beyond my time at USC.
The story I am presenting is one-of-a-kind, and although it is tough to let it go, I have gained
perspective, insight, morals, and values that I never imagined implementing into my own life as a
result of this thesis documentary. Thanks to Adela De Nava, I remind myself to not fear what
circumstances life may throw at me, as unbearable as they may seem, I must keep going. John
De Nava reminds me to never forget where I come from and to celebrate my origins with pride.
Adela Montalvo leaves me with the power of vulnerability, the more I dig into it, the more I can
trust myself. Vincent inspires me to live my passion as a journalist with purpose, and poise, and
that being graceful in my words and actions trumps all. This thesis is not solely an assignment to
hand into the graduate school for the completion of my master's degree, it is a gift to this family,
to all the families of Palo Verde, La Loma, and Bishop, and to those who are curious enough to
question and understand the deep-rooted history of our people in Los Ángeles.
11
Bibliography
(N.d.-a). Retrieved from
https://www.newspapers.com/image/710019860/?terms=chavez+ravine+value+of+homes
(N.d.). Retrieved from https://www.buriedundertheblue.com/
- la loma - bishop - palo verde -. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.notchavezravine.org/
About. (2021). Retrieved from https://mdrakereitan.com/home-page/about/
About. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.buriedundertheblue.com/about
The battle for Chavez Ravine: Eminent domain and the construction of Dodger Stadium. (2019).
Retrieved from https://seamheads.com/blog/2019/04/21/the-battle-for-chavez-ravine-
eminent-domain-and-the-construction-of-dodger-stadium/
Chavez Ravine: A Los Angeles story. (2020). Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBOtKhAAUHs
Davis, M. (2017). Mike Davis, the year 1960, NLR 108, November–December 2017. Retrieved
from https://newleftreview.org/issues/ii108/articles/mike-davis-the-year-1960
Editor, Z. (2023a). May 8, 1959: Mexican American communities evicted. Retrieved from
https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/chavez-ravine-evictions/
Editor, Z. (2023b). May 8, 1959: Mexican American communities evicted. Retrieved from
https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/chavez-ravine-evictions/
12
HENDERSON, C. S. (1980). Los Angeles and the Dodger War, 1957-1962. Southern California
Quarterly, 62(3), 261–289. doi:10.2307/41170888
Jiménez, J. (2023). The land beneath this stadium once was theirs. they want it back. Retrieved
from https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/07/sports/baseball/baseball-dodgers-
reparations.html
Masters, N. (2022c). Chavez Ravine: Community to controversial real estate. Retrieved from
https://www.kcet.org/shows/lost-la/chavez-ravine-community-to-controversial-real-estate
Normark, D. (2003). Chavez Ravine: 1949: A Los Angeles story. Chronicle.
Parson, D. (1993). “This modern marve”: Bunker Hill, Chavez Ravine, and the politics of
modernism in Los Angeles. Southern California Quarterly, 75(3–4), 333–350.
doi:10.2307/41171684
PUBLIC HOUSING AND THE BROOKLYN DODGERS Los Angeles: double play by City
Hall in the Ravine. (n.d.). Retrieved from
https://oac.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/hb1b69n98s/?brand=oac4
rss, A., Several, A. M., Pattison, A. G., & Cooper, A. K. (2021). Retrieved from
https://www.onbunkerhill.org/
Shatkin, E. (2023). The ugly, violent clearing of Chavez Ravine before it was home to the
Dodgers. Retrieved from https://laist.com/news/la-history/dodger-stadium-chavez-ravine-
battle
“stealing home” revisits Dodger Stadium’s nefarious origins. (2020). Retrieved from
https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/books/story/2020-03-31/dodgers-stealing-
home-eric-nusbaum
13
Walter O’Malley : Features : Wyman’s historic efforts bring Dodgers to Los Angeles : Page 2.
(n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.walteromalley.com/en/features/wymans-historic-
efforts/Page-2
Zac. (2018). A short history of California’s First Freeway. Retrieved from
https://www.calbike.org/a_short_history_of_californias_first_freeway/#:~:text=This%20m
onth%20in%20history%3A%20on,California’s%20first%20urban%20freeway%20opened.
14
Documentary Script
Prologue
00:00:00:00
El Barrio Amado — Palo Verde through
three generations
VO
Clip0046 00:01:03:00
Adela recounts her definition of home as
photos of Palo Verde community show on
screen.
Palo Verde, that's, that's the way it should
be.
VO Adela De Nava, a former resident of
Palo Verde, wife of John De Nava, mother
of Adela Montalvo, grandmother of
Vincent Montalvo
Clip0118 00:01:12:16
Adela is in her kitchen preparing a meal
for her husband John.
My name is Adela De Nava, and I'm from
Los Angeles.
SOT
Clip0046 00:01:18:00
Adela sit-down interview
I was born in Los Angeles in Palo Verde,
Chavez Ravine they call it, on August the
first, 1935.
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0119 00:01:30:24
Adela prepares a tea in her kitchen.
I know how heaven is because we lived
there in Palo Verde. It was beautiful. You
were free. Our neighbors were our
friends, our brothers and sisters. We grew
up together.
VO Baseball Announcer
Clip Dodgers Move to LA.mp4
00:01:52:05
Vintage Brooklyn Dodgers footage
This year, baseball finally learned about
the California gold rush, the tears through
which these lady fans watched the last
Dodger game at Ebbets Field failed to
stop the move to the West Coast. The
bombs had been a steady moneymaker,
but owner Walter O'Malley wanted a
larger stadium and better parking
facilities. He played in New York against
Los Angeles in a war of nerves and
15
finally got the deal he wanted in the
California city.
CGI TEXT CARD
00:02:19:12
In 1958, Major League Baseball’s
expansion moved west into Los Angeles,
wiping out the existence of three Mexican
American communities.
These were Palo Verde, La Loma and
Bishop, what is commonly referred to
today as Chavez Ravine.
VO Expert — Dr. Meredith Drake Reitan,
Expert in urban planning and heritage
conservation
Clip0231 00:02:32:09
Photos of Palo Verde family, Palo Verde
Elementary School and bulldozed homes.
I think Chavez Ravine is so strongly in
our memory because it's a scar and it's,
it's a scar that has never been adequately
resolved.
SOT Expert
Clip0231 00:02:45:06
Sit-down interview
It's never been adequately addressed
because the space is still used and
because it's become overlaid with all of
these other sort of loyalties to the
Dodgers …
VO Expert
Clip0231 00:02:53:03
Images of Dodgers in Los Angeles,
construction of Dodger Stadium, Dodger
Stadium today.
… and loyalties to like the team. You
know, it's very hard to kind of mix the
things that happened and to sort of bring
the history of the families who lost their
community into the conversation with
where we are now. Chavez Ravine
becomes more …
SOT Expert
Clip0231 0 00:03:12:29
Sit-down interview
… powerful because we don't actually
address the trauma that was inflicted on
families and communities.
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0122 00:03:26:17
Neighbors would take us in, give us
lunch. Or, "here's some oranges, give,
16
Adela in her kitchen.
give some to the kids," or whatever. He
begged for these. It was a happy family.
The whole barrio, the whole barrio and
comadres and compadres and madrinas
and padrinos [God parents].
SOT Adela De Nava
Clip0046 00:03:51:21
Sit-down interview
That was, though, a beautiful place.
There's no more places like that. No
more.
CGI TEXT CARD
00:04:01:18
At 15 years old, Adela eloped with John
De Nava, a local neighbor from her
community in Palo Verde.
Soon after, they started their own family,
equally filled with fond memories as well
as meeting the challenge of displacement.
SOT Adela de Nava
Clip0046 00:04:16:27
Sit-down interview
The houses that we lived in were houses,
better than this. There were houses ...
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0126 00:04:21:09
Adela washing and cutting a tomato, later
places sweater on her husband John.
I already washed it but I’ll …
We were living with his mom when they
started telling us to pack up because they
were going to move. It's hard for
somebody that lives in one place a long
time and then you have to ... I know that
now because when we had to move from
the apartments, we had to be looking to
see where we were going to land.
Everybody was angry. Oh, boy.
Everybody was angry. My mom used to
cry at night. Then they started bulldozing
everything. They went in and they told
you that they were going to buy your
house and all this, but they were going to
build apartments. And you were the first
one that was going to move in. And it
never happened. Never happened, so.
17
SOT Adela De Nava
Clip0046 00:05:22:23
Sit-down interview
But what can you do? You can do
nothing.
SOT Vincent Montalvo, Lincoln Heights
Neighborhood Councilman, Adela De
Nava’s grandson
Clip0266 00:05:26:15
John walking with his mother Adela
Montalvo on Academy Road toward
Malvina Street.
Mom, do you remember this corner?
Yeah ... This corner's Malvina, this was
the street that ended out of Palo Verde,
where the Arechigas, and Grandma and
Grandpa and where you guys were born.
Yeah. You and Nono. Up the hill right
here. And so it's still here the way it was.
It's just been paved. And now it's part of
the Elysian Park and it's also part of the
Police Academy.
VO Vincent Montalvo
Clip DJI_0089 00:06:08:11
Palo Verde homes in black and white,
legally monitored and filmed drone
footage of Palo Verde hill and today’s
Dodger Stadium.
And the houses would come down all the
way through here, through this tree into
what now is Dodger Stadium. But I know
I came with Grandpa one time, too, and
Grandpa was telling me a lot of stories
about coming through here and how like,
how they used to go to the hills and they
would play or eat avocados in the trees
with the fresh tortillas that they were
getting from …
SOT Vincent Montalvo
Clip0266 00:06:36:16
Vincent standing with his mother Adela
Montalvo on Malvina Street.
… the lady that used to bake them in her
backyard. Yeah, I know. There's a lot of
history on this street.
VO Expert
Clip0231 00:06:46:14
Expert explains the definition and effects
of eminent domain
Eminent domain is a tool.
SOT Expert
Clip0231 00:06:46:14
Sit-down interview
It says the state can take private property
for …
18
VO Expert
Clip0266 00:06:55:21
Vincent and Adela Montalvo standing
together on Malvina Street
… public uses if the owner is justly
compensated. If there is a public good,
the government actually has that right to
do that. Of course, if you're in the …
SOT Expert
Clip0231 00:07:07:14
Sit-down interview
way of the public good, you know, there's
a personal investment that's, that's harder
to kind of fathom.
VO Vincent Montalvo
Clip0288 00:07:15:29
Adela Montalvo holds a cross with the
names of the three communities and year
they were forcefully evicted.
The trauma is real. People just don't get
to interact to see what we see on a daily
basis. This was at a time where Brown
folks could not own homes. But in Palo
Verde, La Loma and Bishop, they did.
And they didn't just own one home. They
owned multiple homes. They had a
community. They had their own policing.
This was before LAPD would come in.
And they were a society that was
thriving.
SOT Vincent Montalvo, Adela Montalvo
Clip0269 00:08:09:17
Vincent and Adela Montalvo bond over
childhood photo of Adela on a horse in the
Palo Verde neighborhood.
That was you.
And my brother.
And then that's your twin brother Nono,
or John. John Jr.
See that, the way it's going down. See the
way it's going down like that?
Yeah
Damn, we were small.
How old were you guys there? You guys
were young. No, like two years old.
With my mom, when she would call us,
she would call us, "Nona Nini, Nono!
Come and eat!" you know.
19
SOT Vincent Montalvo, Adela Montalvo
Clip0270 00:08:44:27
Vincent and Adela Montalvo bond over
childhood photo of Adela on steps of a
Palo Verde home in the early 1950s.
This one is you guys were this is
probably '51,' 52. You guys were still
...you had to have been old enough to
stand up.
I was about three yours old...
No I don't think you were three years old
in this one, you're younger, see, it says
'52. This was in December 1952. I didn't
know it had a date.
Oh, my God! No, no don't show this one
because ... it's embarrassing.
No, don't fold it! Look.
That was on a step of one of the homes in
Palo Verde.
SOT Adela Montalvo, former Palo Verde
resident, daughter of Adela and John De
Nava
Clip0266 00:09:32:23
Adela begins to cry remembering her
childhood community of Palo Verde
So now that I think about it, that ... They
thought we were just trash.
Now I understand why.
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0093 00:10:15:21
Adela De Nava tends to her husband John
at his bedside.
That's what I think, that that's what they
wanted to do. They wanted to get rid of
the Mexican people and whoever was
there. But I don't understand why we
didn't fight. I mean, why. Like now, I
know how to defend myself with my
mouth and those times we were too
young. I mean, I guess.
CGI TEXT CARD
00:10:38:17
https://www.newspapers.com/image/7100
19860/?terms=chavez+ravine+value+of+h
omes
There is evidence to suggest that the L.A.
County Hospital collected health care
service debt from the profits of the sale of
homes in Palo Verde, La Loma and
Bishop.
20
Chavez Ravine: 1949: A Los Angeles
story. Chronicle.
Adela, however, doesn't remember how
much the city paid for her family's two
homes.
On May 14, 1959, Lincoln heights
Bulletin News published an article stating
City Attorney, Roger Arnebergh,
admitted that a Palo Verde home owned
by relatives of the De Navas was
appraised at $17,000.
The family, however, only received
$10,039.
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0145 00:11:13:13
Adela takes the dinner she prepared to her
husband John at his bed.
Okay ... move Papi, you're out, move
Papa. Papa, move.
My story wasn't that pretty …
SOT Adela De Nava
Clip0046 00:11:29:15
Sit-down interview
… but you learn how to live with it. You
survive, you learn how to survive.
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0148 00:11:35:16
Adela gives John his dinner.
You get strong. And that's life, I guess.
You learn how to cope with it.
VO Expert
Clip0148 00:11:46:12
Adela gives John his dinner.
While urban renewal and eminent domain
was a tool that was used and it was used
frequently,
SOT Expert
Clip0231 00:11:52:24
Sit-down interview
I think it's very easy to calculate a fair
market rate. It's harder to calculate the
value of a community.
VO Expert
Clip0201 00:12:04:09
Expert scrolls through digitized version of
1950s Los Angeles land use survey map.
We're not people who just kind of come
and go and have no attachments that
actually there are places that matter
21
SOT Expert
Clip0231 00:11:52:24
Sit-down interview
to people and they matter spiritually.
They matter socially. They matter in all
sorts of ways that are more than the dollar
value of the actual house that they live in.
VO Vincent Montalvo
Clip0277 00:12:28:26
Vincent Montalvo prepares a Buried
Under the Blue booth at Lincoln High
School, Los Angeles.
Today we're at the historical Lincoln
High School, home of the historical
Walkouts. Not too far away from Palo
Verde, La Loma, and Bishop that's just
down the road. The school's putting on an
empowerment workshop to educate
people on the history that we had in our
communities and in the city.
SOT Vincent Montalvo
Clip0267 00:12:48:06
Sit-down interview
Stuff that we're not seeing on the LAUSD
teaching line, right?
CGI TEXT CARD
00:12:52:13
In 2017, Vincent and other descendants
of Palo Verde, La Loma and Bishop
founded Buried Under the Blue.
Their mission is to tell the “true stories”
through the narratives of families that
were
directly impacted by the forceful
evictions
in the 1950s.
SOT Vincent Montalvo
Clip0267 00:13:11:20
Sit-down interview
It was built to bring justice and reparation
to what happened to the three
communities.
VO Vincent Montalvo
Clip0272 00:13:16:22
Vincent organizing historical pictures on
Buried Under the Blue booth, legally
monitored and filmed drone footage of
Solano Canyon homes and surrounding
Chavez Ravine hills today.
It should lead to the reparation and the
correction of the history so that we set
policy and also education straight. Our
goal is to get obviously reparations for
the families, which means the
homeowners and the renters at the
community. But also to repair what we
call land back today, right, which prior to
the people of Palo Verde, La Loma and
22
Bishop, we have the Kizh Nation, the
first people of the L.A. Basin. One of our
goals is to give the land back to them.
Our communities were empowered with
homes in a time where history today
basically says that our history is not
supposed to exist
SOT Vincent Montalvo
Clip0267 00:13:57:25
Sit-down interview
cause we didn't have homes and there
were laws that prevented us. But our
families created generational wealth and
owned multiple homes.
VO Vincent Montalvo
Clip0296 00:14:05:19
Vincent points to his grandfather in a
photo at a Palo Verde reunion in 2016,
other historical photos shown on booth
table, Vincent holds up a Buried Under the
Blue logo post card.
This is a real true story of the American
Dream, until the Americans found out
about us and turned it into a nightmare
because it was a true success story at so
many different levels. And very
important to L.A. history and to what
we're doing today in the housing crisis
and housing issues of Los Angeles. Our
main mission is to tell our story. Buried
Under the Blue decided to come out and
was invited to specifically table and
inform people of history that we have not
seen yet. And a lot of people are
receiving it well, they're very excited. I'm
hoping that people really take this into
the classroom and that one day we can
really get this into the classroom as a
curriculum.
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0302 00:15:00:13
Adela and John looking at framed black
and white photo of Palo Verde
community.
Ah, God. ¿Quien serian estos? Maybe we
were even in these pictures and we don't
know. We never checked.
SOT John De Nava, former resident of
Palo Verde, husband of Adela De Nava,
father of Adela Montalvo, grandfather of
Vincent Montalvo
Clip0302 00:15:12:14
That's the way you'd go to your house.
No, no. I'm over here on this side.
23
John De Nava pointing at photo, Adela
responding.
Next to your house right there, on
Reposa. And Malvina over here.
VO Expert
Clip0302 00:15:30:12
Adela holds framed photograph.
History doesn't repeat, but it echoes.
There are definitely ripple effects that
spread out generationally.
SOT Expert
Clip0231 00:15:40:10
Sit-down interview
There are some who have access to
wealth because they've got access to land
and they've got access to housing and
they've got access to loans that are based
on housing.
VO Expert
Clip0302 00:15:49:22
John holds framed photograph.
And there are some who don't have that
same access. And so that is a cycle
exacerbated by decisions that were made
by policymakers, by urban planners that
kind of made things worse for some
communities, while some actually
benefited.
SOT Adela De Nava
Clip0289 00:16:06:00
Sit-down interview sitting next to John.
If they were going to build that stadium
there, why did they take Palo Verde and
this side off? It wasn't bothering them.
How come they didn't take the park off?
SOT John De Nava
Clip0302 00:16:19:14
John pointing at framed photograph.
This is Lookout, right? Then it’s my hill
right here ... right here. And this is
Reposa, right here.
SOT Expert
Clip0231 00:16:34:03
Sit-down interview
I think there are opportunities for us to
think about displacement now,
gentrification.
VO Expert
Clip0231 00:16:41:27
What do we owe communities to make
them whole?
24
John pointing at framed photograph.
SOT Adela De Nava
Clip0289 00:16:46:17
Sit-down interview sitting next to John.
We were born there, we grew there. And
it's like my mom used to say, "Your
lombriga [umbilical cord] is buried there.
Don't ever forget it."
VO Adela De Nava
Clip0203 00:16:59:00
Adela and John both hold up framed
photograph of the Palo Verde community.
If you learn what we went through,
maybe you could feel something and try
to do it for your grandkids or, you know,
make it something that they can
remember.
SOT Adela De Nava
Clip0305 00:17:15:11
Adela puts away framed photograph on
desk shelf.
Okay, it's time for dinner now.
Ending
00:17:58:13
Documentary:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Vw4Z79lc-YC1oq83sDTixo1iYuFbweJj/view?usp=sharing
25
Script Bibliography
(N.d.-a). Retrieved from
https://www.newspapers.com/image/710019860/?terms=chavez+ravine+value+of+homes
De Nava, Adela, interview by Emily Bonilla. 2023. Former Palo Verde resident, wife of John de
Nava, mother of Adela Montalvo, grandmother of Vincent Montalvo. (February 11,
February 26).
De Nava, John, interviewed by Emily Bonilla 2023. Former Palo Verde resident, Husband of
Adela De Nava, father of Adela Montalvo, grandfather of Vincent Montalvo. (February
26).
Drake Reitan, Dr. Meredith, interview by Emily Bonilla 2023. Expert in urban planning and
heritage conservation. (March 31).
Montalvo, Adela, interviewed by Emily Bonilla 2023. Former Palo Verde resident, daughter of
Adela and John De Nava, mother of Vincent Montalvo. (March 5).
Montalvo, Vincent, interviewed by Emily Bonilla 2023 Lincoln Heights Neighborhood
Councilman, son of Adela Montalvo, grandson of Adela and John De Nava. (March 5,
April 22).
Abstract (if available)
Abstract
“El Barrio Amado — Palo Verde through three generations” is a documentary examining the themes of home, community, displacement, gentrification, and a vital portion of the Mexican American experience commonly left out of American history books and classroom curricula. The word barrio is a slang term commonly used by people of Mexican descent that means neighborhood, amado means loved. This documentary specifically focuses on three generations of a family, the De Nava family and the Montalvo family, who experienced the loss of home, generational wealth, and a promised “American Dream” by being forcefully removed from their homes in the Palo Verde community, their barrio amado. This area of land is now home to prime real estate in the north and northeastern part of the city of Los Angeles; today it is known as Chavez Ravine. For the first time in their lives, Adela and John De Nava, their oldest daughter Adela Montalvo, and grandson Vincent Montalvo recount their family’s stories, question the past, revisit decades of trauma, and allow their stories to be told through the use of journalistic documentary storytelling. This three-generation family lineage was at long last ready to present their stories beyond their barrio, beyond Los Angeles. This documentary provides expert views of what it means to value a community, its erasure, and conversations of proper compensation, commemoration, and justified reparations. “El Barrio Amado — Palo Verde through three generations,” asks the question, “What is the definition of home when physical, emotional, and spiritual forms of home are forcefully taken from you?” The family is finally given a platform to voice their answer; home is forever in Palo Verde.
Linked assets
University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses
Asset Metadata
Creator
Bonilla, Emily Clarisse
(author)
Core Title
El Barrio Amado - Palo Verde through three generations
School
Annenberg School for Communication
Degree
Master of Arts
Degree Program
Specialized Journalism
Degree Conferral Date
2023-08
Publication Date
07/10/2023
Defense Date
07/07/2023
Publisher
University of Southern California
(original),
University of Southern California. Libraries
(digital)
Tag
Arechiga,Bishop,Buried Under The Blue,Chavez Ravine,De Nava,displacement,Dodger Stadium,Dodgers,Elysian Park,eminent domain,Eviction,injustice,Justice,Kizh Nation,La Loma,land back,OAI-PMH Harvest,O'Malley,Palo Verde,Race,reparations
Format
theses
(aat)
Language
English
Contributor
Electronically uploaded by the author
(provenance)
Advisor
Birman, Daniel (
committee chair
), Fellenzer, Jeff (
committee member
), Seidenberg, Willa (
committee member
)
Creator Email
ecbonill@usc.edu,eclarisse11@gmail.com
Permanent Link (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-oUC113262987
Unique identifier
UC113262987
Identifier
etd-BonillaEmi-12046.pdf (filename)
Legacy Identifier
etd-BonillaEmi-12046
Document Type
Thesis
Format
theses (aat)
Rights
Bonilla, Emily Clarisse
Internet Media Type
application/pdf
Type
texts
Source
20230710-usctheses-batch-1064
(batch),
University of Southern California
(contributing entity),
University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses
(collection)
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The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the author, as the original true and official version of the work, but does not grant the reader permission to use the work if the desired use is covered by copyright. It is the author, as rights holder, who must provide use permission if such use is covered by copyright.
Repository Name
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Repository Email
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Tags
Arechiga
Buried Under The Blue
De Nava
displacement
Dodgers
eminent domain
injustice
Kizh Nation
La Loma
land back
O'Malley
Palo Verde