A Forgotten Community Remembers Its Children

Jimtown is one of those bleak places that always seems on the verge of being reclaimed by the desert. It clings to life on an irregular piece of urban land, trapped between a railroad track and the San Gabriel River Freeway.

It is a nearly forgotten strip of Los Angeles County sandwiched between the cities of Whittier and Pico Rivera, a disordered enclave of some 60 low-priced homes where autos parked on front lawns are more a sign of relative affluence than code violations.

There is little agreement on where the name “Jimtown” came from. One storyteller says a wealthy landowner named it after his son 25 years ago in an effort to make him take some responsibility. Another resident says the place was named after the man who ran a small market on the edge of the community. And there are other versions.

What helps make this place a community, however, is an idea, the belief that the neighborhood ought to have a park.

The idea was nurtured for 25 years, mostly by women who wanted a place for their children to play. First it was Mercy Hernandez, now a great-grandmother, who has lived in Jimtown for 23 years. There were others who spent their time and energy trying to sell the idea to a succession of county supervisors.

Meanwhile, volunteers went to work. They donated materials and laid claim to a strip of vacant land on seven acres north of the residential area. Over the years, despite squabbling among neighbors over who controlled it, the barren, vacant strip of land took on the appearance of a rough-hewn park.

Currently, Carmen Gonzales, 59, and her husband Raymond, 61, keep the park alive. She watches the children after a day’s work preparing lunches at Frontier High School in Whittier. Raymond, a retired steelworker, builds equipment and tends the grounds.

For small children there are homemade swings and other types of playground equipment, some donated by neighbors, but most of it painted and cared for by Gonzales. For older children and adults there is a soccer field, a baseball diamond and horseshoe pits.

Carmen says she spends time at the park after school and on weekends. She and her neighbors organize a party at Christmas when Santa appears in the park. On Thanksgiving Day, they cook turkeys and serve dinner in the picnic area.

Carmen and Raymond Gonzales live in a house at the end of Juarez Avenue next to the park. They are drawn to it each day, like the grass from their lawn that has grown under the fence and invaded the playing fields where Raymond cuts and waters it and encourages it to spread. They pay $27 to $35 a month for water delivered through a metered line to keep the grass alive.

A few weeks ago the years of work and dedication by members of the community paid off. County Supervisors Gloria Molina and Deane Dana put Jimtown’s park into the hands of the county Parks and Recreation Department and agreed to provide $10,000 each to upgrade the park and carry on the work begun by the volunteers. It was given a name suggested by the residents--Amigos Park.

The county will allow a nursery to use land along the railroad tracks and a power line right of way. The nursery company will store trees on the property, and income from the lease will help pay for park improvements, according to Molina aide Carrie Sutkin.

The changes will be relatively minor. There will be no restrooms, no lights and no additional parking, just some park benches, a new picnic area and some upgraded playground equipment. A fence will be built to separate the play area from the railroad tracks.

Sutkin said the county Parks and Recreation Department will attempt to retain the character established by the people who built the park.

Jimtown has no government of its own, no city hall, not even a sign to announce its presence. But thanks to people like Mercy Hernandez, Carmen and Raymond Gonzales and others, it does have what it has wanted for more than 25 years: a park.