In the late 60's-early 70's, big cities everywhere were offering military policemen jobs with an early discharge and a sign on bonus if they would sign a contract. Los Angelos was one of them. This hillbilly said no thanks in a big hurry. I'm wondering if that's happening again today.Smith Grove has my vote Bert. When I think of Americana I think of a nice community like Smiths Grove.
I agree on LA. I never want to go back there. EVER. I had family go there in the 1960's but I see my last cousin moved out a few years ago and settled in East Tennessee to retire in the mountains. He finally had enough.
Following the Rodney King ordeal I had to work in South Central LA for months. I had mult-million dollars in damages to inspect and evaluate so off I went. When we got there we met with the Attorney General of the State of California. There were less than 25 of us assigned out there. He gave us the guidelines on what we had to do and what we could not do. He warned us any trouble and the fingers would be pointed at us.
First we could not wear the colors red, blue or black. Red and blue were gang colors and they both considered black as sacred since they were black. So a white man could not wear a black jacket or suit coat. Second we could not work before 10:00 AM or later than 3:00 PM. There was a 5 hour window that most of the gang members and druggies were not active. Third we could not work alone. We had to go in teams of two. Fifth we could not wear a baseball cap or any head gear. Gangs have special ways of wearing their caps and if you by chance had yours like theirs they would kill you or beat you half to death. And finally we had to hire armed body guards to accompany us into South Central. We had to hire two to go with us. One guarded us and the second our car. We paid off duty LA police officers $500 per hour to guard us.
The things I saw out there would be the subject of a good book. I found out the University of Southern California, USC, was in the middle of a ghetto. On tthe campus were military vehicles armed to the 10th degree and hundreds of police officers were in the area. It was surreal. You would think you were in a third world country military zone. Why anyone would attend USC is a mystery to me. I would rather be in Ukraine.