The LAST LAWLESS LAND in America: Slab City

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slap city could be your greatest dreams or it could be your worst nightmares it's selling a little world out here a guy right here could be shot for college so put me here in the middle of the California desert without food running water electricity sewage and without laws anywhere from two hundred to fifteen hundred squatters congregate to make up the last lawless land in the US this is Slab City California so how did this place come about for that we need a little history camp Dunlap was built in 1942 for artillery training as the war came to a close the buildings were demolished in 1956 leaving behind an array of massive slabs veterans with nowhere to go sought refuge in the only place they knew these slabs after the land was given back to the state of California the government didn't have the heart to kick the vets out 50 some years later a diverse group of drifters from all over the country landed on these slabs and built a shantytown and somehow they have never been removed because the land is not managed you can do anything you want here making it the last free place in America however rumors have been stirring that energy companies are interested in buying the land which would effectively eliminate this resilient community so we entered the city in a state of anxiety we didn't know what to expect if anyone would talk to us or if we would be welcomed after all people go to slab city to avoid cameras in this episode we follow our friend Tyler chatting as he explores America's last Wallace land his first question how in the middle of the relentlessly secluded Southern California desert slappers stay connected and so this whole area is kind of the internet cafe well basically the only public place in town for international do you have a way to keep this area cool particularly you got a few fans but yeah in the summertime you just stay in the shade yeah stay hydrated that's the key you mind if we kind of camera crew coming through there are people that don't mind there are people that do mine strictly so area yeah power comes down off the roof into a box that reads the batteries and decides whether or not to continue charging the batteries okay it's really cool to kind of see how it all comes together here oh no I turned it off last night I forgot to turn it back on we were trying to stream a movie last night so I turned the public network off no and forgot to turn it back on they connected yeah it's incredible up thus far kind of been you know pretty off-the-grid going in we knew to expect the unexpected but then we found children somebody would start building like holes with people he would build them home and they would spell with me the house where they leave it will be still their house that's what I think so how long do you kind of think you'll stay in this area until I save up enough to get it beautiful to get out of here anything that you've particularly really liked about this area like something that kind of makes you think I could I kinda want to stay a lot of the people are foreigner [Music] yeah they're pretty good dogs what's places you're right here this is Brian old home this is like a little wild area right here he has a little rough being secluded in the desert survival doesn't come easy with this we wondered how slappers find food and water and how about food resources like how do you guys get food and okay however roughly how far is that we walked through town we noticed structures and homes but how can you own something in a lawless land so what made you I'm kind of get interested in like a library it seems like a really cool central place in a bit abandoned for a long time and I saw it deteriorating so I moved in is my house how does this work here do you like if I wanted to like say rent something or we had a book there's no due dates to library cards as far as like this area in general is there any kind of like hierarchy structure or any Blake for instance you have this library here are you this is my house so I'm the one that called the shots in my house well it's an autonomous scenarios you know where anarchists and not everybody in slabs is anarchist but we are here like the rest of the country federal laws are in place but here in Slab City nothing is enforced allowing residents to live free you know anarchy doesn't mean that there is no law it means that you are your own law in the space that you occupy so if you come into my house and you pee on my shelves then I'm gonna kick your ass right exactly but if you go to your own house and pee on your own shelves then nobody's gonna kick your ass yes everybody's always talking about how it's an anarchistic topia they'll say like everything's perfect of wonderful and blah blah and then on the other side you get people who are like oh well it's a Tweaker dystopia and it sucks and it's it's kind of both of those things at the same time it's you know whatever you want to manifest and sometimes trouble comes your way and sometimes really good things come your way come in and you're like trying to start fights and stealing people's sheds and yeah you're gonna have a bad time yeah but if you're just fucking coming out here to just exist like the rest of us then you're gonna have a great time I think with them more popularity than a games and the more people that give a shit about the fact that subsidy exists that the less likely it is to get fucked with because at this point it's like an international phenomena we headed to the range one of the few public landmarks to figure out what kind of people live here why is it called slab city it's because we got slabs these are slabs that the military originally had buildings on and when they gave up their military they took all the wooden frames and left the slabs people weren't alternate lifestyle so basically what it is trying to get off the grid or even try to get onto the grid I'm trying to get back onto the grid okay turned out to be really a community oriented area yeah for the ones that have been here the whole time then you get the ones that come in for this snowbirds we call them to come in just for the winter then they'll go in the summer gets up to like 120 average out here in the summer I've heard something it's like it is it's really crazy it gets really hot stupid things happen you know people come out from town and a lot of the deaths you've heard in the last couple years were people from out of town they weren't people here we all I got broken dreams we all come out or some of us broken and are trying to recreate ourselves act I think builder builds one of the greatest stories I think he came out here broken and he created the range you know you got people to come out here and they create great things like [Music] permanent structures are a rare find here however we got to speak with the man responsible for this handmade venue this is for a long time been a place to escape the Machine of the world out there the world out there defends itself in a way that makes people feel under threat the range kind of amazes me too because in my previous life I've never had that kind of initiative or drive or stamina or any of that that it takes to do something like that you know and yet it happened I joked that a guy around here could could be shot for calling himself a year because people came here to get away from every type of shape of mayor there is you know whether it be an employment or social circles or the government the police you know the fact that a person can be here to breathe the air stand on the planet you know that's what it's really all about [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] while at the range we saw heavy drug use and heard stories of murder on the slabs but just on the road we found something strangely welcoming so crazy the scope of this place [Music] [Applause] I got here in September January I was a caretaker Salvation month so anything can happen out here slap city could be your greatest dreams or it could be your worst nightmare depends on how you focus your life and what you how you're gonna behave but this place was started in 1984 by a man named Leonard Knight this here started everything we would take him you know like put the fire in here you can do to make all this fire it would create you built a 200-foot hot-air balloon really but what's something like this going on people like what are you doing get out of my County get codes beat it please like wouldn't work that slab city place on the way to my sister's no poles let's go check out in fact this going here this was a blank wall for a while oh really it didn't say like as universal but as Leonard was meeting all these new people you know he was definitely focused you know on God in Jesus and his relationship with that but here comes Buddhist atheist you know all these different religions you know and you know what we're all one it's all the same no matter what we call it or how we divide it that love you could love that your love for your dogs could make you a better person in greater and love is universal that's what it is maybe you don't have any idea of all you know God in any of that look nailed to him whatever brought that out of you and that's up on the wall and that's huge at 50 feet tall this mountain is entirely man-made of haystacks and over a hundred thousand gallons of paint [Music] now these are about a half a gallon of Adobe all these flowers whoo buncha what your fists see what would you think about everybody it's so awesome because he didn't give up did he give up when the balloon failed he didn't give up when the mountain collapsed he didn't give up when his body gave up he just kept going that's super inspiring for everybody that come today he said you I started volunteering out here how did you what brought you out here did you get some friends prior I met this girl bunny my friend in Vegas and then she was tea was when I said go for the price of your hotel for one week you can camp there for the whole time bite and all that so I did there done and then I came and I really like get into stayed yeah so I didn't that's awesome now I'm retired now is awesome everything about this place I like it's beautiful it's hard to kind of take it all in Leonard Knight man he did something that you know I can't imagine even thought about how big it would be you know the whole world loves this it's interesting to think about like how this would have looked before all of this got painted you know when you look around at some of the surrounding landscape it's just it's crazy all this art [Music] I think I'd see some of their like town stuff over there making us feel even more welcomed here we got invited to a group breakfast at the Oasis Club operate every day every morning we meet here for coffee seven days a week where you get you jobs you know I've got more work coming here for coffee and not everybody goes that seems like kind of the trend out here so far as it's very much a contribution even end up helping somebody who can't pay right away or you end up doing it for trade yeah a short 15 bucks sorry I didn't know it's going to take you three hours well I'll take it outsiders out there right here and be insiders I was an outsider out there you know I've got skits green ants oh and this is the only place where I fit in reasonably you know rich people out here there are medication that don't even know you're nuts anybody else yeah dumpling don't be doing that mom wouldn't like that everywhere we went to in Slab City we realized that there were a lot of misconceptions about what happens here some people look at you know like there's a bunch of squatters you know they don't want to pay they don't want to work and most a ton of people out here that are retired you know this is where they want to be you know and there's a ton of people that have come back here just because this is where they want to die and we try to tell everybody you got leadership from out there at that guard shack then you come in here we don't care about out there you know you know it's it's it's own little world out here syntheses and stuff like that and and if you could sit there and you get that you're gonna love it you you know I I've worked my whole life you know I've been in the corporate world I was in banking I was yeah I worked for a fortune 500 company and I gotta tell you right now I've live in more now here than I have about in Chicago for 47 years and I we had a great fucking time in Chicago you know don't get me wrong and I love that city to death but I just it's a different living it's so fully fulfilling you know more heartfelt more real whether you're from halfway around the world or right here in Southern California one of the centralized themes of slab city is art and what the locals tell us is the most creative place you can find here is East Jesus so we're gonna go check it out with no utilities slobbers have found a creative way to deal with their trash problem wait someone else built this port very well built drunkenly in aggressive very well though got a gallery in there a living quarter there what inspired this culture of art and how did it last Charlie he came out to help with salvation mutton and like him and Leonard didn't they see eye to eye so they separate ways and this is actually the dumping grounds of Slab City so then he just started making trash into art and then passed away four years into it but people just kept that kind of idea going as they liked it and then I think two or three years ago they got together and purchased like 30-something acres and then can make art museum status for Imperial County and non-for-profit this whole place has set up many or six weeks and every morning on day it's kind of exciting just to get to see something definitely brand-new [Music] [Music] [Music] it's crazy to think that if you drive a few hours out of Los Angeles you find yourself here in a desolate wasteland and to be honest everywhere we turn we kept finding new and exciting things so this is the slab city skate park pretty crazy a lot of graffiti here no one's skating right now but definitely evidence that people have been here recently I can't afford to oh I'm and I need a raise my but I can't get no sleep got an ache in my chest my man I can't hardly breathe I cried mama I can't move my feet well I've been counting up my soon as dad and I can't find don't you initially slab city seemed like a place where people went to live off the grid do drugs live without laws and escape from the world sure some people do drugs live recklessly and sleep in the dirt but most are simply seeking a place to believe you've got people of so many backgrounds lawyers engineers construction workers veterans jewelers the list goes on and on all of these people somehow came together and formed their own culture where they help one another maintain their lifestyles of living and complete freedom there is a fundamental harmony within everyone who lives here they came to slab city for different reasons but when it comes down to it the people who stuck around all found a common logic reason or momentum and there's something special about that is as for the future of slab city we're not sure from what we can tell people were divided on this but what we really want to know can somewhere like this last forever [Music] [Music] if you'd like to see more follow us on patreon and find the full episode in the description also what we really want to know where should we go next let us know in the comments and don't forget to subscribe [Music]

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Channel: Off the Cuf

Views: 805,118

Rating: 4.7724838 out of 5

Keywords: The last lawless land in America, Slab City, living off the grid, how to live in the desert, how to survive in the desert, being homeless in california, homeless in california, living homeless, being homeless, camp dunlap, homeless problem, no wifi, where is slab city?, where to camp at coachella, mr beast slab city, the true slab city, honest slab city, slab city camp, the range at slab city, fake slab city, Cornelius Talks, anarchist town, cops vs

Id: 8nxPoyvVOTI

Channel Id: undefined

Length: 20min 43sec (1243 seconds)

Published: Wed May 15 2019

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