Molina, Corpus Christi: Its Struggles and Its Victories
A Different History of Molina The history of the Molina Addition is usually told as the history of a poor neighborhood on the west side of Corpus Christi. That description
The Man Who Built Uvalde — and Was Killed in the Town He Created
Most people who drive through Uvalde today probably do not know that the town began with a twenty-two-year-old Quaker from New Jersey, or that its founder eventually fled Texas because
The American Civil War along the Texas Border.
They may never make the movie, but this one deserves to be remembered. The strongest version is not “Tejanos also fought in the Civil War.” It is Tejanos fighting one
Before the Perfect Game: The Little Giants Came Through Corpus Christi
Click on the image above for more on the Little Giants In August 1957, before they became world champions, before Ángel Macías threw the most famous game in Little League
The Rio Grande Valley, Texas, Early Sixties: Young and Mexican, a Musical Tour as Some of Us Knew It
Introduction More than a decade before Motown became a national symbol of Black music and Black-owned enterprise, Mexican-American musicians and businessmen in the Rio Grande Valley had already built much
20% Jewish: a mystery to solve and two love stories as probabilities.
Meme had gone looking for an answer to a number. Almost twenty percent Jewish. The number sat there on the ancestry report as if it required no explanation. But to
San Antonio, Texas, early sixties, young and Mexican, a musical tour as some of us knew it.
San Antonio, Texas, Early Sixties: Young, Mexican, and TikTok Before TikTok Corpus Christi had its jukeboxes, radio stations, dances, and young Mexican Americans listening to the same new music that
At age 50, he packed up and moved the family across the river. Why? Ancieto Barrera
A factionalized family history based on the Barrera records, Starr County land records, and the history of the Garza War. The river was not very wide. That was the strange
The Garza War: The Forgotten Tejano Rebellion Along the Rio Grande
For Savannah Bernal and Jorge Barrera Jr., who keep reading these old South Texas stories and giving me a reason to keep digging. Somebody mentioned the Garza War to me.
Camp Ringgold, Rio Grande City, the fort that Texas forgot.
Digital Edition My parents are from Starr County, and we visited our grandparents, our uncles, and our cousins, but I never realized we had such a historic fort in Rio
Corpus Christi, Texas, early sixties, young and Mexican, a musical tour as some of us knew it.
I will be taking a short trip to Corpus, but this is the first of at least four musical tours of what the music was like for us old Tejanos.
1927 – killing and forcing “Mexicans” to work was common in some counties in South Texas.
In South Texas in the 1920s, a Mexican laborer looking for work could find himself picking cotton for a farmer he had never agreed to work for. The mechanism was
Santiago & Meme School of Chuco Words — Lesson 1
Tonight’s lesson: We didn’t speak bad Spanish. We spoke our Spanish. Our parents gave us the words they knew. Some came from old Spanish, some from Mexico, some from Caló
The Venegas Family – Mexican American History
In 1927, Miguel Venegas left behind a life that, by most standards, had been a good one. He had a wife, Dolores, four young sons, a successful store, ranch property,
Brown & Proud – wanting to be a Marine
I know how to take tests. I have taken hundreds of them during my lifetime. I know when I have done well, and I know when I have walked out
They Beat Them for the Clothes. They Couldn’t Kill the Culture. Pachuco Boogie
In South Texas, Mexican Americans created a sound built around the accordion and bajo sexto. It became conjunto, Tejano, and norteño music. In California, something different happened. “Vamos a Bailar”
He Told His Mother “No Tears.” Seventy-Five Years Later, the Mexican-American Soldier Finally Came Home
Three days before one of the worst battles of the Korean War, 19-year-old Celestino Chavez Jr. wrote home to his mother in Gallup, New Mexico. His letter ended with nine
Colorado Said Mexicans Were White — While Sending Their Children to a Separate “Mexican School” – one of the earliest lawsuits challenging segregation.
Colorado school officials had an interesting argument in 1914. They were not segregating Mexican-American children by race. Why? Because Mexicans were white. There was just one problem with that defense.
Too Mexican, too Catholic, too different to belong: New Mexico
Congress Thought New Mexico Was Too Mexican to Become a State When the United States took control of New Mexico after the Mexican-American War, the people living there did not
Arizona said we can’t have the “ignorant Mexican vote.”
Arizona Became a State — Then It Found a Way to Keep Mexican Americans From Voting Arizona became the 48th state on February 14, 1912. It did not take long