Photo: Alison Rose Jefferson showing Phillips Chapel CME Church. Photograph: Julien James/The Guardian

‘Denying our humanity’: how Santa Monica decimated a thriving Black community
By Sam Levin | The Guardian 
July 31, 2023

African Americans helped build the iconic beach town, historian Alison Rose Jefferson details as California weighs reparations.

At Shutters on the Beach, a luxury hotel in Santa Monica, guests staying in $1,500-a-night rooms can get pristine views of white-sand shores and the Pacific Ocean, hot stone massages, afternoons filled with live jazz and fresh seafood dinners.

Few visitors, however, will know that 100 years ago, the site was at the center of a painful turning point for Santa Monica’s Black community.

Read the article here.