Glamor & Crime In the Five and Dime: A History of Oakland's Reputation
Channel: Nerd Nite East Bay
Date: 2014-01-29

Vivienne Pustell at Nerd Nite East Bay #1, The Stork Club, 28-Oct-2013

Once seen as an exciting destination to visit or a great place to settle down and live, Oakland is now seen as the punchline of jokes at its best, and A Scary, Bad Place at its worst. We're all familiar with most of the problems Oakland faces, but how did it get this way? A city that once outshone San Francisco is now affectionately referred to as San Francisco's Jan Brady. How did it happen, what are we still doing to perpetuate the problems, and how can we fight back?

Vivienne Pustell is a high school teacher in the Oakland Unified School District. An east coast transplant, she fell in love with the quirky history of the Bay Area and has spent a downright silly amount of time learning about it. Her other passions are reading anything that isn't bolted down, finding every possible educational event in the Bay Area that also involves cocktails, and terrorizing her students with her unforgiving red pen.

Credits
Bosses: Rick Karnesky and Ian Davis
Video Editor: Rebecca Cohen
Videography: Amber Crabbe and Claudia Martin
Audio Recording: Christian Lunch