US: California beach returned to heirs of Black owners

Name: US: California beach returned to heirs of Black owners
Uploaded: 21 Jul 2022, 01:40:01 PM
Duration: 01:54
Channel: TIMESOFINDIA.COM

4 views | Jul 21, 2022, 01:40:01 PM | AP

Los Angeles County officials on Wednesday presented the deed to prime California oceanfront property the heirs of a Black couple who built a beach resort for African Americans but were harassed and finally stripped of the land nearly a century ago. The event marked the final step in a complex effort to address the long-ago wrong suffered by Charles and Willa Bruce, entrepreneurs whose resort on the shore of the now-upscale city of Manhattan Beach was known as Bruce's Beach. Against the backdrop of waves washing onto the sunny Manhattan Beach shoreline, county Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan handed a certified copy of the land transfer to Anthony Bruce, a great-great-grandson of the Bruces. The land was purchased by the Bruces in 1912. They suffered racist harassment from white neighbors, and in the 1920s, the Manhattan Beach City Council condemned the property and took the land through eminent domain.