It was in the late afternoon on Wednesday, April 29, 1992, when I learned of the verdicts in the first Rodney King trial as they were being reported on KFWB-AM (980). I had parked my car at Alan’s Custom Lab on Selma Avenue in the heart of Hollywood to deliver my unprocessed film from that morning’s photo assignments for the Business Journal, and was glued to the radio for news about the city’s reaction.
Breaking news was not my usual assignment for the Business Journal, but this day was different. I left my film at the lab and went back to the office, then located in Koreatown at 3345 Wilshire Blvd., directly across from the Ambassador Hotel.
My editor, Steve Ludwig, told me to “get out there and document what’s going on. But be careful.”
I didn’t argue. I knew it was my duty to the readers, and as a photojournalist, to take the necessary risks to document the unprecedented news event unfolding in the city.
Several reporters and I took stock of the scene from the roof of our building, which provided a bird’s eye view of the chaos and the many fires that were already burning.
After checking in with Ludwig the next morning, I walked out of our building onto Wilshire. There were fires all around. I walked westbound toward the commotion at the Big 5 Sporting Goods store on the ground floor of the building at 3424 Wilshire.
I stayed across the street and hid behind large hedges on the plaza of the Equitable Building. As soon as I ducked down, I heard rapid gunfire from across Wilshire. It was impossible to know where the gunfire originated. When it stopped, I looked over the hedge at the Big 5 and saw a man with an armload of rifles calmly walking out the front door and past a young boy standing there looking dazed and lost. The moment was truly terrifying for me because of the unpredictability of it all. There was a tension unlike anything I had ever experienced.
From there I took my car and headed down Western Boulevard and drove as far as a shopping center near the intersection of Venice Boulevard. It was swarming with looters. I took my camera and leaned out from the driver’s side window and took a few photographs when someone from another car screamed at me to stop photographing and then drove at a high speed toward me. I did a quick U-turn in the middle of Western and headed back toward the office.
I photographed the first three days and nights, and then the aftermath for weeks after April 29. I must have shot 1,000 images. The photos were used as part of our coverage for several weeks, and culminated with a special publication called “Beyond the Ashes,” an ambitious project that synthesized the many different perspectives of our coverage – news, analysis, and the opinions of the city’s leadership trying to answer “Where do we go from here?” and published some months later.
Todd Frankel was the Business Journal’s chief editorial photographer from 1989 to 2003.
