Trailer talk

Here are some links and background info on the trailer park phenomenon that's going to sweep the nation just as soon as I move the hell out of here and it becomes cool. By the way, the salute to Idaho photo links to a t-shirt site I found through one of the websites below except I have no idea which one it is anymore and am far too busy in school right now to find it. If any of you readers can figure this out for me you may be eligible for a free tour of my secret trailer location along with one complimentary beverage and an audience with my cat - if he's awake, or in the mood to see visitors.

Some history for students out there approaching deadline (copy and paste).
The Trailer 'Problem': With the Great Depression - an oxymoron, of sorts - home foreclosures began happening at a rate our society would never allow today because we learned back then that unregulated financial markets would be overtaken by greedy investors who would screw the working poor and middle class for the good of the all mighty quarterly return. Anyway, back in those brutally unsophisticated days newly homeless Americans began living year round in what were once nothing more than hardened, domesticated, tents made for vacations out into the country's endless supply of pristine wilderness. These “trailerites" didn't pay real estate taxes and many were considered vagrants, as there were no permanent trailer lots where they could park legally. Within a few years the first trailer parks began to spring up and become an appealing alternative to the dilapidated shacks found within Hoovervilles. Because those trailers were so small, the families would spend a great deal of time outdoors, weather permitting, and violated notions of propriety like a motherfucker. They probably drank,  got loud, and likely included some distant relatives of yours, truly.
Trailer park folks have been taking it on the chin since, even from within. Eminem is one example of a native son who "made it", went on to slander its indigenous culture, then left the old homestead for good not sticking around to offer his sullen example to vulnerable park youths.  Instead, he became a role model for wannabe wiggas across the globe. 

In the news:
Troubled park in legal stew on SoCal rez. 
Conditions of neglect and a plethora of complaints brought Judge Stephen G. Larson himself out to have a look-see at the Duroville park, owned by Cahuilla Indian tribal elder, Harvey Duro. It is mainly inhabited by immigrant farm workers and is in such a sorry state the Judge considered shutting it down but that would only leave the poor park residents homeless, so he is working with Mr. Duro to get him to do the right thing.

Here is an excellent article from a small San Diego county newspaper on efforts to relocate some local park residents into low-income government housing. In the online comment section following the piece, one person writes: "You know who else lives in Orange Grove? There's Rick, the navy vet, who is completely blind and lives off Social Security. There are also Mike and Doris, two formerly homeless people, who finally have a roof over their heads. Doris is on dialysis while Mike just got laid off from his job at a local factory. Then there's Debbie and her two teen age boys she's raising alone. Debbie works for the VUSD in the lunch room. The trailer park holds alot of nice, hard-working people. I know its not much to look at and doesn't fit into Vista's future plans (white suburban tract housing but its home to some great folks. Leave it alone."

This is a brief synopsis of a study on Katrina/FEMA trailer parks by the Urban Institute that exposes the dangers of concentrating the underclass in isolated communities.

Cal State Long Beach's own Dig Magazine has a write-up on a nice park right along Seal Beach. Get your applications in early!

Blog reflections on a trailer park boyhood in west Texas.

Green and expensive trailer like "mini homes" are being made in Canada. Hey, did you know trailer parks are called Caravan Parks in most Commonwealth countries? Well I don't care either.

Making fun of poor folks:
Ugly ones especially get mocked and abused here.

Columbus, Miss., gets a whole page of the treatment on this screed of scorn.

Uneducated fundamentalist types haven't gotten it this bad since H.L. Mencken stalked the plains on "Why Does God Hate Trailer Trash?"

I wouldn't be surprised if this Jolene Baker fella lives somewhere off upper Market. YouTube home-ec trailer tips with a big old wiggy bouffant.

This is the where I got the picture of the Red Neck Mansion photo and I would have liked to have made it into a link but don't believe blogger wants that to happen, not by the likes of me anyway. Click the pic for a bigger version and you can set it up as a down-home desktop.

And finally, American Sexuality traces the origin of the term "white trash" back to Baltimore blacks in the 1820s. Who knew?


This is a scene from the romantic 1981 French film, Diva. The setup is a famous singer who refuses to let her voice be recorded. A young fan sneaks in a mini-studio while some bad guys from a devious record label keep tabs on his efforts. A great bicycle chase ensues, but for the that you have to rent the DVD.
The aria is called Ebben? Ne andrò lontana, from the opera La Wally by Alfredo Catalani, and is sung as Wally prepares to leave home forever. According the the Wikipedia entry, "The opera also features one of the most memorable of operatic deaths, in which the heroine throws herself into a passing avalanche. It is seldom performed because of the difficulty of staging this scene." Yeah, I guess so. Maria Callas does an unbelievable version too but YouTube only offers a slide show. This one will certainly do. Wilhelmenia Wiggins Fernandez performs.