Bruce's Beach

Winter view from the top of Bruce's Beach park (2009)

Bruce's Beach was a beach resort in the city of Manhattan Beach (in Los Angeles County, California), that was owned by and operated for African Americans. It provided the African American community with opportunities unavailable at other beach areas because of racial segregation.

Located at 26th Street and Highland Avenue, the property was acquired by the city via eminent domain proceedings in the 1920s and closed down. Some of the area was eventually turned into a city park in the 1960s and renamed Bruce's Beach in 2007.

On September 30th, 2021, Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill SB796 into law, allowing the descendants of Charles and Willa Bruce to have their land returned to them from Los Angeles County.

History[]

Willa and Charles Bruce bought a property in the strand area for $1,225 that was set aside from Henry Willard in 1912, and added on three lots.^[1] They established a resort and named it for Mrs. Bruce.^[2]

The development included a bathhouse and dining house for Blacks, whose access to public beaches was highly restricted.^[3] Aside from the Blacks-only beach resort, Manhattan Beach was "an otherwise lily-white community" and Blacks only had limited access to beaches; Mrs. Bruce's initiative "defiantly transgressed these racial boundaries."^[4] It was not the only beach attraction available to African-Americans; there was also Peck's Pier and pavilion on 34th Street,^[5] a section of Santa Monica State Beach referred to as the "Ink Well", and the Pacific Beach Club in Orange County. As Los Angeles's population increased and property values soared in the 1920s, Black people in the area suffered from increased racial tension, before eminent domain proceedings started by the city forced the club to close down.^[1]

While some historians credit George H. Peck (1856–1940), a wealthy developer and the founder of Manhattan Beach, for having "bucked" the practice of racial exclusion,^[1] Peck created barriers to direct Black out-of-town visitors to Bruce's Beach. To reach the ocean, visitors had to walk an extra half mile around property owned by Peck, who had lined it with security and “No Trespassing” signs.^[6]

Under the pretense of building a city park, the city of Manhattan Beach took control of the land from the Bruce family, and the buildings were razed in 1927.^[7][8] In the 1950s, city officials began to worry that family members might sue to regain their land unless it was used for the purpose for which it had been originally taken.^[6] In the 1960s, the property, which had been vacant for decades, was made into a city park first called Bayview Terrace Park, then Parque Culiacan. The park is on a steep slope overlooking the ocean and includes rolling grassy terraces with benches and small trees. It is located above the County Lifeguard Station, between 26th and 27th Street, and runs west from Highland Avenue to Manhattan Avenue.^[2]

Advocacy and return of the land[]

In 2006, the Manhattan Beach City Council decided to rename the park, "commemorating our community's understanding that friendship, goodwill and respect for all begins within our own boundaries and extends to the world community. All are welcome."^[2] The city acknowledged its history of racial discrimination and in March 2007 the beach was ceremoniously renamed Bruce's Beach^[9][10] during an event exhibiting "a deep tide of goodwill."^[9][11]

On June 19, 2020, a Juneteenth commemoration picnic was held at Bruce's Beach park. Kavon Ward, a Manhattan Beach resident, staged the event to draw attention to the seizure of the land by the city of Manhattan Beach.^[12] At the event, Ward told a reporter that her goal was to use policy to deed the land back to the Bruce family. In the weeks following, Ward founded the advocacy coalition Justice for Bruce's Beach. In August 2020, Justice for Bruce's Beach held a rally and march to further apply public pressure to return the land to the Bruce family.^[13]

The group's work pressured the city council in October 2020 to create the Bruce's Beach Task Force, which consisted of 13 members.^[14] The task force soon faced opposition from an anonymous group, "Concerned Residents of MB." The anonymous group paid for a two-page advertisement in The Beach Reporter, claiming the task force had used racism to "grab power."^[15]

On April 20, 2021, the same day that Derek Chauvin was found guilty in the murder of George Floyd, LA County Supervisors voted unanimously to approve returning the county land where the LifeGuard Station was located to the family's descendants. The property to be returned was estimated to be worth $75 million at the time. "If the plan is approved, the county will have 60 days to create a timeline for the land transfer and determine whether or not the lifeguard station [located on the property] will have to move" (CBSLA Staff).^[16]

On June 2, 2021, the California State Senate approved a bill to return the property to descendants of the Bruces.^[17][18]

Due to a series of land transfers, a restriction required Los Angeles County to use Bruce's Beach for public recreation and prevented the county from transferring or selling the property. Legislative approval by the state to eliminate that restriction was passed on September 9, 2021,^[19] and signed by Governor Gavin Newsom on September 30, 2021.^[20]

Further reading[]

• Michael Scott Moore. California’s Novel Attempt at Land Reparations. The New Yorker. May 27, 2021.
• Kali Holloway. In California, a Case of Black Land Loss Is Finally Being Made Right. The Nation. June 1, 2021.
• Jefferson, Alison Rose (2020). Living the California Dream: African American Leisure Sites during the Jim Crow Era. University of Nebraska Press. p. 366. ISBN 978-1-4962-1930-5. JSTOR j.ctvsn3p0k.

See also[]

• Val Verde, California

References[]

External links[]

Bruce's Beach, City of Manhattan Beach: City Manager

Justice for Bruce's Beach

Kavon Ward website

Coordinates: 33°53′40″N 118°24′56″W / 33.89444°N 118.41556°W / 33.89444; -118.41556