Stealing Home: Los Angeles, the Dodgers, and the Lives Caught in Between

by Eric Nusbaum

Overview

A story about baseball, family, the American Dream, and the fight to turn Los Angeles into a big league city.


Dodger Stadium is an American icon. But the story of how it came to be goes far beyond baseball. The hills that cradle the stadium were once home to three vibrant Mexican American communities. In the early 1950s, those communities were condemned to make way for a utopian public housing project. Then, in a remarkable turn, public housing in the city was defeated amidst a Red Scare conspiracy.


Instead of getting their homes back, the remaining residents saw the city sell their land to Walter O'Malley, the owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Now LA would be getting a different sort of utopian fantasy — a glittering, ultra-modern stadium.


But before Dodger Stadium could be built, the city would have to face down the neighborhood's families — including one, the Aréchigas, who refused to yield their home. The ensuing confrontation captivated the nation - and the divisive outcome still echoes through Los Angeles today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781541742215
Publisher:	PublicAffairs
Publication date:	03/24/2020
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	351,118
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

Eric Nusbaum is a former sports editor at VICE. In addition to VICE, his work on sports, history, and culture has appeared in ESPN the Magazine, Sports Illustrated, Outside, The Daily Beast, Deadspin, and the Best American Sports Writing anthology. Eric was born and raised in L.A. He has spent many hours both attending games at Dodger Stadium, and sitting in traffic to reach those games. He has also lived and worked in Seattle and Mexico City.

Table of Contents

Two Notes xi

Maps xiv

Preface 1

Part I Among the Rocks 7

Part II Sleep to Wake 37

Part III The New Town in Town 91

Part IV Billion Dollar Blackjack 145

Part V Manifest Destiny 199

Part VI Rastreando 255

Acknowledgments 297

Notes on Sources 301

Index 319

Editorial Reviews

2019-12-22
A well-known tale of racial injustice given a fresh look by sportswriter Nusbaum.

The construction of Dodger Stadium is an epic well known in the history of Southern California. The author digs deep to find stories from the canyon where the stadium was built, a place made by Mexican and Mexican American families who were covenanted out of other neighborhoods in Los Angeles. The early residents could climb the hill above the canyon and see the skyline of a growing metropolis whose new City Hall appeared "like an arrow pointing upwards to the infinite possibilities of Southern California—or perhaps like a giant middle finger aimed directly at [them]." When the 101, a multilane major highway, was built, the isolation was complete—until, when the Brooklyn Dodgers moved across the country, the three neighborhoods of Chavez Ravine were deemed an ideal spot for a stadium. Nusbaum charts the course of what happened next, as neighbors banded together and activists set about agitating for their rights, all to no avail, and with jail sentences for some. One aspect of the story is that, a decade before the Dodgers arrived, the area was slated for modernist public housing, but the project was shelved in a Cold War era in which such utopian enterprises smacked of communism. Instead, capitalism won out: Deeds were bought and sold, properties condemned, construction companies and developers enriched. A nice twist, as Nusbaum writes toward the end of his illuminating narrative, is that barely anything seemed to go right as the stadium was going up. With the passage of time, the communities of Palo Verde, La Loma, and Bishop faded from memory. "Baseball may have mystical powers, but it cannot erase the past," writes the author near the end. "It cannot redeem us." That's just right, and Nusbaum does good work by reminding readers of what was lost in the name of municipal bragging rights.

Provocative, essential reading for students of California history.

Kirkus Reviews

"A well-known tale of racial injustice given a fresh look...Provocative, essential reading."
—Kirkus

"Eric Nusbaum takes several overlooked threads of history and weaves them into a vivid tapestry of twentieth-century America that is at once sprawling and intimate, raw and poignant. Stealing Home is a relevant and important book—and a fantastic read."—Margot Lee Shetterly, New York Times-bestselling author of Hidden Figures

"Stealing Home has a driving plot, a humane heart, and a proud conscience. Read it and enjoy the story, or read it and get mad, or read it and change your mind. Most importantly, read it."—Chuck D, founding member of Public Enemy

"In my family, the Dodgers caused pain and disillusionment when they left Brooklyn. But what happened in Los Angeles is a second drama with its own measure of financial manipulation, political intrigue, and working-class heartache. Stealing Home takes on a whole new meaning in Eric Nusbaum's marvelous book."—David Maraniss, New York Times-bestselling author of When Pride Still Mattered and Clemente

"As a sports book, Stealing Home is astonishingly good-but it's more than just a sports book. The human experience it depicts resonates far beyond Los Angeles. The writing is lean, hard, and urgent. You'll read it quickly and think about it for a long time."—Brian Phillips, New York Times-bestselling author of Impossible Owls

"A story perfectly told, riveting, moving, and deeply human."—Will Leitch, author of Are We Winning? and God Save the Fan

"A detailed, compelling history that goes well beyond Los Angeles. Eric Nusbaum asks an urgent modern question: What do the things we love actually cost? And who pays the price?"—Jay Caspian Kang, writer-at-large, New York Times Magazine

From the Publisher

This audiobook takes a sociological look at Southern California in the time leading up to the building and opening of Dodger Stadium in 1962. It’s a story about immigration, subsidized housing, and other topics, and narrator David Owen Nelson brings an appropriate tone to the work. His beautiful Spanish accent, used for Spanish words and names, is a delight to hear, and the author’s passion for his topic comes through as well. It’s fair to say the Elysian Park neighborhood in L.A. designated for the stadium was disputed territory. The author humanizes the legal battles that took place over many years through the eyes of several people. Nelson’s enunciation is excellent, but what is most notable is the dignity he gives to each character. M.B. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

JUNE 2020 - AudioFile

This audiobook takes a sociological look at Southern California in the time leading up to the building and opening of Dodger Stadium in 1962. It’s a story about immigration, subsidized housing, and other topics, and narrator David Owen Nelson brings an appropriate tone to the work. His beautiful Spanish accent, used for Spanish words and names, is a delight to hear, and the author’s passion for his topic comes through as well. It’s fair to say the Elysian Park neighborhood in L.A. designated for the stadium was disputed territory. The author humanizes the legal battles that took place over many years through the eyes of several people. Nelson’s enunciation is excellent, but what is most notable is the dignity he gives to each character. M.B. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine

JUNE 2020 - AudioFile