On this day in1965, Marquette Frye, a 21-year-old Black man, was stopped by policemen in Watts, a predominantly Black neighborhood of Los Angeles. Onlookers watched as the arrest spiraled into violence. Exhausted by years of economic and political isolation, the chaotic scene sparked 6 days of intense rioting in Watts and surrounding neighborhoods; leaving 34 dead, 1,032 injured, and nearly 4,000 arrested. We cannot live up to our greatest ideals without confronting the realities of our history.