Accessing the Right California Resources

The first resource that I decided to research was James J. Rawls’s “California: A people, a Place, a Dream”. This article discusses the false hope that California promises immigrants that migrate to the dreamland. James J. Rawls states that the California Dream is filled with high expectations that are not met once immigrants get here. California is seen as a place of “endless blue skies and spectacular seacoasts” (Rawls 142). Many people believe that their deepest longing for a better lifestyle will be fulfilled once they arrive to California. However, many immigrants are surely mistaken once they arrive to the “Golden State” and realize that the California Dream is simply a myth. Rawls traces the origin of the false California Dream all the way back to the Gold Rush where a mass influx of eager and expectant people, who believed that no work was required to fulfill their dreams, filled the state of California. These people created the false California Dream that, still to this day, lead immigrants to believing in the false hope that California provides. This article is extremely helpful in the fact that it allows me to get an even better grasp as to what immigrants thought of California before migrating there and how they viewed it afterwards.

The second resource that I explored was “Immigrants Out!: The New Nativism and the Anti-Immigrant Impulse in the United States”. This article focuses on the America’s view of immigrant in the country and even focuses on California's Proposition 187, which was a proposition to establish a state-run citizenship screening system as well as prohibit illegal immigrants from using health care, public education, and other social services in California. This article will definitely be useful in figuring out whether California accepted the assimilation of certain groups of immigrants. Identifying key figuring such as intermarriage between ethnic groups is the ultimate measuring stick as to whether or not a group has truly assimilated in America. This along with many of topics concerning immigration is viewed in “Immigration Out”.

Storytelling

On Wednesday October 19,2011 I witnessed Tracey Kidder, a Harvard University graduate, deliver a captivating speech about his time in Africa and his experience with a friend that changed his life. Kidder begins his storytelling with an anecdote about his soon-to-be friend Dei, who endured pain and strife in the midst of civil unrest in his country of Burundi. Dei eventually escaped to America where he enrolled in Columbia University. Immediately, the idea of sunshine and noir hit me as I imagined the war that proceeded in Burundi represented darkness and confusion (noir) while the hope and promise that America provided represented light and positiveness (sunshine).
Later Kidder discusses how he met Dei and traveled back to Burundi in order help with the poverty that consumed the area. Dei had the mindset of creating something bigger than himself upon his arrival and so he did as he constructed the "Village Health Works". This structure was a hospital that aided the sick and wounded in Burundi. Dei's mindset was completely different from the mindsets of the water barons of Los Angeles such as William Mulholland because, in contrast to Dei, Mulholland only cared about getting water into Los Angeles and not the lives of the people of the Owens River Valley.

Kidder closed his speech with the main point of his speech which was, "one can understand the world through storytelling". He proceeded to elaborate by stating that storytelling is an art that if used right can captivate an entire audience. This reminded me of the reason why students at USC are required to take Writing-140. This class is meant to develop student's ability to create arguments and back them up in order to convince your audience of your position.

William Mulholland Revealed!

After deeply researching the famous water engineer of Los Angeles, William Mulholland, my opinion of his character and morals has largely changed. Initially, my view of Mulholland was skewed due to the viewing of the movie "Cadillac Desert". The movie contained heavy commentary from Mulholland's granddaughter. At one instance of the movie she talked about Mulholland being only concerned about the people of Los Angeles when the St. Francis Dam broke. Her kind, warming words about her grandfather throughout the film planted an image of a compassionate, noble man inside my head. This image would begin to germinate in my psyche and before you know it my draft of my "LA's Past and Prologue" essay is geared toward Mulholland being the kind savior of Los Angeles. However, my research has led me to conclude that Mulholland was not concerned with the people of LA or the people in which he took the water from.

Mulholland was a water engineer, and with an engineer's mindset, he saw the task of getting a water source for LA with tunnel vision. This means that Mulholland created a solution that did not keep in mind the side effects that it would create. The solution was an extensive aqueduct that carried water from Mono Lake and Owens River Valley to LA, but this masterpiece did not take into account the damage of the ecosystem of the two water sources. In addition, the people of Mono Lake and Owens River Valley lost the majority of their source of water for their own needs. The caring image of Mulholland in "Cadillac Desert" was created by his granddaughter, a close relative who was likely to supply this view of Mulholland. Real history shows that this water engineer was not concerned with anything but getting water into the growing city of Los Angeles.

With this being said, the citizens of Los Angeles are also to blame for the deprivation of water from the Mono Lake and Owens Valley Lake community. The people of LA as a whole were only concerned with getting water into the city as well, and did not care about the methods that transported the resource into it. This is evident because no protests or disapprovals were made about Mulholland until after the St. Francis Dam broke. Los Angeles at that time period was only concerned with growth and expansion, and not the well-being of other cities and regions.

William Mulholland-Savior or Foe?

For my topic on the history of Los Angeles, I decided to write about the water struggle in LA and the man, by the name of William Mulholland, who constructed the water aqueducts that allowed for water to flow through the regoin. At the beginning of the acquisition of water to LA, Mulholland was seen as the hero of the city. Los Angeles was growing and without adequate water supply the city would stop growing. As a result, Mulholland had the idea of bringing water to LA via the Owens River Valley. He would do this by building aqueducts from the River Valley to Los Angeles in what became the key factor to Los Angeles expanding to the size it did today. After the project was completed, Mulholland was treated as if he were a God as the whole idea of LA being a beautiful paradise was now complete due to the availability of water. However, the notion of William Mulholland being the savior of LA completely diminished when a dam holding the city's water reserves breaks after inspection. This devastating event cost millions of dollars and numerous lives. Mulholland was immediately shunned from the town and fell out of the grace of Los Angeles forever. In my research, I will be looking articles and documents that discribe how the citizens of LA felt toward Mulholland on a deeper level after the breaking of the dam. The more detail I aquire on the feel of the citizens of LA during the tragic event, the better understanding of the spirit and nature of LA I acquire.