The great-grandchildren of a black couple whose Southern California beachfront property was seized by local officials in 1924 and returned to the family last year will sell it back to Los Angeles County for nearly $20 million, an official said Tuesday .
The Manhattan Beach property once housed Bruce’s Lodge, a resort founded in 1912 by the property’s owners, Willa and Charles Bruce, as a place for black tourists to go to avoid harassment during a time of rampant discrimination of black people in California and beyond. It was informally known as ‘Bruce’s Beach’.
Manhattan Beach officials condemned the property in 1924, paid the Bruces $14,500 and said they needed it for a public park. They ended up leaving it undeveloped for over three decades and the couple lost a legal battle to reclaim it. The land was later transferred to Los Angeles County and now houses a lifeguard training center.
But three years ago, nationwide demonstrations against racism and police brutality sparked a renewed local interest in the Bruce family’s campaign. And last July, after Los Angeles County and the California state legislature worked out the legal details, the county returned the property to the couple’s closest living heirs, their great-grandsons Derrick and Marcus Bruce.
Janice Hahn, chair of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, said Tuesday that the owners had decided to sell the property to the county for nearly $20 million, a value her office said was determined through an appraisal process.
“This is what reparations look like and it’s a model I hope governments across the country will follow,” Ms Hahn said on Twitter.
The county received word from the family about the sale on Dec. 30, and the escrow process is likely to be completed within 30 days, Liz Odendahl, a spokeswoman for Ms. Hahn’s office, said in an email Tuesday evening. Members of the Bruce family were not immediately available for comment.
Duane Yellow Feather Shepard, a relative who lives in Los Angeles, said in a telephone interview Tuesday evening that the family was “very pleased” with the sale price. He said they wanted to sell the property as it is for public use only.
“They had no choice but to sell it and get all they could out of it and use it to invest in some other way in developing their lost family property,” said Mr. Shepard, a clan chief of the Pocasset Wampanoag Tribe of the Pokanoket Nation.
The property consists of two adjoining beachfront lots. Mrs. Bruce bought one in 1912 for $1,225 and the second eight years later for $10, Los Angeles County said, noting that the first lot measures about 33 feet by 35 feet. Mr. Shepard said the two lots are identical.
A persistent question has been whether officials in Manhattan Beach, a city of about 34,000 that was incorporated in 1912 and is 75 percent white, would issue a formal apology to the Bruce family.
“I think an apology is the least they can do,” Anthony Bruce, the great-great-grandson of Willa and Charles Bruce, told The New York Times in 2021.
The couple, who moved to Manhattan Beach from New Mexico, were among the first black people to settle in the area. They established their beachfront resort in the Jim Crow era, amid a resurgence of Ku Klux Klan activity in the United States and campaigns of white supremacist terror and lynchings in the South.
Two years ago, the Manhattan Beach City Council voted 4 to 1 to pass a “statement of recognition and condemnation” that contained no apology. The city’s then-mayor, Suzanne Hadley, condemned the racism against the Bruces, but said an apology could increase the risk of lawsuits against the city.
Steve Napolitano, the current mayor, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.
