Pacoima’s Planned Wall of Fame to Honor Those Who Made Mark

Marie Harris has been out dispelling rumors these past few weeks that a decade-old summer tradition in Pacoima is gone forever. Instead, organizers say it is just “taking a little sabbatical.”

For the second consecutive year the community’s folksy summer ritual called “Back to Pacoima Expo,” a festival honoring Pacoima achievers, has been canceled. Organizers instead have focused their time on two other projects--one that will be unveiled in December and the other next summer, when the Expo returns.

“People keep calling me saying they are really sad the Expo is over with,” Harris said. “I’m telling them it’s not gone, but will be back better than ever next year.”

The biggest project in the works is the creation of a Pacoima Wall of Fame--not to be confused with a walk of fame.

“We don’t want our stars in the ground some place where people are walking, spitting all over them,” said Harris, a longtime Pacoima activist and executive director of the Pacoima Chamber of Commerce. “We want them up high where people can see them.”

The chamber and other community groups hope to raise several thousand dollars between now and next summer to erect the wall, which they envision as a landmark where the names of prominent hometown leaders will be etched in stone.

During the 1986 Expo, a weekend-long fair at Hansen Dam Park, 15 “stars” who grew up in Pacoima, including gospel recording artist Andrae Crouch, boxer Bobby Chacon and Los Angeles Rams football player Charles White, were honored with foot-tall black granite stars with their names printed in gold. And the town’s most famous son, Richie Valens, has a Pacoima star.

Today, the granite awards sit stacked in Harris’ living room.

Harris hopes to garner the help of community groups to select a site and donate money and labor to build the wall to hold up the stars. Though the cost is unknown, chamber officials will try to raise several thousand dollars. The goal is to show off the Wall of Fame at the 1989 Expo.

“We want children to be able to see the Wall of Fame and think that someday they can have a star too,” Harris said. “It will give them something to look forward to rather than seeing all the negative things.”

Rick Hardiman, 18, a Pacoima youth honored at the last Expo for his volunteer service at the Boys and Girls Club of San Fernando, agreed that the proposed Wall of Fame would boost pride.

“A lot of people look down on this community,” said Hardiman, who will attend Pierce College to study business in the fall. “This could show the good side of the community.”

Two potential sites for the wall are the courtyard at the Pacoima Community Center and the Hansen Dam Park area, she said.

Arthur Broadous, director of the Pacoima Youth Cultural Center, said that bringing a new twist to the Expo will keep the “keep the program from stagnating.”

The fair traditionally has featured food and informational booths, entertainment spotlighting local talent and an evening concert. For years children involved with the center have performed at the Expo as well as local church choirs. In past years, it has drawn from 3,000 to 5,000 residents.

“People from the area really look forward to it,” Broadus said. “It gives people a chance to show off the good in the community.”

To compensate for the Expo’s absence this year, Harris said, another community project will be shown off by the chamber in December. New Christmas street decorations will be displayed at the intersection of Glenoaks and Van Nuys boulevards--the center of Pacoima’s revitalization effort, where a 4-year-old shopping center and the $1.9-million Boys and Girls Club are located.

“Pacoima has never had Christmas decorations before,” Harris said. The $1,500 in city-allocated funds that would have been used to put on this year’s Expo were instead used to buy the decorations.