TL;DR -- Again, the holilday issue in 2025 of The Economist has an article that is apropos to our research. This one was titled "El Segundo" which is a town known to us for several reasons. Anyone going into or out of LAX flies over the town. It was a technology town for WWII and before and somewhat after. Nowadays, it was derelict until efforts at the real side of technology came to town with a new motto: Bits to atoms. Or is it atoms to bits? In any case, we'll feature the location regularly for a while as we take the focus from that Valley up north which is so famous.
--
This is the fourth series. So far, we have looked at science, literature, and economics. This post picks up the thread of technology which has been our focus for a while which became more visible with the release of GenAI/LLM (or AI/ML) three years ago. So, we will pause the usual focus and move the looking glass at culture and technology which is imperative.
El Segundo? Of California? Los Angeles area? Gosh, it's about time that we mention the place. As we have had lots of posts on DTLA (Downtown Los Angeles) where we find a neighborhood with the name of Bunker Hill West where the U.S. and its 250th has a long history. And, it is technology that got our interest shifted.
Though, it could have been the SoCal beach culture that was the focus. We are talking about a place that is north of the more known beaches (say, those mentioned in song by the Beach Boys). Too, it's north of Long Beach. But south of the LaLa land up north starting with Venice up to Malibu. Lots of history to cover.
Both of us have have family history in the area, going back to before WWI. That includes firms in the El Segundo/Hawthorne area. One of these firms was Hughes. Some say that the area is blue collar. The major industry was aviation. As said, LAX is right there. But, Defense work was a prime contributor, as well.
In terms of culture, Hawthorne is name for cousin, Nathaniel, who is also important to New England's reach. That will be a topic of a future post. Prior to WWI, the area was agricultural. By the time of WWII, the technology focus grew abound. And, looking at such ought to give us pause with respect to recent manias, but that's an old topic still under discussion with respect to the future focus that we ought to take.
No comments:
Post a Comment