- The Romans had their chariots.
Mexican cowboys, or charros, had their horses.
The modern day charro, is the lowrider.
The modern day lowrider is to take a look at a car,
boost them up, and showcase it throughout the neighborhood
to say, hey you know what, this is what we're all about.
(Chilled out music)
My biggest deal when I take out my car is,
I always roll down the windows,
because I wanna make sure that I hear things
when people come up.
Most of the comments, believe it or not,
come when you're at a stop light.
You get a lot of thumbs up,
a lot of good job, a lot of, you know.
It reinforces the reason why,
going back to that charro thing of displaying
and showcasing what you're all about,
is to get on that road and enjoy your car,
enjoy the music, and enjoy what other people say about it.
(upbeat music)
I have a 1976 Chevy Caprice Classic.
It's painted dodger blue.
The car's unique, it has a great flake top on it,
that has a blue roof.
It's lifted all the way around.
It has Dayton's on it,
and the engine's all original.
It has parts of the undercarriage that are chrome.
When you open the trunk, and it has a custom trunk,
that highlights the hydraulic system.
The interior is all original blue from 1976.
Original cloth material, original carpet.
It has a great sound system
because you wanna hear those sounds from back in the day.
You gotta make sure you have good sounds
as you cruise down the boulevard.
I'm proudly flying the Imperials Car Club plaque.
My background with the Imperials Car Club
dates back to 1969.
Around the block from my home in East Los Angeles,
was the president of the Imperials Car Club,
and his brothers were in the Imperials Club,
also the Valadez family.
I had a great mentor, Jesse Valadez,
who was the owner of the Gypsy Rose.
Being 12 years old, come by, and you start listening,
and you say, wow, I want to be part of that.
The opportunity to clean some of the cars.
Here, here's a towel,
why don't you go clean the rims for me.
That was a highlight for me back in 1969.
Having grown up in East Los Angeles from a single parent,
looking for that male role model,
the mentorship that they provided,
around being responsible, being accountable,
and for me, that's always been my model.
Have integrity, be a learner,
and also be a model for everyone else.
Those small things add up to big things later in life.
(upbeat music)
I'm so proud and humble and honored
to be the club president.
I became president in January of this year.
The mission of the Imperials Car Club is also to give back.
One of the goals for me is to develop partnerships
with our social agencies,
so that we could support the community
in whatever they need.
During Christmastime we have a Christmas car show
where we collect toys, we distribute those toys
to the underprivileged families in our communities.
This year, we're partnering
with the Los Angeles police department,
and we're gonna have a Christmas car show
at the police academy.
It's important that we do give back
and that we do serve our communities,
so that lowriding can be showcased in a positive way.
I was born and raised in East Los Angeles.
Was born at the General Hospital in Boyle Heights.
I've always asked my mother, where was I born?
"Oh, you were born at the hospital with movie stars."
I grew up in East Los Angeles,
my immediate family consists of one brother,
and two sisters.
Was raised by a single parent, my mom.
We were on welfare.
But she made sure that whatever we did,
she fed us, she made sure that we took our sack lunch
to school every day.
Made sure that we were properly clothed.
My mom was a very strong person.
She had a saying, "I'm not going to ask you
"to do anything that you can't do for yourself."
And that always stayed with me, that always stayed with me
because those were hard times.
Once we became older, in junior high,
my mother said,
"You know, this welfare thing's only temporary."
So she ended up working for See's Candies, as a packer.
Every morning at five o'clock in the morning,
waiting for the señoras to pick her up, go into work,
and I remember her calling me once in a while,
"Spanky," waking me up at 4:30 in the morning, four o'clock,
"My ride's not gonna come today,
"can you please take me to work?"
So here I am, getting in my car, 4:30,
five o'clock in the morning,
let's go mom, you need to get to work on time.
She ended up working for 35 years
and retired from See's Candy,
and I remember she taught me, whatever you did,
is that you did it and you accomplished it,
and you always give back to the community,
to your job, to your friends, that's important.
Yeah, my mom was very special.
Very special lady.
And, she's been gone for about 14 years,
but I still remember as if yesterday.
All right, next subject.
Everybody knew me in the neighborhood as Spanky.
It was a great childhood,
it was a great time of growing up, this was me in the '60's.
Attended public school, Rowan Avenue school,
Stevenson Middle School, Stevenson Junior High.
Growing up, anything that you wanted,
you had to go out and get yourself.
And so one of the first jobs that I had as a kid,
was a shoe shine boy.
Shoe shining, downtown L.A. during Easter break,
or working at the corner store, Louie's Market,
right on the corner of Sixth and Ditman in East Los Angeles.
Those were things that helped me.
I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up.
I just wanted a good job,
I wanted a job where I could support my mom.
I wanted a job where I could have the things
that I didn't have when I was a child.
At the high school we went to
wasn't the best performing high schools in Los Angeles.
A matter of fact,
it was one of the worst performing high schools.
And I remember just trying to survive high school.
I ended up attending East Los Angeles College.
I completed my AA, started working as a teacher assistant
at Humphries Avenue School, in East Los Angeles.
And I saw what the teachers were doing, and I said,
you know what, I can do that job.
So right there and then, between East L.A. college,
and the university, I said I wanted to be a teacher.
I ended up transferring over to Cal State Los Angeles,
got my bachelor of arts degree in child development.
I started teaching.
Got my masters in education administration,
and became an assistant principle
with the Los Angeles Unified School District.
I was an assistant principle for about four years.
So working in education is like missionary work.
You've gotta give a lot, you gotta give a lot,
you gotta do a lot.
I got promoted to principle.
The school where I was first assigned to
was a low performing school.
So I ended up taking that school.
We gained so many points in what they call
the Academic Performance Index, over 300 points,
so that was unheard of.
So then my superintendent comes up to me and says,
"Eugene Hernandez, I have an opportunity for you."
He says, "We have a new school that's gonna be opening up,
"on first and Vermont, in East Hollywood.
"Would you, are you interested?"
I said, sure.
Frank Del Olmo Elementary School on first of Vermont.
When I left that school seven years later,
our Academic Performance Index was 848, unheard of.
It was important that I established a relation of culture
with the school community.
Because as we all know,
schools are the center of that neighborhood.
And I used to tell my staff, kids and families come first.
Why do kids and families come first?
Because they're there 24/7.
So it's important to establish,
they come first out of whatever we do.
Having it open between Monday and Friday was one thing,
but having it open on the weekend was another thing.
Most kids that needed the necessary skills,
or were falling behind in language arts or mathematics,
we tailored programs for them where we offered
differentiated instruction for those kids.
The phone would ring once in a while and of course,
who's calling on a Sunday?
"Oh, this is Mrs. Garcia. Mr. Hernandez,
we understand you're at the school.
We're making some burritos for you, we're outside the gate,
and so we wanna make sure that we feed you."
I said, wow.
So again, it goes back to that relationship,
that culture of saying that,
you know what, whatever we do, we do it for our kids.
Superintendent calls me up one day and he says,
"We wanna hire you for district leadership."
Currently, I'm the administrative operations
for Los Angeles Unified School District,
Local District Central,
which encompasses about 160 schools.
Part of my job involves providing a safe school culture
and climate for kids.
Because if kids don't feel safe,
they're not gonna become high-achieving,
they're not gonna be learners.
And many of our kids
who live in underprivileged neighborhoods,
do come to school with many things that they see,
that you and I growing up never saw.
I've seen a rise of kids coming to school with trauma.
Whether it's something that occurred in the neighborhood,
whether it's a shooting, whether it's a family disconnect,
you know, many of our kids are undocumented.
And so having, you know, parents taken away,
that plays a big part.
So, it's important that everybody at the school site
becomes trauma informed.
And that we know the stories
of our kids that are coming to school.
Many times we, we're quick to say,
hey, where's your pencil, where's your homework?
But it goes back to that relational culture piece,
that if you don't know where these kids come from,
if you don't know who they are,
you know, setting them off by saying,
hey where's your homework?
For them, they're worried about their parents
that got deported the night before,
or they're worried about a brother that got shot,
or they're worried about not knowing
where the next meal's gonna come from,
or they're getting evicted or living in the garage.
So it's important that we're sensitive.
But how do we establish those relationships
with the kids that we educate?
And once we get them feeling safe about themselves,
guess what, the academic achievement's gonna go up.
Because they know that they have adults
that care for them.
Kids are approachable, kids are reachable,
students are reachable.
And it's important that we start having those relationships
with our kids.
Many times when I visit high schools,
I try to seek out those kids that are in the corner,
or hanging out.
And I'll walk over and I'll introduce myself.
Many times, are you a narc, are you police,
what are you, the principal?
So what I do is I usually whip out my phone,
and I show my car.
Wow, Mr, that's your car?
I say, yeah.
You have that ice-breaker.
For me, it's that lowrider.
So instead of pushing them out, we push them in
and say, you know what, it's important that you're here.
We care about you.
Things that I've learned well,
when I was in the car club as a young man,
those things help me become a better principal.
It's about taking what you learned before,
to apply them to my job as principal,
and working with the families
and working with the communities.
I've been with the school district for 41 years now.
People say, you have a huge title.
But it's still the Eugene Hernandez,
it's still the same Spanks from East Los Angeles.
My message is simple,
you could be whoever you wanna be.
It all depends who you're gonna follow,
what you're gonna do in life.
Do the best you can.
Hanging out with people who are gonna push your agenda,
not keep you down.
You don't have to be a product of what you are.
It's always thinking about the future,
what you wanna be.
Don't look at me as a role model,
look at me as somebody who has made it,
who's continuing to learn,
and working hard at whatever they have.
My name is Eugene Lewis Hernandez,
I'm an administrator of operations
for the Los Angeles Unified School District,
and I'm a lowrider role model.