Ramona Gardens

Ramona Gardens

When Serafin Lived in California. He moved his family into a new development called Ramona Gardens. Ramona Gardens is a public housing development in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. It is operated by the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles. Currently and historically Latino, it is also the home of the Big Hazard street gang, connected to the Mexican Mafia, and has been the center of the illegal drug market in Southern California.

The Ramona Gardens project was designed by Housing Architects Associated, made up of Ralph Flewelling, George J. Adams, Lloyd Wright, Lewis Eugene Wilson, and Eugene Weston Jr.. They had previously designed the Utah Street housing project under the name of Utah Street Architects Association and designed the Aliso Village project under the name Housing Group Architects.[1] The landscaping was by the firm of Bashford and Barlow.[2]

The project was originally named Ramona Village, it was changed in November 1939 because it conflicted with the name of a private land development. At the time, Ramona Gardens was billed a "slum clearance and low-rent housing project".[3] Construction began in February or March 1940, with a groundbreaking ceremony on March 16, 1940 attended by Governor Culbert Olson.[4][5][6][7]

It was built on 32 acres (13 ha) with 610 apartment units in over 100 buildings. The planned cost was $2 million, 90% funded by the United States Housing Authority through the Housing Act of 1937.[8][9][7][6][5][4] It was built by the Herbert M. Baruch Corporation.[10][11]

Demonstration units opened in October 1940,[12] with the first six families occupying apartments on 2 January 1941.[13] It was dedicated on 22 February 1941 with both Governor Olson and Mayor Fletcher Bowron in attendance. At that time, 252 of 610 units were occupied, with the remainder expected to be complete within two months.[14][15] The Christian Science Monitor praised the "home conveniences that many of [the residents] never before enjoyed—electric refrigerators, new gas ranges, gas water heaters, and wall furnaces—at rentals ranging from $11 to $18 a month, including all utilities."[8] Two hundred members of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) toured the development in May 1941, including architect and AIA President Richmond Shreve.[16]

-Wikipedia

He was so likable that the community named him the honary Mayor of Ramona Gardens.

Serafins sister in law Henrietta (Enrriqueta) Lucy's sister. Also lived in Ramona Gardens, just down the street.