Sam Youngman, brother of Daviess County Sheriff Brad Youngman, grew up in Owensboro but now lives in Los Angeles. Sam is a veteran political campaign reporter and former White House correspondent. He covered the presidential campaigns of 2004, 2008, and 2012; countless U.S. House and Senate races; and the administrations of George W. Bush and Barack Obama while working for The Hill, Reuters, and other news organizations.
Youngman wrote the following column for Owensboro Times to describe his experience during the devastating and deadly wildfires that swept across the Greater Los Angeles area.
When I opened the door, the air was thick with smoke and she was standing there holding a succulent and her Emmy.
With massive fires ravaging the Los Angeles area, my friends were forced to evacuate their apartment in Hollywood and stay with me in the safe and centrally located Mid-Wilshire area. They gathered what was important to them. While her boyfriend grabbed their clothes and medicine, Ashley grabbed the Emmy award she won for writing on General Hospital.
Only in L.A., right?
Except Ashley was born in Texas, raised in North Carolina and went to high school in Lexington. I met her boyfriend, Jacob, while we were both at Western Kentucky University. He grew up outside of Radcliff. I was born in Lexington but raised in Owensboro (Go Red Devils!). For the last five years, I have called L.A. home. But I am and always will be a proud Kentuckian. Especially now that Coach Cal is in Arkansas.
But I am also pretty darn proud and happy to live in the City of Angels, even these last couple of weeks when it has felt and looked like hell on Earth.
Despite its reputation as a decadent unsafe Sodom for celebrities and the homeless, L.A. is mostly a working-class city, packed with people from all over the country and the world who are busting their butts for a shot at the American dream. We love football, we stand for the National Anthem at Laker games, we grill, we pay taxes and we send our men and women to serve in the military. In other words, Angelenos are Americans just like the good people of Kentucky.
But I understand the confusion. This is a wonderfully weird place, after all.
I’m a clumsy middle-aged man who surfs by the Santa Monica Pier several times a week. I often see Conan O’Brien at my coffee shop. Arnold Schwarzenegger gave me a salute last year, and the guy who directed Anchorman let me take apart the box of Sex Panther Cologne to see how it worked. On any given day, this place is so dang weird it doesn’t feel real.
Before I moved here, I occasionally visited for work. I would go see a concert at the Hollywood Bowl or a show at the Comedy Store, inhaling rock ‘n’ roll history and street tacos. But I never saw grocery stores or gas stations on those trips. I rarely saw the people working three jobs to make ends meet. When I decided to leave Kentucky and move out here, I had to wrap my head around the fact that it is a real city where real people live and work.
It didn’t take long. The COVID pandemic, the George Floyd protests and Kobe Bryant’s death all combined to reveal a city with a heart — a heart that was capable of breaking. The more I lived and worked here, the more I came to see the similarities the 10 million people of Los Angeles County have with the 4.5 million people in Kentucky. Hell, I even went to my first NASCAR race here.
The first week of the fires reminded me of tornado watches back home. The sudden randomness with which one might pop up and destroy everything and everyone you love took me back to that unseasonably warm January day 25 years ago when it felt like half the ‘Boro was wiped out by an F3. There was never any doubt then that people from everywhere sympathized with us, stood by us and would help us rebuild.
But in L.A., our city is in pain, and we can’t help but wonder if we are alone.
While I’ve been inundated with messages of concern from Kentuckians (you better believe my Sheriff brother has been in regular contact to make sure I have mapped out evacuation routes and procured emergency supplies), I have also been heartbroken to see many of my fellow Americans suggest we deserved this tragedy because of how we vote, repeating internet BS about our response and suggesting this all happened because of who our firefighters are or who our mayor or governor is.
Of course in the past, I’ve seen idiots suggest Western Kentucky deserved tornadoes or Eastern Kentucky deserved floods because the state voted for Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul. I’m not naive about the division in this country or the realities of politics. Still, I continue to hope that we are a better nation than our politicians, and I choose to focus on the kindness of those who have reached out to check on me or offer assistance or a prayer. It has meant the world during a time of sadness and uncertainty. It’s the Kentucky I know, and I am grateful.
Rest assured that Los Angeles will come back because we are Americans and that’s what we do. But we can’t do it alone. We need y’all to help and to stand with us. We need your thoughts and your prayers, and we need the resources to rebuild from the ashes.
But mostly we need you to remember that we are you. We are Americans in a crisis. We are your brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews. We just live in a weird and crowded place where movies and TV shows are made and where people grab their Emmys when fleeing a fire.
And a place like that could only exist in such a great country.
