Eternity Street ─ Violence and Justice in Frontier Los Angeles

“Los Angeles is a terrible place for murders,” declared the Daily Alta California in 1850. The county suffered more than two hundred killings between 1850 and 1859, with many bodies borne down Eternity Street on the way to Cavalry Cemetery.Yale historian John Mack Faragher delves into the birth of the City of Angels to deliver a rich portrait of its rise. From its modest origins as a small Mexican pueblo to a sprawling modern metropolis, Los Angeles would remain a city founded on blood, where justice was elusive. Saloons and gambling houses teemed with crowds of Indians, Californios, Mexicans, and Americans, all quick to draw their Bowie knives or Colt revolvers. Faragher reveals the city’s long tradition as a lawless outpost rife with ethnic conflict and ruled by vigilantism, resisting an official legal system. Eternity Street delivers a piercing look at the birth of this quintessentially American city.