Boom Years for L.A.

Thanks mainly to war production, World War II (1939-1945) launched a period of astounding growth in Los Angeles that did not slow down until the 1970s.

The population of Los Angeles County at the beginning of the war was just over 3 million; by 1950 it had soared to 4.7 million.

Postwar demobilization of military personnel created a huge demand for homes, so a new burst of residential and population expansion characterized the 1950s and 1960s. As this segregated white population spread outward, 20 new cities within Los Angeles County were founded during the 1950s alone.

In the San Fernando Valley, thousands of acres of orange groves were bulldozed and replaced with tract homes. At the same time, national military buildup associated with the Cold War continued high levels of military production, keeping the area’s economy strong.

In 1961 the expanded and redesigned Los Angeles International Airport was dedicated. Its spaceship-shaped Theme Building became a new Los Angeles icon, and, like many features of Los Angeles, an American icon as well.

In the period of the 1950s and 1960s, many U.S. citizens came to view Los Angeles as the representation of the American dream. This dream life featured an affordable home with a backyard swimming pool, year-round barbecues, and a convertible automobile for commuting to a white-collar job—possibly in Hollywood—during weekdays and to the beaches for surf parties on weekends.

A major symbol of Los Angeles's challenge to the East Coast for American cultural preeminence was the move of Brooklyn’s beloved Dodgers baseball team from New York to Los Angeles in 1958.

In Los Angeles the Dodgers won the World Series in 1959 and moved into Dodger Stadium in 1962, where they won the pennant again in 1963.

Federal transportation and housing funds poured into the metropolis during the 1940s and 1950s, fueling a massive boom in freeway construction and urban redevelopment. Within two decades hundreds of miles of freeways were built, including the Harbor (I-110), Hollywood (U.S. 101), and Santa Monica (I-10) freeways. The old core of downtown Los Angeles was razed in the 1960s and rebuilt as a gleaming new office and fine arts complex.

But amid all this prosperity and optimistic building, social crises clouded the otherwise sunny skies. Prosperity and expansion had proceeded heedless of racial equality.

Los Angeles was one of the most segregated cities in the United States, and the most lucrative new jobs were beyond the reach of the increasingly impoverished African American community.

Frustrations exploded in August 1965, sparked by the alleged beating of an African American motorist by two California Highway Patrol officers in the community of Watts.

Six days of unprecedented, destructive rioting ensued, laying waste to 28 sq km (11 sq mi) of the city and resulting in 34 deaths (28 of whom were African Americans) and $40 million in property damage.

It was estimated that 50,000 people participated in the riot, which took more than 35,000 law enforcement officers and National Guardsmen to suppress.

Racial relations improved in the aftermath of the riot, leading to the election of the city's first African American mayor, Tom Bradley, in 1973.