A Miracle on East 6th Street: Las Posadas Followed by a Lawry’s Dinner : Christmas Procession, Meals From Beverly Hills Restaurant Give Families Living on Skid Row an Evening to Remember

East 6th Street is as ugly as any other part of Skid Row. It is also about as rough as Skid Row gets. Drug dealings and the attendant violence have made it about the last place one would look to find two events that happened one night last week--a Christmas procession of little children and their families led by a band of mariachis, followed by a roast beef dinner for those families catered by Lawry’s The Prime Rib restaurant of Beverly Hills.

Las Familias del Pueblo’s annual Las Posadas party was, for all concerned, a night to remember.

Las Familias is a community center and service organization that helps families, most of them Latino, move off Skid Row to areas more suitable for children. While the families are on Skid Row, however, it provides a variety of services.

Program Started in ’82

Since Las Familias started in 1982, it has helped about 190 families relocate, said the Rev. Alice Callaghan, the organization’s founding director and an Episcopalian priest affiliated with All Saints Episcopal in Pasadena. At its peak, about 400 families lived within the Skid Row boundaries, she said. Today, about 70 to 80 families remain.

Most of those remaining seemed to be at the Christmas party.

It started (4:30 p.m.) and ended (7:30 p.m.) a little earlier than usual, Callaghan said, because of the increasing danger: “We wanted to get the families (here) . . . and off the street as soon as possible.”

The main dangers inside Las Familias’ big room, however, appeared to be the possibility of tripping over baby strollers and toys, being trampled by a phalanx of excited children on the move or deafened by their cries combined with the joyful blasts of Mariachi Azteca. As the adults gathered inside, the spillover crowd of children played outside on huge plastic climbing toys that were set on the sidewalk, the only playground area Las Familias has.

As darkness began to fall, staff members Annamarie Rivera, Nancy Berlin and Kerry Tingley began passing out candles to adults and older children. Callaghan, who had earlier passed out song sheets, finally gave up trying to get the people to rehearse and shrugged. “Every year it’s the same problem,” she said. “Nobody knows the songs.”

She chose a young man to lead the procession and handed him a smoking brass thurible on chains (the type of censers used in liturgical ceremonies) which she had loaded with charcoal and incense.

Calling out, “En frente, everybody, en frente, “ she headed out the door.

Las Posadas is a traditional Christmas procession in Latin American countries that re-enacts the journey of Mary and Joseph searching for lodgings in Bethlehem. The procession approaches several dwellings, where, by arrangement, they are refused entry (“No room in the inn”) until they finally are taken in at a place representing the stable.

In past years, Callaghan said, the Skid Row procession involved costumes and visits to a number of hotels. This year, again because of danger, it was scaled down to a visit to the Simon Hotel two blocks down 6th Street.

The two blocks, however, contained a microcosm of Skid Row hazards. With the marchers shielding their candles against a light wind and mothers trying to keep sight of their children, they took off slowly, the mariachis leading them in a few carols and “Feliz Navidad . “ “I want to wish you a merry Christmas,” they sang over and over. As they neared the hotel they passed a small, unlit park at Gladys Street which has been serving as home for a number of homeless people, not all of them peaceful. The park reportedly has been the scene of fights, muggings, stabbings and drug deals.

Three or four clusters of homeless people huddled around cooking fires were discernible. Near the sidewalk and street light, one woman stood in the rubbish near a fire, holding a red-and-white box of lard, spooning it into a pan of squash. A few tables of men playing cards and chess stopped to look at the carolers, some bemused, some mocking, some calling out a friendly greeting. One young man emerged from the concrete toilets, bopping and clapping to the mariachis, yelling out “Merry Christmas, everybody.”

“He probably just shot up,” one of the adults in the procession murmured.

The little ones just kept yelling “Merry Christmas” and “Feliz Navidad” to the shadowy figures.

Arriving at the Hotel

At the Simon Hotel Christmas lights lined one window on the second floor and shone dimly through the grimy glass. The old building looked like it could not accommodate the hundred or so visitors, and climbing up the staircase that opened onto the street was a lengthy process. While they processed double file, one passer-by approached a man waiting to go up, asking what was going on.

“I don’t know, man,” he answered. “I’m just standing here holding a candle.”

Inside, in a narrow hallway on the second floor, the mariachis gave it their best, expanding their repertoire to include “Jingle Bells” while the marchers went through the formality of knocking on two doors and being refused.

“OK, we got refused twice,” Callaghan called out in keeping with the tradition. “We’ll go to Las Familias. They’ll let us in.”

Not only was Las Familias, where volunteers were waiting, supposed to let them in; Lawry’s was supposed to be waiting there with a roast beef dinner. Not so.

By now a sea of people had gathered at the center. But, while the marchers were away, the panicked call had come: Lawry’s truck had broken down on Olive Street near Pershing Square.

And so it was that finally, about half an hour behind schedule, the food from Beverly Hills arrived in a yellow pickup that Las Familias had dispatched to Pershing Square. A cheering crowd welcomed it.

The Lawry’s team of four, all dressed in white chef’s clothes, were unflappable and proceeded to portray nothing short of grace under pressure as they unloaded dinner for 300, made their way through the throng inside, set up shop in the toy storage room and got to work.

Chef Mel Young stepped out of the truck, and, standing by the curb, fitted his tall, white hat on his head and started unloading.

Dick Powell, (“At times I manage The Prime Rib; today I’m a car repairman”), hit the ground running, saying to Callaghan, “OK, boss. Tell us what the system is here.”

The system, as Sue Holzhauer of Lawry’s public relations said moments later while spreading out beige tablecloths as children crowded and leaned on the other side of the table, was “full chaos.”

Somehow, it worked.

Only one “slight catastrophe” was noted by Powell. They had forgotten the napkins, so Las Familias, which is not equipped with kitchen facilities, came to the rescue with rolls of paper towels.

Setting Up

Ricky McKenzie of Lawry’s started adding the croutons, crumbled cheese and julienne beets to the salad. He and Young spooned out gallons of peas into a serving tray and Powell set up the metal chafing dishes.

Once an extension cord was located, Young set up the meat slicer and started to work on the 18 boned, prime rib roasts, 14 pounds each.

Dinner was served: Roast beef au jus, salad, peas, rolls, butter and soft drinks.

The mariachis moved on to a polka. Volunteers Carin and Myla Crain, mother and daughter, stood at the buffet serving with neighborhood residents Claudia and Caesar. (Many in the area are illegal aliens and are reluctant to use last names.) A team of mothers brought the plates through, then passed them to a handful of older children who acted as runners, passing plates and soft drinks to the packed and hungry house.

It was not a menu of familiar foods, but people seemed to relish it.

“They may not be familiar with roast beef,” Callaghan said of the families later, “but eating meat is a big thing and it’s very expensive. They don’t get much meat.”

Most of the families, relative newcomers and mostly poor, have no idea what Lawry’s is, or much idea about Beverly Hills, Callaghan said.

“I explain about Lawry’s, but really that’s beyond them. To them, it’s just a nice party with really good food.”

The people from Lawry’s looked like they could not have cared less about the recognition.

Smiles All Around

Was this the most challenging endeavor the restaurant undertook?

Powell shook his head, smiling: “This is the most fun.”

Every year it has been the same, Young said: “We make the list and invariably there’s one thing we forget. But it always works out. Everyone gets fed. Everyone’s happy.”

Powell said he had wanted the restaurant to get involved in feeding people at holiday time three years ago but did not know how to go about it until he was put in touch with Callaghan through his boss, David Stockman, a member of All Saints.

The only thing that seemed to have concerned Lawry’s was the unscheduled stop in Pershing Square.

Nothing was open, Powell said, but finally they spotted a croissant shop, closed but lit, with a man inside cleaning up. The young Latino mopping the floor somehow managed to believe that the four people in white coats knocking on the door were not crazy or dangerous.

“He was great,” Powell said. He said the man offered them croissants, and let them use the phone for a series of SOS calls. The man, too, was unfamiliar with Lawry’s, but by the time they left, Powell said, they had managed to convey to him that there really was such a place and that he and a friend were invited to come there for dinner on the house.

By 8 p.m. it was all over but the clean up. “It looks real nice outside, Alice,” Sue Holzhauer warned her. Many people had eaten out on the sidewalk, and the area was a mess. Before anyone could get concerned about it, however, two young transvestites who had happened by, had taken brooms and trash bags and set to work without waiting to be asked.

As the few remaining people began to clean up inside, a few children brought empty paper cups up to the buffet tables and asked for peas. They stood there spooning peas into their mouths, drinking the liquid when they were through.

“Look at that,” Rivera said. “You couldn’t force peas down my throat when I was a kid. These kids must be starved for vegetables.”

It was over. Lawry’s took off with an exchange of “See you next years,” and all that remained was for Rivera to fetch a Christmas tree she had stored in the back room and deliver it to a nearby family “with seven kids and no money”’ while Callaghan gave one woman a ride home.

The woman, Betty, was a large, distracted woman, a Skid Row regular who manages to get by in one of the single-room occupancy hotels. She had been mugged earlier that day when someone from the park had crossed the street and jumped her, getting away with all she had.

She had been afraid to go home by herself after that and had sat, patient and confused, through the party, accepting a plate of food, listening to the music, waiting for a ride.

Now, with Callaghan helping her into her car, she politely started expressing her gratitude and appreciation, repeating her messages many times.

“That was a wonderful dinner,” she said. “I’d be glad to come by and help you some afternoon--to pay for it. It was such a lovely dinner. Did the citizens donate it?”

“No, Betty, a restaurant in Beverly Hills did.”

“Oh, I see,” she said.

She got out of the car, while a young woman in tight jeans and a sweater spotted her from the hotel hall. As the woman unlocked the heavy, cage-like metal screen door, Betty turned to Callaghan and repeated for maybe the third time, “This has been a lovely, lovely evening.”