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How It Took A Korean American Family Decades To Process The 1992 Los Angeles Uprising
Carol Park as an adult at the gas station formerly owned by her family in Compton.
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Samanta Helou Hernandez
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LAist
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Carol Park at 12 years old.
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Courtesy Carol Park
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Topline:
In the first episode of "Inheriting," host Emily Kwong speaks with Carol Kwang Park, whose family ran a gas station in Compton for decades. The episode follows how Park experienced working as a cashier at the gas station, leading up to and during the 1992 L.A. Uprising.
Meet Carol Kwang Park: Park started working as a cashier at her family’s gas station in Compton in 1990, when she was only 10 years old. After Park’s father died, her mother needed help running the station. Park says she would work 24- to 72-hour shifts, in which she would mostly sit inside of the cashier’s booth encased in bulletproof glass.
By 1990, Korean families like the Parks ran thousands of businesses across L.A. County, many in majority Black and Latino communities. As a child, Park didn’t fully understand the historic, economic, and cultural context outside her narrow view from the bulletproof window, where she saw flashes of hostility on the other side.
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What is Inheriting?
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"Inheriting" is a show about Asian American and Pacific Islander families, which explores how one event in history can ripple through generations. In doing so, the show seeks to break apart the AAPI monolith and tell a fuller story of these communities. Learn more LAist.com/Inheriting
“I was racist at some point because they were calling me these names so I called it right back,” Park says. “I know that was extremely wrong now and in my later adult years, I understood what was happening. But I was angry for a long, long time.”
With escalating interracial conflicts, along with increasing incidents of police brutality against Blacks and Latinos, many Korean-owned businesses across Los Angeles were looted and burned during the 1992 L.A. Uprising. But the Parks’ gas station was spared. For Park, everything changed after the Uprising took place. As Park grew older, her understanding of the L.A. Uprising and her place in it evolved.
Son Lye Park, Carol Park’s mom, standing outside the cashier booth of the family gas station in Compton before her death.
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Courtesy Carol Park
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Park continued to work at the station every weekend for 16 years. In 2009, Park began a double master's degree in ethnic studies and creative writing at UC Riverside.
“I began to understand anti-Blackness exists. Anti-Asian hate exists. And these two things butt heads all the time.” Park started writing her memoir about growing up in the gas station and began interviewing her mother about her memories during the Uprising.
Compton
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In the 1990s, Compton was more than 70% Black and working class jobs were scarce. Jewish and Japanese merchants began to sell their stores, and the prices were cheap enough for Koreans to move in. The Korean presence in Compton was growing, and by the 1990s, Korean families ran thousands of businesses – gas stations, liquor stores and beauty supply stores – across L.A. County, many in majority Black and Latino neighborhoods.
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Today, Park is pursuing her PhD in ethnic studies at the University of California, Riverside, and teaches at colleges throughout Southern California.
“When I'm teaching, I tell the students, go home and talk to your parents, and it will change your lives and how you see them and how they see you.” she says. In the first two episodes of Inheriting, we’ll explore Park’s story and her evolving perspective of the L.A. Uprising.
Carol Park teaching her Introduction to Race and Ethnicity Class at Cal State Long Beach in 2023.
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Samanta Helou Hernandez
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LAist
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The history behind the 1992 Los Angeles Uprising, or Sa-I-Gu: On April 29, 1992, the verdict for the trial of four Los Angeles police officers charged in the videotaped beating of Rodney King, a Black motorist, was announced — acquitted on almost all charges. Outrage from the acquittal and years of racial inequality fueled and resulted in six days of demonstrations and destruction, known today as the 1992 L.A. Uprising.
Another incident that added fuel to the Uprising was the killing of Latasha Harlins the year prior. In 1991, Harlins, a Black teenager, was shot and killed by a Korean store owner, Soon Ja Du. The media began to sensationalize and frame the resulting protests and anger as the “Black-Korean conflict.” That sentiment began to ripple across the city.
Demonstrations and protests calling for justice gave way to stores being burned down and emptied. By the end of the six days of protest, sixty-three people died, most of whom were Black and Latino.
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There was also $1 billion in property damage. Nearly half of those properties were Korean-owned. Korean Americans refer to the Uprising as “Sa-I-Gu,” literally translating to “four-two-nine” for the date. According to surveys conducted after the Uprising, almost 40% of Korean Americans said they were thinking of leaving Los Angeles, and 50% of Korean business owners were facing a “very difficult” financial situation. The term acknowledges the event as one that had a huge toll specifically on Korean Americans and their livelihoods.
How can I listen to more of this story?
Hear Episode 1 of "Inheriting"
New episodes of "Inheriting" publish every Thursday wherever you get your podcasts and on LAist.com/Inheriting.
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