The Weekly Newspaper of El Segundo
Herald Publications - El Segundo, Hawthorne, Lawndale & Inglewood Community Newspapers Since 1911 - (310) 322-1830 - Vol. 111, No. 4 - January 27, 2022
Inside
This Issue
Certified & Licensed
Professionals.....................12
Classifieds............................4
Crossword/Sudoku.............4
Entertainment......................3
Legals..............................9-10
Pets......................................11
Police Reports.....................3
Real Estate.......................5-7
Sports.............................. 2,12
Travel.....................................2
Weekend
Forecast
Gundo Boys Soccer Team Makes
It to the Section 1 Tournament
Area 1D Champion Team members (l-r): Ian Smigelski, Marcus Dell, Johnny Amaral, Louis Lappe, Xavier Gomez, Lucien de Saint-Aignan, Caz Inghram, Leo Toivanen, Cooper Bartha, Van Parker,
Willem Siegloch and Kuno Inghram (not pictured). For Boys Soccer story see Sports Shorts on page 2. Photo courtesy Anthony Gomez.
Friday
Partly
Cloudy
72˚/51˚
Saturday
Partly
Cloudy
69˚/49˚
Sunday
Sunny
67˚/50˚
A Courtroom Hearing You
Wouldn’t Mind Getting
By Kiersten Vannest
Picture a court scene: the defense, the
prosecution, the judge, the jury. Perhaps a
police officer, an attorney, or a full gallery
are in attendance. In this picture, do you see
someone in attendance furiously swiping away
at a machine, listening intently? This is the
court reporter, and it’s secretly one of the
most in-demand jobs on the market.
Stella Cordova, a lifelong El Segundo resident,
Stella Cordova. Photo provided by Stella Cordova.
has been trying to tell the world about
her job for years. “There are different court
reporting schools around the country,” says
Cordova, “and it’s more and more common
now to train online.” Cordova herself didn’t
know about court reporting until she found
herself doing it!
“It’s kind of funny. I went to school in the
seventies, and there was a big gas shortage,
and that’s when they started the carpool thing,”
she says. A friend of hers wanted to go to
court reporting school and asked if Cordova
would carpool with her. Not knowing what
she was getting into, what it would cost, or
where it would go, she agreed. She stayed
simply because she didn’t want any gossip
about her quitting or giving up!
Cordova says it was the hardest four years
of her life getting trained as a court reporter.
She explains how court reporters don’t hear
words in the same way as normal English
speakers; in fact, they practically speak a
different language. Court reporters have to
be able to transcribe every word said in
court, which means they have to intake a lot
of information incredibly quickly. Because
of this, court reporters are trained to hear
vowels and consonants instead of words and
sentences by letter.
As the words are spoken, Cordova listens to
the sounds and strokes a stenotype machine
according to what she’s hearing. The machine
is like a typewriter, only it has fewer keys,
and it’s meant to be typed pressing multiple
keys at once. Cordova tells the machine
the syllables she hears, and the machine
interprets the syllables into fully spelled
out words.
Being a court reporter has sculpted her
into an excellent listener. So much so that
Cordova says she used to come home and
want absolute silence, a sentiment shared by
many court reporters.
See Stella Cordova, page 8
Kirk Brown:
Enduring in El Segundo
By Duane Plank
Kirk Brown is an El Segundo lifer. His
family settled here in 1924. His grandfather
was an El Segundo police officer
in the thirties and the forty’s, protecting
the citizenry from whatever crimes were
being committed decades ago.
His father worked at what was known as
the Standard Oil Refinery, for 40 years. His
mom, Bernice, attended Richmond Street
School and graduated from El Segundo
High School (ESHS) in the mid-30’s. Kirk
attended Center Street School (CSS), went
through the local schooling protocol, and
ended-up nabbing a Bachelor of Science
degree and Master of Arts degree from
Pepperdine University.
Post-college, Brown, decided to teach.
He taught for seven years, and then, some
40+years ago, pivoted to employment in
the real estate industry.
Kirk’s mother relocated to El Segundo
as a youngster when his grandparents
moved out West. His grandfather was
“a railroad guy. I believed he (worked
on) the railroad,” Brown said, that runs
through the refinery.
Brown’s father grew-up in downtown
Los Angeles, got married, and moved
to El Segundo. Son Kirk Jr. lives in El
Segundo and has three children. His
daughter Carianne lives in Studio City
and has an eight-year-old son. “I am
See Kirk Brown, page 8