L.A. People 2008

In character

A A A Comments (4) By Laurie Ochoa Wednesday, May 14 2008

When you fall in love with a city, you fall in love with the character of the city, that hard-to-define sense of place that is sometimes revealed through architecture, cultural achievements, climate ... or by its taco trucks and $4 cupcakes. In this issue, we look at Los Angeles through the people who live here — the characters of the city. The coroner’s investigator who is the Nancy Drew of ancient Indian burial sites. The mixed-martial-arts expert who lugs his guitar to the gym along with his workout gear. The journalist who spent a year documenting every homicide in the city. The blogger who found instant fame this year with an idea that half the country thinks they should have thought of first. The major Hollywood star and producer who has found artistic freedom on the Web. Risk-taking comedians. We are a city of celebrity hairdressers and rock-star life coaches, but just as telling is the artist who adorns the city’s power lines with his work just to make it a more beautiful place. Or the pretty greenskeeper at one of the city’s most exclusive golf courses who can do one-arm push-ups.

In Los Angeles, everyone has more than one thing going on. We are dreamers who often find what we’re looking for and then want more. In this, our third-annual L.A. People issue, we’ve found so many personalities to write about that we have decided to expand the concept from a once-a-year event to a weekly feature. In L.A., the baby-faced, 7-foot Spaniard with the NBA basketball could be the boy next door.

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All photos by Kevin Scanlon. To see slideshows of Scanlon's People 2008 photos click here and here.

Also see our People 2007 issue here.

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Pam Ward, LA native and the WI 07/29/2008 1:28:00 AM

Pam Ward Writes About the Wild Wild West Pam Ward is a third generation native of Los Angeles who likes to write about all that stuff your mama told you hush when you asked her: sex, politics, unthinkable crime and the freeway long rides through the streets of L.A. A California Arts Council Fellow in Literature and a New Letters Award winner, she has had her work published in Scream When you Burn, Grand Passion, Calyx, Catch the Fire, Men We Cherish and Best American Erotica, to name a few. Her first novel, WANT SOME GET SOME, Kensington 2007 is a ode to Los Angeles and takes place a few years after the �92 riots. �I lived through two LA riots and couldn�t wait to jump in my car and go down Crenshaw to see what the hell was going on in April of �92.� Armed with her rottweiler, Pam rolled down the boulevard behind a caravan of Crips who were videotaping the event on their motorcycles and SUV�s while waving blue scarfs. �I wrote WANT SOME GET SOME on my front porch during the three week hiatus the riot created from my graphic design business. None of my clients wanted to come where I lived and worked off Crenshaw and Adams so I had a great window to do something else creative. I wrote the whole book long hand using my daughter�s notebook paper. I was breathing in all that riot smoke, watching telephone poles blaze up like big christmas trees as gangs of folks raced home with fresh stolen booze.� A Los Angeles poet, Pam wrote, published and ran a small press for community writers called Short Dress Press, publishing the first anthology of black female poets called, The Supergirl's Handbook. �It was a natural step as a writer and graphics person.� A former instructor and current mentor at Art Center College of Design, Pam runs a graphic design business while raising her daughters. �I come from a big, artistic close-knit family. We�re very clannish. My grandpa is 96 and lives with my mom. He tells us stories about old LA and remembers seeing the actual Klan marching around the park in Watts.� Her grandfather, George Comfort, lived next to the man who ran the first bus in Watts which he made himself out of an old broken down truck. He gave rides to the people in town for a nickel circling 103 to Wilmington to Imperial to Compton and parked his bus in Pam�s great aunt�s lot and lived in it. �Grandpa also gave rides to his acting partner, Dorothy Dandridge while filming Porgy and Bess and almost bought the house next to hers but Grandmother put the brakes on that.� Pam's mother Bonnie, a former Watts resident, who graced the cover of Jet magazine in the fifties also helped Simon Rodia with her contributions of broken cups and plates which are woven in the Watts Towers today. Pam�s father, James Moore, a Los Angeles architect, designed the new Watts Library on 103rd and Central and other LA landmarks. Pam�s second novel, BAD GIRLS BURN SLOW is about criminals, fake identity and the funeral business. "I live right next to Rosedale, the second oldest cemetery in Los Angeles and the first to bury blacks and whites side by side. Since I have both cops and robbers in my blood my stories have lots of criminal elements based on actual Los Angeles facts. �I�m a progression of the wild wild west. My family gave me a keen sense of awareness and unwavering black pride which I wear like bullet proof vest." pam ward (323) 732-3391 � wardgraphics@sbcglobal.net � www.pamwardwriter.com
Nancy Lewis 05/16/2008 3:31:00 AM

Fantastic that your mag is so cool to recognize the amazing talents of MoJow & the Vibration Army! They are brilliantly entertaining & they deserve the front cover!
julie simpson 05/15/2008 7:49:00 PM

BIG UP MOJOW! KEEP MARCHING ON VIBRATION ARMY! NO ONE CAN ROCK AN ARTESIAN WELL LIKE THE DUO!!
Sarah 05/15/2008 12:26:00 PM

In one of the most diverse cities in the world - why are all of these people white? Completely unreflective.