User:Parker chevy/sandbox

Operation Bootstrap (1965-1983) was a grassroots, community-based organization, that addressed political and economic issues and provided needed services to the Avalon neighborhood in South Los Angeles after the Watts Rebellion. According to a 1965 special census report on the area, Avalon had one of the highest unemployment rates in the city and more than 35% of families lived below the poverty line. Avalon was 95.5% black. Inspired by the work of Leon Sullivan and his Opportunities Industrialization Center, Louis S. Smith and Robert L. Hall in the fall of 1965 founded Operation Bootstrap in response to the Watts Rebellion. Smith, a national representative of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and Hall, A Los Angeles community activist of N-VAC.(Non-Violent Action Committee) partnered under the banner “Learn Baby Learn,” derived from the Rebellion's  chant of “Burn, Baby, Burn."  Operation Bootstrap offered job training, remedial education and later entrepreneurship, spawning successful endeavors such as Shindana Toys.