Bridging the Divide: Tom Bradley and the Politics of Race

Bradley’s Dramatic Battle for Los Angeles City Hall, 1969

In 1969, four years after the Watts Riot, in a nation torn apart by political turmoil, in a conservative city with an overwhelmingly white population, African American Tom Bradley set out to do the impossible - run for mayor of Los Angeles. Incumbent Mayor Sam Yorty fights back with a campaign fueled by racism and redbaiting, in one of the meanest, roughest campaigns in modern American history.

Bradley’s Dramatic Battle for Los Angeles City Hall, 1969

3m 42s

  • Full Episode: asset-mezzanine-16x9

    Full Episode

    S1 E1 - 55m 40s

    Thirty-five years before Barack Obama’s election as President, the question of race and the possibility of bridging racial barriers were put to the test in an overlooked story in American politics: Tom Bradley’s 1973 election as Mayor of Los Angeles: The first African American mayor of a major U.S. city elected with an overwhelmingly white majority.

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