Watts Writers Workshop

The Watts Writers Workshop was a creative writing group initiated by screenwriter Budd Schulberg in the wake of the devastating 1965 riots in South Central Los Angeles (now South Los Angeles). The group was composed primarily of young African Americans in Watts and the surrounding neighborhoods. The group expanded its facilities and activities over the next several years with funding from the Rockefeller Foundation. Government files later revealed that the Workshop had been the target of covert operations by the FBI. Well-known writers to emerge from the Workshop include Quincy Troupe and Stanley Crouch, as well as the poetry group Watts Prophets.

Along with Budd Schulberg, one of the founders of the Watts Writers Workshop was the actor Yaphet Kotto. Kotto dedicated his time, earnings, and safety by going to Watts right after the riot to teach and support.

Harry Dolan was the director of the Watts Writers Workshop when the workshop was burned down by FBI informant Darthard Perry. He had taken his own hard earned money and kept the workshop going after federal funding had been cut.

References

*Rapoport, Roger (1977). "Meet America’s Meanest Dirty Trickster: The Man the FBI Used to Destroy the Black Movement in Los Angeles." "Mother Jones", April 1977, pp. 19-23, 59-61.
*Widener, David (2003). "Something Else: Creative Community and Black Liberation in Postwar Los Angeles." Ph.D. dissertation. New York: New York University.