Photos: The scenes of unrest from 50 years ago
A crowd gathers at Imperial Highway and Avalon Boulevard in South Los Angeles in the early morning just before violence broke out. (Don Cormier / Los Angeles Times)
National Guard troops secure a stretch of 103rd Street, dubbed Charcoal Alley, during the Watts riots. This photo was published on the front page of the Aug. 14, 1965, edition of the Los Angeles Times. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Debris litters Avalon Boulevard near 105th Street as pedestrians watch smoke rise from a building at 108th Street. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
An aerial view of two buildings on fire on Avalon Boulevard at 107th Street, left, and at 108th Street. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Smoke rises from buildings on 103rd Street. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
A girl injured carried into Oak Park Hospital. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Los Angeles police officers stand guard as debris is cleared from Avalon Boulevard and Imperial Highway, one of the trouble spots during the Watts riots. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Smoke from a row of burning buildings on Central Avenue, south of 43rd Street, darkens the sky. (Ray Graham / Los Angeles Times)
A California National Guardsman patrols 103rd Street near Compton Avenue in the Watts business district. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Local residents and journalists converge on California Gov.Pat Brown, under arrow, as he arrives at Jacob Riis High School to have lunch with high-ranking National Guard officers. (Bill Murphy / Los Angeles Times)
Above: National guardsman take up positions to enforce a curfew at Atlantic Boulevard and Anaheim Street in Long Beach. Below: Long Beach Police Officer George Medac, attended by Sgt. R. A. Castillo in St. Mary's Hospital, suffered a bullet wound to the arm. (Joe Kennedy / Los Angeles Times)
A car is searched at a roadblock at 103rd Street and Central Avenue by National Guardsmen. Small gauge hunting shotgun shells were returned to the motorist. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Only women were allowed to enter the Giant Food Market at 1712 E. 103rd St. after it reopened during the Watts riots. The clerks carried guns. The man facing the camera is store manager Carl Margolis. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
A national guardsman helps a woman on Wilmington Avenue and 103rd Street. (Bruce H. Cox / Los Angeles Times)
Two women walk by the ruins of a store on 103rd Street near Maie Avenue in the center of the riot area. (R. L. Oliver / Los Angeles Times)
An L.A. Department of Water and Power lineman works among wires on poles burned and snapped apart by fires. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Shop keepers placed "I am a blood brother" signs in store windows to deter looting. (Los Angeles Times file)
Charles Vance sweeps up litter in front of stores at 4th Street and Central Avenue as businessmen begin to assess the damage. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
A. Z. Smith begins the task of getting a Beach Street barber shop back in shape (R. L. Oliver / Los Angeles Times)
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. answers reporters' questions after a stormy meeting with then-Los Angeles Mayor Samuel W. Yorty, shown covering his eyes at right. (Larry Sharkey / Los Angeles Times)
A Department of Public Works crew cleans up at 103rd Street and Maie Avenue after the Watts riots. (John Malmin / Los Angeles Times)
Residents walk along 103rd Street in Watts, where rubble is piled up nearly two stories high. (Los Angeles Times file)
