[dropcap size=big]D[/dropcap]arrell Kunitomi points to a mural in the Art Deco-decorated Globe Lobby of the Los Angeles Times, an image of the recently canonized Junipero Serra with an indigenous person.
“Father Serra is now a saint, we have a California saint,” he tells the gathered group of elementary school kids, cheerily but neutrally. “But the Native Americans didn’t do so well under Father Serra. Many died.”
His words are perfectly true and straightforward, the kind of quick factual statement that is natural to newspaper people like him, if unnatural to the dogmatic or the ideologue. The kids listen. They are impressionable young Angelenos who, if you think about it, are perilously close to inheriting an era where fact becomes meaningless.
“Cool thing about journalists,” the tour-guide tells them. “They’re kind of like teachers and nurses. They don't make a whole lot of gosh darn money, but they love what they do.”