What is the Worst Town in California?

aah yes, no one has mentioned the salton sea yet. i've got a friend who is a sculpture who just bought a spread out there so he would have room to build his giant stone constructions. it's not an armpit, it's a festering goiter in an armpit.

Originally Posted by foodguy

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dude ... shopping at the Americana, never going east of the 405 ... you realize you're not really living in los angeles, right? you might as well be spending your time at disneyland.

I only get dragged to the Americana/Galleria, as I stated. Honestly, besides a few middle eastern restaurants what else is there in Glendale? What exactly am I missing here that I can't get on the westside.

Originally Posted by foodguy

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aah yes, no one has mentioned the salton sea yet. i've got a friend who is a sculpture who just bought a spread out there so he would have room to build his giant stone constructions. it's not an armpit, it's a festering goiter in an armpit.
It really is. The place is very creepy, too. Richard Misrach captured it well.

Originally Posted by foodguy

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does it occur to you that maybe your impressions are based on where you lived? my neighborhood is incredibly diverse ... probably 5-6 nationalities and/or races within a half block in either direction. of course, we don't have gates.
hey i only lived there in the late 80's from 8-10yo (as mentioned in my post). before that I grew up in a rich sailing town in rhode island that seemed idyllic but were full of racial tension, especially because of the new influx of asian (including filipinos/south asians), black (there were exactly three families! but all their kids went on to play varsity sports eventually going to Div-1 sport scholarships -lol) and a lot of west germans (i have no idea why but there was a ton of guys from west germany circa before the wall came down). There wasn't any direct racism towards asians and blacks, but the area was always quick to make anti-semetic jokes right to jewish kids faces. but southern california was my first foray into actually seeing whole asian communities living in gated compounds. what was weird was a lot of these asian communities were very stressful places to live in because of the insular nature, weird financial/standing competitions, and petty jealousy mixed with an almost lack of privacy because everyone knew everyone's business. I'm sure there are tons of super diverse fun places to live in southern california, but I can only speak of where I lived in (the Orange County area near Fashion Island, and woodcrest hills riverside). I just remember OC being like 97% white and waspy and woodcrest hills being mostly white too). Bakersfield and flatland riverside was a mix, but still depressing in my memory. Maybe its better now, but I haven't been back in over 20years.

Originally Posted by foodguy

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aah yes, no one has mentioned the salton sea yet. i've got a friend who is a sculpture who just bought a spread out there so he would have room to build his giant stone constructions. it's not an armpit, it's a festering goiter in an armpit.
we visited and camped at the salton sea and it was a pretty fun trip. My father is a pro-caliber fisherman and he was there to fish. I just remember the salt water mosquitos that rival any other vicious saltwater mosquito bites be it florida, the north east, and texas.

Slab City.

Originally Posted by NorCal

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I don't really **** around with the inland empire but one of those meth lab towns with 50% unemployment, starving drunken illegals, pissed off white trash, a few brutally stupid brothers, bike gangs, and Mexi gangs of various stripes, slowly rotting to death in the 100 degree heat has got to be the worse that California has to offer.
Like baron wrote, the desert's ears are ringing. You described towns along the 99 in the Central Valley (ie, Modesto) but the CV is far worse because of the utter isolation. There isn't a Claremont, or even an Ontario, for hours in any direction.

Originally Posted by mordecai

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What about Baker?
A high school friend told me about the worst week of his life. He said he was going to Vegas with a family friend that owned a big rig when it broke down in Baker. In the middle of the summer. It took five days to get the part and get on the road...

Originally Posted by venessian

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It really is. The place is very creepy, too.
I did, or attempted to do, a photo shoot at Salton last year. The problem was that photos like this really romanticize it. It's bigger by far than I would have imagined and aside from buildings that are more huts than houses there are few "ghost town" structures still around. Originally, we had planned to shoot at an old hotel, specifically one has been shot and filmed to death. It wasn't until we got out there that we found out that several of the old hotels and buildings were in the process of being remodeled an an attempt to revive the area... We spent several hours driving around looking for anything that was remotely as cool as the photos you posted. Aside from the abandoned church/antique store we ended up at, zilch.

Originally Posted by mordecai

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Sunset Blvd. between Crescent Heights and Doheny
disqualified by Book Soup alone, plus there are a few decent places to eat. i would nominate Turlock, but that's colored by a personal experience involving a broken-down car, Greyhound, a ****** mechanic, and several junk yards.

Turklock is another gem. This thread has me missing my old Tuolumne/Stanislaus Co. haunts.

Originally Posted by whodini

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I did, or attempted to do, a photo shoot at Salton last year. The problem was that photos like this really romanticize it. It's bigger by far than I would have imagined and aside from buildings that are more huts than houses there are few "ghost town" structures still around. Originally, we had planned to shoot at an old hotel, specifically one has been shot and filmed to death. It wasn't until we got out there that we found out that several of the old hotels and buildings were in the process of being remodeled an an attempt to revive the area...

We spent several hours driving around looking for anything that was remotely as cool as the photos you posted. Aside from the abandoned church/antique store we ended up at, zilch.

Interesting. I have been out there for that purpose as well, and it's tough. The scale is big, and it takes a long time to get around the area. I couldn't get into it. I thought it was creepy, desolate, foul (and smelly as hell), but none of that in any particularly compelling way. I can't believe it will be revived.

I guess that one could say that Misrach's photographs there are somewhat "romantic", like some of Joel Meyerowitz's or Joel Sternfeld's work, maybe more than others of their generation. I think he did find a place that fit his aesthetic at the time.

Anywhere that's 50 or more miles east of the coast is a likely candidate for worst town.

Originally Posted by Xericx

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I despise Glendale. Also places like Pomona...hell on earth.
I disagree about Glendale - boring, mega-malls, but far from the worst Pomona - oh yeah, that's one of the worst. What a hell hole. Always horrible traffic on the 10. Always adds an hour to any Vegas trip, even though it's only 5 miles across. San Bernadino gets my vote. Helped roll B Camera on a rap video shoot some years ago. It was like no place I'd ever seen before. All the guys in the rap group and the extras would go into this (rightfully) paranoid hyper alert mode - almost ducking - whenever any car would slow down as it passed. On the other side, a congregation of more than a handful of brothers for the filming would get the LE helicopters flying over. Scary life in that city. Ironically surrounded by beautiful mountains and non stop sunshine.

Originally Posted by Manton

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Similarly, only people from somewhere else say "Cali." Term did not exist among natives in the '70s, '80s and '90s.
Blame it on him:
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Originally Posted by Baron

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Slab City.

Slab City sounds pretty cool.

Originally Posted by whodini

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Like baron wrote, the desert's ears are ringing. You described towns along the 99 in the Central Valley (ie, Modesto) but the CV is far worse because of the utter isolation. There isn't a Claremont, or even an Ontario, for hours in any direction. A high school friend told me about the worst week of his life. He said he was going to Vegas with a family friend that owned a big rig when it broke down in Baker. In the middle of the summer. It took five days to get the part and get on the road...
Yeah, I'm really thinking that corridor bordered by 5 and 99 from about Stockton to Bakersfield and then E. to Barstow. I can't say I've been each and every where along there and if I have it's all a blur but man. . . that's just another world.

Don't know about OP's question but to an outsider this seems to make sense: 'You need California to make the rest of the US seem real, you need Hollywood to make California seem real, and you need Disneyland to make Hollywood seem real' - or some such.

Delano
Corcoran
Santa Cruz

Man california gets ripped on a lot... I'm moving part time to LA... now I'm scared.

I was once in Chatsworth... that was pretty bad.