The San Gabriel Mountains formed the northern border. The Puente-Montebello Hills closed the valley in on the south. Muddy riverbeds and railroad tracks cut through the middle.
The eastern edge was ambiguously defined. When the view improved, you knew you were out of the valley.
The San Gabriel Valley was flat and box-shaped. The mountain flank trapped in smog. The individual towns— Alhambra, Industry, Bassett, La Puente, Covina, West Covina, Baldwin Park, El Monte, Temple City, Rosemead, San Gabriel, South San Gabriel, Irwindale, Duarte—bled together with nothing but Kiwanis Club signs to distinguish them.
The San Gabriel Valley was hot and humid. Wicked winds kicked dust off the northern foothills. Packed-dirt sidewalks and gravel-pit debris made your eyes sting.
Valley land was cheap. The flat topography was ideal for grid housing and potential freeway construction. The more remote the area, the more land your money got you. You could hunt coons a few blocks off the local main drag and nobody would give you any grief. You could fence in your yard and raise chickens and goats for slaughter. You could let your toddlers run down the block in their shit-stained diapers.
The San Gabriel Valley was White Trash Heaven.
Spanish explorers discovered the valley in 1769. They wiped out the indigenous Indian population and established a mission near the Pomona Freeway-Rosemead Boulevard juncture. La Mision del Santo Arcangel San Gabriel de los Temblores predated the first L.A. settlement by ten years.
Mexican marauders took over the valley in 1822. They kicked out the Spaniards and appropriated their mission land. The United States and Mexico fought a brief war in ’46. The Mexicans lost and had to fork over California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah and New Mexico.
The White Man got business going. The San Gabriel Valley enjoyed a long agriculture boom. Confederate sympathizers moved west after the Civil War and bought a lot of valley land.
The railroad shot through in 1872 and sparked a real-estate boom. The valley’s population increased by 1,000%. L.A. was becoming a good-sized burg. The valley cashed in on it.
Real-estate profiteers annexed the valley into small cities. A development boom followed and continued straight through the 1920s. City populations grew exponentially.
Housing bans were enforced valley-wide. Mexicans were restricted to slum districts and tin-roof shantytowns. Negroes were not allowed on the streets after dark.
Walnut crops were big. Citrus crops were big. Dairies were a real moneymaker.
The Depression put the skids to San Gabriel Valley growth. World War II resurrected it. Returning GIs got hip to westward migration. Real-estate developers got hip to their hipness.
Tracts and subdivisions went up. Walnut groves and orchards were blitzed to make room for more and more of them. City boundaries expanded.
The population skyrocketed through the ’50s. The agriculture biz declined. Manufacturing and light industry flourished. The San Bernardino Freeway stretched from downtown L.A. to south of El Monte. Automobiles became a necessity.
Smog arrived. More housing developments went up. The boom economy brought a new look to the valley—but did not in any way alter its Wild West character.
You had Dust Bowl refugees and their teenage kids. You had pachucos with duck’s-ass haircuts, Sir Guy shirts and slit-bottomed khakis. Okies hated spies the way the old cowboys hated Indians.
You had a big influx of men fucked up by World War II and Korea. You had packed suburbs interspersed with large rural patches. You could walk down the Rio Hondo Wash and catch fish with your hands. You could jump into the Rosemead cattle pens and shoot yourself a cow. You could carve yourself a nice fresh steak right there.
You could go drinking. You could hit the Aces, the Torch, the Ship’s Inn, the Wee Nipee, the Playroom, Suzanne’s, the Kit Kat, the Hat, the Bonnie Rae or the Jolly Jug. You could see what was shaking at the Horseshoe, the Coconino, the Trade-winds, the Desert Inn, the Time-Out, the Jet Room, the Lucky X or the Alibi. The Hollywood East was good. The Big Time, the Off-Beat, the Manger, the Blue Room and the French Basque were okay. Ditto the Cobra Room, Lalo’s, the Pine-Away, the Melody Room, the Cave, the Sportsman, the Pioneer, the 49’er, the Palms and the Twister.
You could belt a few. You might meet somebody. The ’50s divorce boom was peaking. You could draw from a big pool of at-the-ready women. El Monte was the ’58 hub of the valley. Early settlers called it “the End of the Santa Fe Trail.” It was a shitkicker town and a good place to have fun. Recent settlers called it “the City of Divorced Women.” It was a honky-tonk place with a more-than-distinct western atmosphere.
The population hovered around 10,000. It was 90% white and 10% Mexican. The city was five miles square. Unincorporated county land bordered it.
The population expanded on Saturday nights. Out-of-towners drove in to prowl the cocktail joints on Valley and Garvey. The El Monte Legion Stadium featured Cliffie Stone and Hometown Jamboree—broadcast live on KTLA- TV
The audience wore cowboy garb: Stetsons and pipestem pants for the men; starched hoop skirts for the women. The Stadium ran doo-wop dances on Cliffie’s off-Saturdays. Pachucos and white punks slugged it out in the parking lot regularly.
The San Berdoo Freeway cut through El Monte. Motorists exited and took Valley Boulevard eastbound. They stopped to eat at Stan’s Drive-in and the Hula-Hut. They stopped to drink at the Desert Inn, the Playroom and the Horseshoe. Valley was
The action strip ended at Five Points—the juncture of Valley and Garvey. Stan’s and the Playroom stood at the prime northeast corner. Crawford’s Giant Country Market was just across the street. A dozen restaurants and juke joints were jammed together off the intersection.
Residential El Monte ran north, south and west of there. Houses were small and came in two styles: faux-ranch and stucco cube. Mexicans were isolated in a strip called Medina Court and a shack town named Hicks Camp.
Medina Court was three blocks long. The houses there were made of cinderblock and scavenged wood. Hicks Camp was just across the Pacific-Electric tracks. The houses there had dirt floors and were built from lumber ripped
