Crip History

Essay by dneroJunior High, 8th gradeB+, March 2009

download word file, 5 pages 0.0

Crip is an alliance of individual street organizations known as sets. The Crip alliance originated in Los Angeles, California. Each Crip set is it's own individual gang and are known to have sub-clicks, blocks, or lines (line-ups) which are like smaller individual sets within the set. Gang members in gangs under the Crip allaince are known as Locs and all Crips call each other "cuz" (short for cousin) to signify that they see each other as family. The gangs under the Crip Alliance are mainly identified by the color blue which is worn proudly by all Crip members as a primary color. Each Crip set has significant differences such as hand signs, use of secondary colors, and customs. The Crip alliance has significantly branched out of California and has spread throughout the majority of the United States.

A 15 year old Fremont High School student named Raymond Washington started a gang called the Baby Avenues in 1969 in an attempt to be like the older gangs and copy the political activities carried out by other organizations such as the Black Panthers.

The gang named itself the Avenue Cribs eventually and took on the nickname Cribs because most members were very young back then. The name Crips was first brought up in L.A. a Los Angeles newspaper in a artical about young Cribs with canes, as if they were crippled. A lot of people believe the name came to existance because of a spelling error. Either way, The name stuck and the Crips alliance was formed.

Stanley Tookie Williams is one of the co-founders of the Crips. He started his own gang called the Westside Crips. The Crips were very well known throughout southern L.A. as more and more people began to join. The Crips eventually became the biggest and...