The Golden Summer/Introduction
This is a 28 page “book” I just finished. I will post it in sections.
Here is the cover page for a hard copy followed by the Introduction.
THE GOLDEN SUMMER
DTLA 2040…Skid Row Action Plan…United Methodist Church
Land Acknowledgment — County of Los Angeles
“The County of Los Angeles recognizes that we occupy land originally and still inhabited and cared for by the Tongva, Tatavium, Serrano, Kizh, and Chumash Peoples. We honor and pay respect to their elders and descendants — past, present, and emerging — as they continue their stewardship of these lands and waters. We acknowledge that settler colonization resulted in land seizure, disease, subjugation, slavery, relocation, broken promises, genocide, and multigenerational trauma. This acknowledgment demonstrates our responsibility and commitment to truth, healing, and reconciliation and to elevating the stories, culture, and community of the original inhabitants of Los Angeles County. We are grateful to have the opportunity to live and work on these ancestral lands. We are dedicated to growing and sustaining relationships with Native peoples and local tribal governments.”
Labor Acknowledgement — Cal State Long Beach
“We recognize and acknowledge the labor upon which our country, state, and institution are built. We remember that our country was built on the labor of enslaved people who were kidnapped and brought to the U.S. from the African continent and recognize the continued contribution of their survivors. We also acknowledge all immigrant and indigenous labor, including voluntary, involuntary, trafficked, forced, and undocumented peoples who contributed to the building of the country and continue to serve within our labor force. We recognize that our country is continuously defined, supported, and built upon by oppressed communities and peoples. We acknowledge labor inequities and the shared responsibility for combatting oppressive systems in our daily work.”
INTRODUCTION
My name is Tom Grode. I’m the Skid Row Liaison for First United Methodist Church Los Angeles. I lived in Skid Row from 2013 to 2017. I’m writing this in August and September 2024. In other words, summer. You probably have never heard of The Golden Summer. It directly connects to the history of the Methodist Church.
John Wesley was a young church leader from London who went to the colony of Georgia to start a new church in 1735.
In this generation of great violence between Catholics and Protestants, around 300 religious refugees in the 1720’s settled in a rural part of Moravia. Their village was full of tension and conflict and as they struggled, something powerful and mysterious happened which changed everything. They called this period of time The Golden Summer.
After two years in Georgia, Wesley had to accept that his effort was a complete failure. As he returned to England by ship, discouraged and unsure what his future held, he encountered the Moravians. He describes his time with them as his “heart strangely warmed”. Over time, Wesley became the founder of the Methodist Church, called that because of the “methods” of John Wesley.
There is a major connection between John Wesley and Skid Row. Wesley Health Clinic has been a large health clinic in the heart of Skid Row for decades. Prior to Wesley Health Center it was JWCH, or John Wesley Community Health, and prior to that JWCH, it was JWCH as in John Wesley County Hospital.
In 2011, I began to hear cool things about new things happening in Downtown Los Angeles, especially in the arts. I lived in Santa Monica and in 2012 as I was thinking about moving Downtown, I got a text. It was from a friend who moved to Hollywood from Alabama and after several months, she moved back to Alabama because of a family health emergency. The text read: the Chattahoochee River runs through Fort Benning. That meant nothing to me and so I googled it.
I learned the Chattahoochee River goes through Georgia, Alabama, and Florida. It begins in the mountains of North Georgia, where the Georgia Gold Rush began in 1829. A year later from Washington D.C. came the Indian Removal Act of 1830. Many Muscogee and Cherokee lived along the banks of the Chattahochee and they were forced to march to Oklahoma. This is known as the Trail of Tears.
Fort Benning is one of the largest Army bases in the country. It was named after Confederate General Henry Benning. Benning believed a new nation should give more authority to places like Georgia and Alabama than places like Virginia because he wanted to make sure slavery remained part of the economic foundation of this new nation.
As I pondered the histories of the Chattahoochee River and Fort Benning, three words came very strongly to me — war on mammon. (Mammon is a medieval word for the worship of money.)
I moved Downtown in the Spring of 2012 to Main Street. I then learned that if I crossed the street I would be in Skid Row.
Back in 2015, when I was now living in Skid Row, a group in the Arts District, the neighborhood immediately east of Skid Row, asked me to come over and speak about Skid Row. I said sure.
After I was done, a guy walked up to me and said he has a friend who is getting his Masters Degree at USC in Community Development and he is totally puzzled by Skid Row. He asked me if I would get a cup of coffee with his friend so he could ask me questions. I said sure.
We got together for coffee at the Downtown Women’s Center coffee shop and started to chat. After fifteen minutes or so of him asking me questions and me answering, he stopped me in mid-sentence….
HIM — Wait, hold on.
ME — Why, what’s wrong?
HIM — You’re freaking me out.
ME — Why am I freaking you out?
HIM — Because everything you’re telling me about Skid Row is the exact opposite of everything I’m being taught at USC on how you’re supposed to do things.
Welcome To The Golden Summer