Almost 100 years After a black family’s seaside property was confiscated by the government during segregation, Southern California officials have agreed to return the property to their surviving descendants to “right a wrong.”
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The great-grandchildren of Willa and Charles Bruce, who bought the land for use as a Black Beach resort in the early 1900s, will get the prime properties, valued at $21 million, back to them after a unanimous vote Tuesday from Los Angeles district board of directors.
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“It’s never too late to correct a mistake,” County Supervisor Janice Hahn, who helped lead efforts to restore Manhattan Beach land, said in a statement. “Bruce’s Beach was taken almost a century ago, but it was an injustice done not only to Willa and Charles Bruce, but also to generations of their descendants who would almost certainly be millionaires today if they had been allowed to keep their beachfront property .”
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Jay L. Clendenin/Los Angeles Times über Getty Images
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The approximately 7,000-square-foot lot gave black people access to the beach at a time when they were otherwise restricted and discouraged from accessing the shore. Willa Bruce paid $1,225 for the property, according to an interview she gave in 1912, which described that price as “high” compared to nearby properties.
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“Wherever we’ve tried to buy land for a beach resort, we’ve been refused, but this land is mine and I will keep it,” she said, meeting opposition from white locals who reportedly promised a solution for the resort to continue operating.
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About 13 years later, in 1925, the land was confiscated under Eminent Domain by the Manhattan Beach Board of Trustees with the claim that it would be converted to a park. Hahn’s motion, co-authored with Supervisor Holly Mitchell, noted that “it is well documented that this move was a racially motivated attempt to evict the successful black business and its patrons.”
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The Washington Post via Getty Images
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The property was condemned and the resort demolished just five years later. The land was vested in the state until 1995 when it was then vested in the county, which used it for lifeguard operations.
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A deed of transfer returns ownership to the family’s two great-grandchildren, Marcus and Derrick Bruce. There is a 24-month lease in which the county pays $413,000 annually for continued use. Operating and maintenance costs are also covered. The agreement also includes the right for the county to purchase the land at a later date for $20 million.
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“The lease will allow the Bruce family to realize the generational wealth they were previously denied, while allowing the county’s lifeguard operations to continue without interruption for the foreseeable future,” the filing reads.
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Jay L. Clendenin über Getty Images
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Anthony Bruce, a great-great grandson of Willa and Charles, told the Los Angeles Times that losing the land all those years ago tore his family apart.
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Willa and Charles Bruce ended up working as chefs for other business owners for the rest of their lives, and Anthony’s grandfather Bernard lived his life “extremely angry at the world” for his family’s abuses, he said.
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“Many families in the United States have been evicted from their homes and their lands,” he told the Times. “I hope these monumental events will encourage such families to continue to have faith and faith that one day they will get what they deserve. We hope that our country will no longer accept prejudice as acceptable behavior and we must stand united against it because it has no place in our society today.”
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