Short Stuff: Skid Row (not the band) | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

[Music]. hey and welcome to the short stuff I'm. Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's here. too and this is short. stuff another short stuff uh this one a. bit Crusade and I think important that's. right uh because if you have ever driven. through downtown Los Angeles there's a. good chance you may have maybe on. purpose or maybe accidentally turned. into the heart of skid row uh which is a. 50 City Block area roughly uh in the.

heart of downtown um that is something. that happened to me when I lived there. and I had heard of skid row but I had. never seen it and all of a sudden I was. in the middle of it and I was like wow I. didn't quite know it was like this down. here yeah we stayed nearby too and I. don't know if we made it all the way. there but you could tell it was very. close by um and the hotel Cecil which. was uh made very famous by the death of. Alisa lamb is uh right there in the.

midst of skidrow and as a matter of fact. it's been turned into housing for the. people who live on skidrow and skidrow. we should say finds his origin the term. here in Los Angeles Los Angeles is like. there's Skid Row in just about every. town it's what they call them but the. original Skid Row is in Los Angeles and. it's been there essentially as long as. Los Angeles has yeah sort of uh I mean. La was there but it wasn't the LA we. know yes but okay so so it it's it.

followed so quickly on the heels of the. establishment of La that it's. practically part of it. forever well it's definitely a part of. it fair enough so uh what is going on in. skidrow is um unhoused people are living. there um as many as 10,000 11,000 it's. kind of hard to get an exact number. because it fluctuates uh a few thousand. of those live in uh tent city um the. rest live in Shel ERS uh some live in.

SRO hotels single room occupancy hotels. uh the ones who are really um lucky are. living in newer mini apartments that. have been constructed by. nonprofits and that is what it's going. on about 20% of them are are US military. veterans uh most are black males but. there are people of all stripes on. skidrow yeah and like I said it's been. around a very long time but it's under. threat actually um which you might be.

like well isn't it always under threat. no it was actually protected for decades. we'll talk about the the impending. threats and whether it's going to go. through or not but um let's talk a. little bit about the original history of. the thing shall we yeah and I think I. see what you were saying. now uh about skid being there as long as. LA's been there thank you but I just. don't agree because skidrow skid really. was the 1930s and La started to become a. thing at the turn of the. century okay okay you know what I'm.

saying we're going to Hash this out one. way or another over the course of this. episode I promise so in the 1870s La uh. at San Francisco is getting all the. California Love uh with in terms of uh. infrastructure and stuff like that uh. namely railroads going in there and so. la was like hey what about us down here. we could use a railroad so they said. yeah it's a good idea so they built that. railroad down to California and where. that railroad ended is what is now right. in the middle of Skid Row.

yeah so it like you said it wasn't skid. R yet fair enough I I can agree with you. on that what but it has always been a. bit of a rough and tumble area sure the. so the skid row area that we know and. love now is actually um a Remnant a. relic of the area that that grew up. around those railroad yards to house and. entertain the workers almost entirely. single young men who came to to Los.

Angeles along with the railroad to. unload rail cars to load rail cars to. box Citrus just do all the things that. you need to do around a rail yard and. some of them started hanging out around. there and that's where the neighborhood. that is now skid bro finally started to. develop that's right and because they. were young men basically uh there were. you know bars and saloons and brothel. and they had those single resident. hotels very early. on uh oil came to LA and that brought. even more people um the automobile.

industry really brought a lot more. people in the film industry brought more. people in uh basically you know people. were migrating westward in great great. numbers and this area where that train. ended uh just became overrun they you. know there weren't enough jobs uh all of. a sudden you had people sleeping in Hobo. encampments you had people sleeping on. The Rail Yards and in the cars and some. of them if they were lucky enough to get. into one of those you know cruddy SRO.

hotels did so but the 1930s is when I. mean it basically became the skid r that. we know it now a permanent underclass. living there yeah and so I mean it was. already the downtrodden were already. starting to accumulate in Skid Row but. it was not helped At All by the. depression and the Dust Bowl that pushed. migration further west and made people. even more destitute so that kind of. sealed the deal like you said from the. 1930s onward Skid Row as we understand.

it today was was born and I say we take. a break and we come back and talk some. more about skid row let's do. [Music]. it okay Chuck so um the skidrow.

population was greatly added to um. during the second world war and the. Korean War because Los Angeles was a. port of exit and entry back to the. United States for soldiers that were. shipping out and some of them came back. and were not prepared to go home they. had PTSD they had developed drug. addiction they had developed alcoholism. and they stuck around La and they just. inevitably would migrate to skidrow. that's just kind of where people have. always been funneled and as part of.

urban renewal in the 50s and 60s a lot. of other cities were like we're just. going to build a highway through skid R. and that's how we're going to get rid of. it in Los Angeles the people leading the. city at the time said we're not going to. do that we're actually going to preserve. this area for the people who need it. that's right uh that was in. 1976 uh they said you know there needs. to be a place for uh people I think they. labeled them extremely low income uh but. in most cases it was probably no in come.

uh and you know there's a couple of ways. to look at this in one way it was a more. humanitarian policy than um demolishing. it and building a highway through it uh. and another uh another way to look at it. is that was it was a part of a. containment strategy which is like hey. don't leave this 50 square block area. this is yours uh it's basically like. Escape From New York down there but uh. as long as you stay in that area then. you know it's sort of like the not in my. backyard thing uh we just you know stay.

in that area and everything will be okay. I think escape from La would be more. appropriate don't you the sequel yeah. but that was so not good was it I've. never seen it it was strangely a garbage. movie considering how great a filmmaker. Carpenter was and how Great Escape From. New York was well was it because he. substituted Kurt Russell with Hillary. Swank yeah that was. it I was wondering you're going to I was. wondering what actor was going to come. out of your mouth when you started that.

not what I expected so that was the 70s. so um that was pretty cool I mean yes it. depends on how you look at it it was. either a ruthless strategy or a Humane. solution I think it's kind of both do we. have to think in such black and white. terms agreed um but this this area now. contained meant that the other area of. downtown could be refurbished and open. for business because skidrow as you. might have imagined chased the. businesses out of downtown but now that. the people who lived in skidrow were. like this is your spot you have to stay.

here we're going to develop around you. and the area became gentrified um but. the people were from skidrow actually. benefited from that because those single. room occupancy hotels um that had been. built over the last like 50 60 70 years. or longer um were starting to get really. down in the heels and and threadbear so. they demolished some of them or they. refurbished them and they did it for the. residents of skid R they they.

essentially gentrified skidrow for the. residents of skid in the 80s and 90s. yeah they tried uh the Cecil hotel in. fact was um I think they finally. finished it but they were I think they. were refurbishing it and then it was. shut down because of covid and I think. they eventually finished it even though. the cesil hotel property is is now up. for sale um and there's you know there's. a lot going on now you know is skid grow. going to look this way in 10 years. probably not there are three big.

developments that are going on uh one of. which is those SRO that you were talking. about from the 80s and 90s that they. helped build back up are in a lot of. trouble uh financially and just. livability goes because they're not. putting the money into it to keep them. up uh they were just built new and have. kind of become more dilapidated over the. years uh the biggest of these providers. uh the Skid Row Housing Trust uh went. into a receivership last year so that's. not a good sign things to come no and.

there's um there's a group called the. AIDS Healthcare Foundation that is. trying to take over the skidrow housing. trusts um properties to keep them going. but apparently their own single room. occupancy building as um they're having. so much trouble running it that the city. actually stepped in to be like we don't. approve this deal we don't want this. deal to happen so it's not. clear how this is going to happen but. there does seem to be a progress r or a. progression toward knocking down some of.

those buildings and building up the. highrises that again are being built for. the residents of skid R and if that. happens they're they're going to be much. better off than they are now because a. single room occupancy hotel room is it's. a room there's a bed there's a desk. there's room enough for you there's no. bathroom there's a bathroom down the. hall what they're building instead are. mini Apartments to where like this is. your home this is your unit you can stay. in here here and you don't have to go.

out if you don't want to at all there's. no shared bathroom it's your spot that's. what they're trying to build now and if. everybody can get it together that's. what they're going to have like you said. in the next 10 years yeah and you know. if you've ever visited LA and you went. to the sort of newly crowned uh downtown. Arts District which is now booming with. brew pubs and restaurants and wine bars. and theaters and all the things that you. would expect in a a gentrified uh. downtown situation.

uh and if you're like why this art is. great um you may not know that the skid. Ro was literally right next to you um I. don't know if you saw that show on Apple. TV platonic with Seth Rogan and Rose. Burn no uh friend of the show Janet. vanney is also in it by the way okay um. it's the whole thing basically is uh or. at least Seth Rogan and his his Brew Pub. is in the arts district and a lot of the. filming takes place right there so if. you've seen that show just blocks away. or you know 10,000 people living on the.

streets uh so it's just something to. remember when you're being a tourist in. that town yeah I hope to get to make it. to a brew pub. someday I'll take you we'll have a have. a nice Hy IPA that sounds great I wonder. if they'll have one I don't know maybe. we can Dare To Dream yeah uh you got. anything else about skid ow I guess the. the main message here is wait and see. and cross your fingers and hope hope. hope that's right uh okay well then.

that's it for this short stuff everybody. and that means short stuff is. out stuff you should know is a. production of iHeart radio for more. podcasts iHeart Radio visit the ihart. radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you. listen to your favorite shows. [Music].