On Aug. 11, 1965, 60 years ago, I stood transfixed with hundreds of others on the corner several blocks from my house in South L.A. watching what seemed like a horrid page out of “Dante’s Inferno.”
But this was real life. Liquor stores, a laundromat and two dry cleaners blazed away. There was an ear-splitting din from the crowd’s shouts, curses and jeers at the police cars that sped by crammed with cops in full battle gear, shotguns flailing out of their cars.
There was an almost carnival air of euphoria among the roving throngs as packs of young and not-so-young people darted into the stores snatching and grabbing anything that wasn’t nailed down. Their arms bulged with liquor bottles and cigarette cartons. I was 18 and felt a childlike mix of awe and fascination watching this…