Austin Brown Beret Places

8th Street Austin Police Department
715 E 8th St, Austin, TX 78701

In late March 1974, the Brown Berets organized a demonstration outside the front steps of the Austin Police Department. This picket was to protest continued police brutality and demand the removal of Police Chief Bob Miles. The picket line stretched across the front of the police department for two hours. The East Austin community newspaper the Echo stated this as the first time anyone had held a demonstration in front of the police department. Aside from occasional planned protests, spontaneous protests occurred every day for months straight, usually established by the Brown Berets following moments of police brutality towards Chicano citizens in East Austin.¹

“It wasn’t just us we had people with us. They initiated a review board, that came from those actions. That came from us staging a protest in front of the police department you know day after day after day after day for weeks somebody was out there. Sometimes it might be one or two people, but somebody was out there with a sign every day for weeks and weeks. So that had some change, some permanent change and the way that things are done.”

Adela Mancias²

_{[1] Zeke, Romo, “Brown Berets Picket Police,” The Echo, Volume V, No. 2, March 29, 1974, Page 1, 5.
[2] Transcript, Adela Mancias Oral History Interview, June 24, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 10.}

Barton Springs Pool
2100 Barton Springs Rd, Austin, TX 78704

The 1928 Master Plan created green spaces for white people and pushed black and Mexican families to parts east of downtown Austin. Barton Springs and Zilker Park were the crwon jewels of this exclusionary effort. Taking strength in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, black teens and their allies sought to integrate this crown jewel of Austin’s white supremacy. These community-based efforts led to the desegregation of Barton Springs Pool and citywide playgrounds, allowing black and brown families to enjoy city amenities and experience some of Austin’s most valuable nature areas.¹

_{[1] Austin Library | Desegregation in Austin}

El Eco de Dove Springs
Pan American Recreation Center
2100 E 3rd St, Austin, TX 78702

“Never approach them in a way where we were radical at all. It just strictly informative. You know? There's a Pan-American recreation center, you know, there's gonna be a big show tonight, you know, and I'll be MC'ing and so and so will be playing. Come on down. When they did we would sit there and talk to them about hey by the way, we need better streets we need for you to go to city council you know, and talk about that. And you're having trouble, you know, with this and with that and who to go to. So, we were more like an informative group of people.

And funny because when we started the Brown Berets they were the people that were really making a contact with the people bringing all that information to me. In fact, all my Brown Berets, I gave them like one of those throw away cameras and said whatever you see wrong take a picture, bring it to me, I'll develop it, put it in the paper. You know? And this way I mean you're talking about a hundred a hundred fifty Brown Berets out in the street. I mean they gotta see something, you know? I couldn't do it myself. So it was a collaborative thing. In other words, you get the community involved and the community can do a lot for you. When you alienate your community then all of a sudden you get the rebuttal back, you know? But I never did that.

TCU: Did for example your activities in your [inaudible 00:02:03] did they ever damage your relationship with advertisers?

Tafoya: Oh no. Well see again that's coming back to the Echo. Okay, the Echo was so radical that advertisers didn't want to advertise with them. You know? So, but I said, you know what? I'm gonna create another newspaper called Musica which is nothing but about music. What the artists are doing, where they're at and the advertisers "Oh yeah I'll buy ads on that". So the Musica was supporting the Echo. So again, I did what David done to us many years, I played them in their own game. But that's the way I was able to do that otherwise not like you said.” - Marcelo Tafoya

Economy Furniture Company
9315 McNeil Rd, Austin, TX 78758

The Economy Furniture Strike by the Upholsters International Union began in 1968 after company administrators ignored a worker vote of 252-83 for union representation. Ninety percent of the workers were Mexican Americans, some who'd worked for the company for over two decades. The strike occurred from 1967 to 1971, during this time workers demanded better pay, vacation days, tenure, and improved working conditions. On February 5-6, 1971, Caesar Chavez gave a speech in Austin in support of the Chicano Huelga of Austin and the Economy Furniture Company Strike. The inclusion of student activists from the University of Texas and the Catholic Church in Austin set an origin of activism for Brown Beret members like Ernesto Fraga in Austin. The Huelga is also the first organized strike for Chicanos in Austin. In the end, the Economy Furniture Company granted workers their demands making the strike an essential turning point for Mexican American workers in Austin.¹

“One of the things that we did while we were organizing was to join the Economy Furniture strike march that was being held in Austin at that period of time. So, we got to join the march on Congress Avenue. I met leaders like Lencho Hernandez and Lio Hernandez who are a part of the Economy Furniture strike and I would later go on to work with them when I moved to Austin in 1970.”

Ernesto Fraga²

_{[1] Texas State Historical Association | Economy Furniture Company Strike
[2] Transcript, Ernesto Fraga, Oral History Interview, October 20, 2013, By Susana Almanza, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 4.}

The Depot
1104 E Main St,
Edmore, MI 48829

For a large part of the twentieth century Latino migrant workers and their families made annual trips across the United States visiting farms from California to Michigan. Many young Chicanos hold memories of working as migrant farm labor. When he was a child Brown Beret member Gavino Fernandez along with his entire family worked as migrant workers picking cherries, onions, and tomatoes in Michigan.

In 1965, the Edmore Picle Company became the site of a three week wildcat strike, connecting Braceros, Puerto Rican contract workers and Tejano families. The scandal after Edmore shaped migrant labor activism for the next five years, leading to the formation of the Michigan Farm Labor Commission in 1966

“We would go every summer to pick, we would go to Michigan every summer. We would hang out. There's three or four families and every summer around May, later May, we'd take off to Michigan, cherry, pickle, onions, tomatoes, and when you'd go pick tomatoes you'd see the big families, eight, nine, ten. Everybody getting their own cart. That's when it dawned on you, oh, no wonder they have. That was the reason why families had large families. Because of the labor part. We'd go pick cotton. Same thing. I mean, you would see rows of just endless rows.”

Gavino Fernandez

“We were teenagers. We liked to hang out downtown and stuff, and we'd go work for a week or something like that picking apricots, pears. Strawberries, forget it, man. That was hard work. We quit. I walked off of that job. But I have a lot of respect for farm workers. As a matter of fact, I still participate in their events with the UFW and things like that. I always volunteer and try to do what I can to support the cause.”

Raul Valdez

El Centro Chicano

105 San Marcos St, Austin, TX 78702 (original location to 1979)

1208 Willow St, Austin, TX 78702 (From 1979 to 1990s)

Established in the early 1970s, El Centro Chicano acted as the Austin Brown Beret headquarters. The Brown Berets held meetings, classes, and afterschool programs out of an East Austin home on San Marcos Street near Interstate 35. During their grand opening in 1974, the center hosted a Cinco de Mayo festival bringing over 1,000 people together in celebration. Throughout the 1970s El Centro would host community meetings, after-school programs, and daycare services acting as an essential community space for Chicanos in Austin. In 1979 the Brown Berets lost their headquarters to arson and relocated from San Marcos to a building on Willow Street donated by El Buen Pastor church.^1,2

“El Centro Chicano was a project that I give Paul Hernandez all the credit for. He was from Austin when I was not. He had the contacts of people including funding sources. Right there at the Centro Chicano I remember several of us would enter information for the proposal to get funding for the Centro Chicano. I want to show a little picture here of 1974, when during the midst of the police brutality campaign that we had with the East Austin Committee for Justice we had mayor Roy Butler and the city manager, and the police chief arrive at a caravan of the city staff hierarchy at the Centro Chicano to meet with the Brown Berets and the East Austin Committee for Justice.”

Ernesto Fraga³

“We started El Centro Chicano, we let that be the outlet where we would do all the outreach work. We would work with the kids and at the same time deal with the political issues that we were facing. Police brutality was really horrible in fact our group of Brown Berets were the first group in Austin that started filming police officers. We would have a little patrol and every time they would stop someone we’d be across the street filming it. They would get so upset, but we got a grant and we bought a video camera and we would just sit there. We had a little hotline. Every time they’d call us we’d go out there and just film them you know. But that was later on not at the very beginning and we had a hotline for police brutality that they could call in at the Centro you know so.”

Sabino “Pio” Renteria⁴

“So, we started this whole program where we’d make fideo and beans and tortillas and have a whole group of people. We would feed the kids and then they began to know that at lunch time they could come to the Centro Chicano and that there was going to be a meal happening.”

Susana Almanza⁵

_{[1] Ernesto Fraga, “Centro Chicano SERVES,” The Echo, Page 3.
Martin Delgado and Zeke Uballe, Radio Interview, “Chicano Advocates: A User's Guide to The Centro Chicano In Austin,” Host Alejandro Saenz, Onda Latina, August 9, 1977.
[3] Transcript, Ernesto Fraga, Oral History Interview, October 20, 2013, By Susana Almanza, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 9.
[4] Transcript, Susana Almanza and Sabino Renteria Oral History Interview, September 16, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 10.
[5] Transcript, Susana Almanza and Sabino Renteria Oral History Interview, September 16, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 8.}

El Cristo Rey Church
2215 E 2nd St, Austin, TX 78702

In 1972, Ernesto Fraga invited Susana Almanza and Sabino Renteria to one of the first Brown Beret meetings held at El Cristo Rey Church. Catholic Churches in Chicano communities throughout the 1960s to 1970s acted as semi-safe spaces for young Chicanos to organize. The Brown Berets moved their meetings to El Centro Chicano on San Marcos Street expanding from the church.

“I think ’73 he invited me to go to a Brown Beret meeting. They were putting the Brown Berets together and they’d been meeting at Cristo Rey Church on 2nd Street. Back then it was Father Lonny Arias (??) he was real activist priests and so he had been active in so many things. He was sort of like hosting the Brown Berets, letting them meet there at the church. So, I said, Well sure I’ll go check it out and see how things are going, what they’re doing. I went to the meeting and that’s what they were talking about you know, police brutalities, or how do we need to work with our youth? How do we need to protect our neighborhood? The barrio was the key word.”

Susana Almanza¹

_{[1] Transcript, Susana Almanza and Sabino Renteria Oral History Interview, September 16, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 6.}

Fiesta Gardens and Festival Beach
2101 Jesse E. Segovia St, Austin, TX 78702

In 1972, as a response to the Aqua Fest boat races the Brown Berets along with the Town Lake community organized demonstrations against the national festivals invasion of East Austin and Festival Beach. Paul Hernandez led demonstrators into protest demanding the events move the loud and disruptive boat races away from their neighborhood. Aqua Fest affected the majority Mexican American community living near Town Lake, along with other homeowners in the area. The festival ran from the late mid-1960s to the early 1980s and caused property damage, noise pollution, and loitering.

The City Council sided against the Brown Berets and neighborhood coalition for over a decade and continued to grant the festival permission to host races at Festival Beach. On April 22nd, 1978, during an anti-boat race demonstration, plain-clothed police officers attacked peaceful protesters. Nineteen protesters were arrested, including Brown Beret members Paul and Sam Hernandez. In custody, Paul and Sam refused to give fingerprints and staged a hunger strike. Their strike gained media recognition and public attention and successfully applied pressure to the City Council who later moved the festival elsewhere.

“The boat races at that time was a very hot issues, Paul Hernandez was making that one of his pet issues because he was involved in barrio neighborhood associations. Even members of his own family would be complaining about the tourism that was invading our barrios during those boat races. It really had more to do with self-determination of our barrios. The preservation of our barrios. A lot of people misunderstood our beef with boat races per say. It was really about preserving our barrios, to be in control of our own community. On that day of April 22, the Brown Berets organized a march from the east side to Town Lake close to the bridge on I35. One of the things that happened we were very fortunate that a person by the name of Jim Lutz was videotaping that march that manifestation that we had. He was able to capture on video that the police actually deliberately came face to face with our picketers and actually assaulted pulling people from the picket line into the street which caused a chaos because one person, one Beret after another was trying to protect the other.”

Ernesto Fraga¹

_{[1] Transcript, Ernesto Fraga, Oral History Interview, October 20, 2013, By Susana Almanza, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 12.}

Dell Picket Elementary School
1100 Thousand Oaks Blvd,
Georgetown, TX 78628

How was running in Georgetown back then?

Tafoya: “Well, first of all when we got to Georgetown there were three schools: An all white school, an all black school, and Escuelita Mexicanas near the river. My two brothers were already in such a position that they went automatically to the junior high which was a white man's school and I didn't. I ended up in the escuelita near the river and I only went to the first grade believe it or not. All the students were migrant workers so they never could get actually past the first grade because they would go work.

By the time they would come back, go to work, come back and I was stuck with them, too, but then the teacher died which is not a happy occasion but in my sense is that they couldn't find another bilingual teacher. They moved us, there was 42 of us, they moved us to the grammar school which the guys were already like 12 years old and they were cotton pickers so they were big. They wouldn't fit in the little desk so they kept moving us to the third, fourth, fifth grade and finally they moved us to the high school, which they built a special class for us in junior high.

Out of the 42 kids, 12 of us graduated and stuck it out. But yeah, discrimination was pretty heavy in Georgetown then. In fact, you go there to the courthouse and in the bottom basement they have two water fountains, black and white, and we don't know which one we should drink from. There was a question there, and of course Georgetown has a back history of there's a tree right behind the courthouse. They called it the hanging tree where they used to hang Indians and Mexicans and Blacks and all that stuff. It was pretty bad.”

- Marcelo Tafoya

Our Lady of Guadalupe
1206 E. 9th Street
Austin, TX 78702

But again, the people reacted because they saw what was happening, and because you were honest and straight forward with them. You weren't lying to them. And then we started getting more people to go out and vote, and just the movement started, okay? And then of course, [Raphanita 00:00:46] came in, of course PASO ... I don't know if you ever heard of PASO, and I was one of the original members of PASO. And with the church, of course, we did a lot to get people out to vote here in Austin the same way.

But it took organizations like that, and somebody that had the media that was willing disseminate that to the people, because the other radio stations, the other programs, because they were prominent Mexican, they wouldn't do that because to them, it was just, la musica and all this stuff, and I wasn't. I was more like community, hey, we're living in poverty. And the history here in Austin is that ... you know where I35 is. There was no I35. It was nothing but grass. Between the police station and the hill across the street, there was nothing there all the way to the river. So, what they did was the Mexicanos and the rico lived on Lamar Boulevard believe it or not. Even the Catholic church was there [inaudible 00:01:44] Guadalupe. They moved all of them over to this side, including the church.” – Marcelo Tafoya

Holly Street Power Plant
2401 Holly Street, Austin, TX

In 1958, the city-owned utility Austin Energy started building the the Holly Street Power Plant on the east edge of east Austin just west of the Longhorn Dam on the Colorado River. By 1972, the plant produced noise levels that exceed the Housing, Urban, and Development (HUD) federal standards for residential areas, along with high electromagnetic fields. The plant was the largest stationary source of nitrogen oxide in Austin, adding to the list of concerns for the surrounding neighborhood. Ongoing community pressure led by East Austin citizens and Chicano activists like Susana Almanza and Gavino Fernandez led the City Council to close the HPP on September 30, 2007.

“And the for the Holly Power Plant we had a fire, Halloween fire. One of the tanks leaked oil and all along we've been asking for it to be shut down since 1970. We had four turbines and when they all four ran we had 120 decibels of noise. I could sit on my porch 'cause I lived two lots from the plant, my dad did and we couldn't carry a conversation”

Gavino Fernandez¹

_{[1] Gavino Fernandez, July 2, 2016, By Steve Arionus and Vinicio Sinta, Civil Rights in Black and Brown Oral History Project: Texas Christian University, Page 17.}

IBM
11501 Burnet Road, Austin, Texas

In 1967, IBM opened a plant for Electric Composer typewriters in Austin. Bringing work opportunities for Austin citizens, and boosting Austin’s technology manufacturing sector. IBM played an integral part in providing jobs for people of color in Austin through their support of affirmative action. Sabino "Pio" Renteria joined IBM's workforce supporting his growing professional career.¹

“You’re out in the country, it’s still there it’s a real beautiful little place but we’re out in the country. A lot of these kids never have left the neighborhood, they didn’t know what it was like anywhere else. That was the things that we did, by that time I had already gotten a job with IBM and IBM would give us $1,000 for community funding so I would apply for these grants and you now, to by all kinds of little items and one year we were able to take the kids to Six Flags.”

Sabino “Pio” Renteria²

_{[1] Castelbury, Glen. 1966. IBM Will Build Here. The Austin Statesman, December 9, 1966.
[2] Transcript, Susana Almanza and Sabino Renteria Oral History Interview, September 16, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 13.}

Juárez-Lincoln University
707 E. Cesar Chavez Street, Austin, TX

Juárez-Lincoln University, the first Chicano intuition of higher education in Austin, Texas. When the university first arrived at Austin in 1972, they ran out of the St. Edward’s University. The university became an affiliate of the Antioch Graduate School of Education in Ohio. By 1975 enrollment reached over 200 students, mainly including the Mexican American East Austin community and Brown Beret members who participated in educational programs offered at the university. In 1979, Antioch University withdrew financial support. However, the building continued to be used by local groups. In 1980, real estate developers announced the demolition of the university for the creation of new office building. Neighborhood groups, including the Brown Berets, protested the demolition in hopes of turning it into a neighborhood center and saving a pre-Columbian inspired mural by artist Raul Valdez. Despite community demonstrations in 1983, the building was demolished.

King Ranch South Texas
Memorial Middle School
915 S Armstrong St,
Kingsville, TX 78363

“They were originally—my grandfather and father were originally ranch—they worked on ranches and then farming and then we just went over there and they were working there. My dad moved around a lot, he was a welder—he became a welder and he moved around a lot. He always went to little rural towns and little rural towns have little rural minds, unfortunately. It was always these farming towns and in Texas and sometimes in other states including Kansas but there was always something—and I couldn’t ever put my finger on it. I didn’t know what to call it but you know the way teachers treated us, the way sometimes other students treated us. There were incidences where they actually said, You can’t be at this part of the playground or You can’t us this equipment because this is for the white people and this is for the Mexicans. That stuff hurt, it hurt a lot but I wasn’t sure where to put it. I wasn’t sure how to handle it you know my parents didn’t talk about the word racism.”
- Adela Mancias

Kingsville, Texas

Memorial Middle School
915 S Armstrong St,
Kingsville, TX 78363
G45C+JM Kingsville, Texas

Leander Park

The Brown Berets through El Centro Chicano acted offered a safe space for young Chicanos in East Austin. Family unity and education for the Chicano community by the Brown Berets meant after-school programs, weekend classes, and extracurricular activities. In 1974 the Berets organized a trip to Leander through El Centro Chicano. This event provided a camping adventure for children in their community, offering Chicano children new experiences in nature outside of migrant farm labor.1

“So, what we did was we took, several times, we took a big group of the kids down to Leander and Elvia, remember Elvia Castro she had the connections. There was a lot of people that work with certain camps and they were able to say, Well we can get that camp for a weekend. You know they’d get the camp out for a lot of kids it was the first time going somewhere fun to camp out where you’re not working in the fields or something just camping out. We did a whole list of activities that we were going to have. Get up and make pancakes for the kids in the morning and then do hayrides, do sack races, just all kinds of just really run stuff. You know just have a good time and let the kids be out in the nature, also, be out in the open environment. Even though a lot of our communities, it’s not as full as today, it was pretty open, but this was even more out because you’re out in the ranch and you’re getting to do a lot of different things.”

Susana Almanza2

_{[1] Susie Renteria, “Kids’ Camp Out,” The Echo, Vol. V No. 3, April 26, 1974, Page 2.
[2] Transcript, Susana Almanza and Sabino Renteria Oral History Interview, September 16, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 13.}

Republic Steel
1807 E 28th St,
Lorain, OH 44055

TCU: Where were you born?

Tafoya: I was born in Lorraine, Ohio.

TCU: Okay.

Tafoya: January 16, 1939, before you were a tear in your daddy's eye.

TCU: Did you grow up there?

Tafoya: No, we moved back to Texas where our family originated, which is Georgetown, Texas, just 30 miles north of Austin, and I just came back and I was only seven years old at the time. I was raised in Georgetown.

TCU: What was your family doing in Ohio?

Tafoya: Well, my father moved over there to work at the steel factory, Lorain Steel Factory, and we were all born there

Old Austin City Hall
124 W 8th St, Austin, TX 78701

The Brown Berets themselves, along with community members approached the Austin City Council on multiple occasions. Members encouraged community members speaking to the city council about issues such as segregation, homeowner rights, and police brutality to name a few. On April 4th, 1974, the East Austin Committee for Justice (EACJ), a Brown Beret police brutality committee presented photographs, cases, proposals, and facts about police brutality. The Berets were offered the chance to speak to the City Council only after staging a protest outside the Police Department a few weeks prior. The City Council acted as a zone where the city would attempt to hear out the concerns of East Austin citizens.

“We would pack the council chambers, we would pack them. That’s back then when they had like these time limits you know where after a certain time they don’t have any more meetings. We stayed for more than one occasion. We stayed till one or two in the morning talking and people would stay. You know people from the community would get up on the podium, they had never spoken publicly, and they would talk sometimes in Spanish and they had translators. It was that initial energy it was like, Wow we have this you know this ability, this power to do this and it went on for several years.”

Adela Mancias¹

“What we did was we had the East Austin Committee for Justice present itself before city council and press conferences to show that it was not just a small little group demanding justice or calling on the issues of the day, but it was a wide spectrum of the community.”

Ernesto Fraga²

_{[1] Transcript, Adela Mancias Oral History Interview, June 24, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 9.
[2] Transcript, Ernesto Fraga, Oral History Interview, October 20, 2013, By Susana Almanza, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 6-7.}

Palm School
744 TX-343 Loop, Austin, TX 78701

Established in 1892, Palm School stood as one of Austin’s first elementary schools serving the Austin for 84 years. In the 1960s, Palm School acted as an unofficial summer hangout center for East Austin’s Chicano children. Susana Almanza and Pio Renteria shared memories of hanging around the school and swimming pool located directly next door during summers. They saw many children using Palm School as a safe hangout space during the summer. Their shared experiences impacted the decision of the Brown Berets to create after-school programs and free meals out of El Centro Chicano supplementing a safe space for children after schools closing in 1976.

“One of the programs we did was feeding the youth during summer time because one of the things were a lot of our kids, now we’re getting into the seventies and a lot of parents that used to be stay home no longer could afford to stay home. We were talking about two parents working and a lot of the children kind of hanging around and we would hang around at Palm School, you know for more than a day. Our situation was different because we could go home, and our mom would be there, and she’d have food ready.”

Susana Almanza¹

_{[1] Transcript, Susana Almanza and Sabino Renteria Oral History Interview, September 16, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 8-9.}

Pan American Center
2100 E 3rd St, Austin, TX 78702

Established in 1942 as the Federated Latin-American Club of the Austin Recreation Department as the first and only Latin-American Center in Austin later renamed as the Pan American Recreation Center. Throughout the 1960s to the present day, the Pan American Center acts as a community recreation center for East Austin citizens¹. Chicano activists and community members used the Pan Am Center as meeting ground for discussions and special events. On May 3, 1970, the East Austin Chicano Moratorium met and organized at the Pan American Center for an anti-war/anti-Viet Nam parade and protest. The Echo noted that over 1,000 Mexican-Americans gathers forming the first organized community demonstration by Chicanos in East Austin.²

“Well it was unique for us because we had a recreation center right in front of the street, the Pan American Recreation Center. So, to us, well, in that era, the 60s, that was the only AC facility around this whole area. So, in the summers that was our hangout. From 9:00 AM, they close at 12:00, then they open at 3:00, and they close at 10:00. So many of us that grew up around here in those times would hang out at the recreation centers because activities. More importantly during the summer in was the only AC facility that we had. That's where we were growing up.”

Gavino Fernandez³

_{[1] Oswaldo A.B. Cantu/Pan American Recreation Center
[2] “Chicanos March in East Austin May 3,” The Echo, May 19, 1970, Page 3.
[3]Gavino Fernandez, July 2, 2016, By Steve Arionus and Vinicio Sinta, Civil Rights in Black and Brown Oral History Project: Texas Christian University, Page 5.}

Plainsview High School
1501 Quincy St,
Plainview, TX 79072

“They were originally—my grandfather and father were originally ranch—they worked on ranches and then farming and then we just went over there and they were working there. My dad moved around a lot, he was a welder—he became a welder and he moved around a lot. He always went to little rural towns and little rural towns have little rural minds, unfortunately. It was always these farming towns and in Texas and sometimes in other states including Kansas but there was always something—and I couldn’t ever put my finger on it. I didn’t know what to call it but you know the way teachers treated us, the way sometimes other students treated us. There were incidences where they actually said, You can’t be at this part of the playground or You can’t us this equipment because this is for the white people and this is for the Mexicans. That stuff hurt, it hurt a lot but I wasn’t sure where to put it. I wasn’t sure how to handle it you know my parents didn’t talk about the word racism.”
- Adela Mancias

Political Science Department
Batts Hall
UT Austin
158 W. 21st Street
Austin, TX 78712

“I didn’t go to UT I went to Texas Woman’s University for a year then I went to South West Texas and then I didn’t know what I wanted to do, Austin was right here so I came here. Looking for something to do I got a little bit into education then I went back to school. I took a course and the course was Chicano studies—never heard of that honestly Chicano was even a new word for me. I took that course and oh my god that totally you know opened up my eyes and my brain as to who I was and what had been happening and what this whole life experience that I had up to now was. My professor was Armando Gutierrez who was Raza Unida and Raza Unida had been going on for a few years already. I mean since the sixties and there had been a lot of organizing and a lot had happened and this was already in the later seventies, ’77 was when this was.”
- Adela Mancias

Rainey Street Neighborhood
79 Rainey Street

Rainey Street Historic District 78701
Map Code: 7756+HJ Austin, Texas

In 1967, the City of Austin ‘Downtown Renewal’ plan suggested that the largely Latino Rainey Street neighborhood become the first project in a broad Downtown renewal plan. A study suggested that existing single-family dwellings be demolished and replaced with high-density residential and commercial buildings.¹ In the 1980s the Brown Berets organized homeowners in the Rainy Street neighborhood providing courses on zoning issues and homeowner rights. Efforts to save the neighborhood also included residents joining with preservationists to protect the historical value of the homes in Rainey Street. In 1985 they successfully listed the Rainey Street Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places. Paul Hernandez founder of the Brown Berets focused considerable time on educating homeowners on how to defend themselves from greedy land developers, allowing some families to hold onto their property as long as they could. By the 1990s redevelopment pressures from Austin's tech boom reinitiated the gentrification process and in 2004 rezoning completed the demise of family homes on Rainy Street.²

“Mr. Martinez was a very soft-spoken man but saw things very clearly. He had a little house on Rainey Street and he saw the writing on the wall. We had been working on Rainey Street going door to door talking about zoning and protecting the neighborhood. Talking about not bringing in this developer or that development it was always something and Mr. Martinez would have meetings. We would find someone to have a meeting at their home and he came and from the minute he got involved he became the leader for that neighborhood, the Rainey Street neighborhood.”

Adela Mancias³

_{[1, 2] Feit, Rachel. 2012. The Ghost of Developers Past. The Austin Chronicle. May 28, 2012
[3] Transcript, Adela Mancias Oral History Interview, June 24, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 9.}

Resistencia Bookstore
105 San Marcos Street, Austin, TX

Centro de la raza / Resistencia Bookstore Washington
2524 16th Ave S, Seattle, WA 98144

Initially founded in Seattle, Washington at El Centro de la Raza Resistencia Books acted as a meeting place for activists and poets. Poet Raúl Salinas and Gilbert Rivera met while studying at the University of Washington and upon moving back with help from the community and Gilbert, Raúl opened a Resistencia Books in Austin in 1983. Resistencia acted as a neighborhood center for aspiring writers, providing quality literature to Austin communities. Resistencia became a treasured part of Austin’s Chicano/Latino community.

“Raul Salinas was an instructor at the University of Washington and I was a student. He and a couple of other people started the La Resistencia book store. The Resistencia book store was basically what you see now.

When he came back to Austin he brought the idea of the bookstore, the original Resistencia still existed over there, but he came back and opened up a Resistencia book store here in Austin. And it has been around and different homes for the last thirty years, nonstop and it's in Seattle. It was a place where you met a lot of intellectuals, a lot of poets.”

Gilbert Rivera¹

“Well, Resistencia was founded in Seattle, Washington, at the Centro de la Raza. You can actually google Centro de la Raza. They're still around in Seattle. El Centro was a four-story school building. Big, gigantic school building that was not being used by the Seattle school district. I came in maybe a year after it was occupied. The local activists decided to occupy it. When I went to Seattle, that's where I landed, at the Centro de la Raza and I lived on the third floor on a mattress in one of the school rooms. When I went and then somebody says, "Oh, Gilbert, this is Pancho. He's now your roommate." So, we slept on the floor on mattresses, and we were occupying the building. Finally, the city of Seattle, or the school district, said, "Okay. We're giving up the school. It's yours now." So that's how the Centro de la Raza was created.

The Centro was a place that activists really migrated to. It was really interesting, because you had Indios, you had African-Americans, you had Filipinos, you had Vietnamese and all types of people, because unlike Austin, Seattle was very metropolitan. You had people from all over the world. Here in Austin when I left, it was you were black or brown or white and basically, very seldom did any of those three mix. So, when you went over there, it was great. The Resistencia Bookstore was one of the things that was developed out of there.”

Gilbert Rivera²

_{[1] Gilbert Rivera Oral History Interview, June 6, 2016, By Steve Arionus and Vinicio Sinta, Civil Rights in Black and Brown Oral History Project: Texas Christian University, Page 25.
[2] Gilbert Rivera Oral History Interview, June 6, 2016, By Steve Arionus and Vinicio Sinta, Civil Rights in Black and Brown Oral History Project: Texas Christian University, Page 23-24.}

Downtown Saginaw Farmer’s Market
203 S Washington Ave,
Saginaw, MI 48607

For a large part of the twentieth century Latino migrant workers and their families made annual trips across the United States visiting farms from California to Michigan. Many young Chicanos hold memories of working as migrant farm labor. When he was a child Brown Beret member Gavino Fernandez along with his entire family worked as migrant workers picking cherries, onions, and tomatoes in Michigan.

Saginaw became one of the hearts of farm labor organizing, particularly around sugar beets. In 1968, workers led a march from Saginaw to the state capitol of Lansing to protest and change working conditions in sugar beets.

“We would go every summer to pick, we would go to Michigan every summer. We would hang out. There's three or four families and every summer around May, later May, we'd take off to Michigan, cherry, pickle, onions, tomatoes, and when you'd go pick tomatoes you'd see the big families, eight, nine, ten. Everybody getting their own cart. That's when it dawned on you, oh, no wonder they have. That was the reason why families had large families. Because of the labor part. We'd go pick cotton. Same thing. I mean, you would see rows of just endless rows.”

Gavino Fernandez

“We were teenagers. We liked to hang out downtown and stuff, and we'd go work for a week or something like that picking apricots, pears. Strawberries, forget it, man. That was hard work. We quit. I walked off of that job. But I have a lot of respect for farm workers. As a matter of fact, I still participate in their events with the UFW and things like that. I always volunteer and try to do what I can to support the cause.”

Raul Valdez

Sal Si Puedes Neighborhood
739 E Lake Ave # 2,
Watsonville, CA 95076

For a large part of the twentieth century Latino migrant workers and their families made annual trips across the United States visiting farms from California to Michigan. Many young Chicanos like Gilberto Rivera, Adela Mancias, Raul Valdez and Gavino Fernandez hold memories of working as migrant farm labor. In the 1960s Austin artist, Raul Valdez arrived in California in his late teens picking fruits and vegetables.

In the 1960s the United Farm Workers of America (UFW) organized for better wages and better working conditions for migrant workers in California. The UFW formed the Chicano Movement of the 1960s bringing attention to the Chicano struggle with their nationwide grape boycott and strike in the late 1960s to the 1970s. Cesar Chavez became a notable farm rights activist, and the UFW movement sprouted seeds amongst young Chicano activists.

“I spent a lot of time in California, too, though. All my summers, I'd spend in California. San Jose and in Los Angeles.”

Raul Valdez

“We were teenagers. We liked to hang out downtown and stuff, and we'd go work for a week or something like that picking apricots, pears. Strawberries, forget it, man. That was hard work. We quit. I walked off of that job. But I have a lot of respect for farm workers. As a matter of fact, I still participate in their events with the UFW and things like that. I always volunteer and try to do what I can to support the cause.”

Raul Valdez

“Well, first of all, they would pay you $1.25 for a big old box. I had to fill it up to the top, I mean totally full. It took us like half a day to get one box. Even in the '60s, you know. That's when it was. That was, it was a lot of work, man and I didn't know how to do it. Once you get it, you know. There were some people that had been doing it for years, and they'd pass me up and they'd be way out there, and I'd be still over here looking for strawberries and all. So, it wasn't an easy job if you don't know what you're doing or how to do it.”

Raul Valdez

Texas Capital
1100 Congress Avenue, Austin, TX 78701

The February 1983 Ku Klux Klan march at the Capital is called a watershed moment for police brutality in Austin. During this event, a counter-protest occurred to demonstrate the rejection of the Klan at the capital. After the demonstration, three Brown Beret members were attacked by police, without any provocation or warning. The attacked included Adela Mancias, Maria Limon, and Paul Hernandez met a gang of billy clubs by multiple police officers. A Houston news station captured the assault via a parking garage roof. Arrested for "resisting" arrest Paul Hernandez received several broken bones and head stitches. Three weeks later Adela and Maria are charged with unlawful interference of Paul’s arrest, but later have all charges dropped. This attack added to the number of violent acts committed by the Austin Police Department to Chicano residents through the 1970s and 1980s.¹

“So, we did a counter rally and actually it wasn’t the Klan that attacked us it was the police. It was a very well-known event because it was on news nationally. People that I knew in other states called me about it and that became I think, I don’t know sort of a watershed moment for everybody. I guess because of the publicity I’m not sure exactly if it was a turning moment. It seems like it was but at that moment we got a lot of publicity from everywhere and the trial went on for weeks. We were arrested, three of us were arrested three weeks after the event for unlawful interference with somebody else’s arrest. The person that got arrested was Paul Hernandez. Paul was the leader of the Berets at the time. He got severely beaten and it was all on camera. A T.V. camera had gotten it from the top from like a bird’s eye view from the top of a parking garage”

Adela Mancias²

_{[1] Dick Stanley, Joe Wagner, and Jerry White. “11 Injured, 13 Arrested in Clash at Klan March,” The Austin American-Statesman, February 20, 1983, Page A1, A24.
Janet Willson, “Group Plans Alternative to Klan Rally,” The Austin American-Statesman (1973-1987), February 8, 1983, Page B2.
[2] Transcript, Adela Mancias Oral History Interview, June 24, 2013, By Gloria Espitia, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 5.}

Southwest Texas State
Taylor Murphy Hall
601 University Drive
San Marcos, TX 78666

“I didn’t go to UT I went to Texas Woman’s University for a year then I went to South West Texas and then I didn’t know what I wanted to do, Austin was right here so I came here. Looking for something to do I got a little bit into education then I went back to school. I took a course and the course was Chicano studies—never heard of that honestly Chicano was even a new word for me. I took that course and oh my god that totally you know opened up my eyes and my brain as to who I was and what had been happening and what this whole life experience that I had up to now was. My professor was Armando Gutierrez who was Raza Unida and Raza Unida had been going on for a few years already. I mean since the sixties and there had been a lot of organizing and a lot had happened and this was already in the later seventies, ’77 was when this was.”

Texas Woman’s University
304 Administration Dr,
Denton, TX 76204

“I didn’t go to UT I went to Texas Woman’s University for a year then I went to South West Texas and then I didn’t know what I wanted to do, Austin was right here so I came here. Looking for something to do I got a little bit into education then I went back to school. I took a course and the course was Chicano studies—never heard of that honestly Chicano was even a new word for me. I took that course and oh my god that totally you know opened up my eyes and my brain as to who I was and what had been happening and what this whole life experience that I had up to now was. My professor was Armando Gutierrez who was Raza Unida and Raza Unida had been going on for a few years already. I mean since the sixties and there had been a lot of organizing and a lot had happened and this was already in the later seventies, ’77 was when this was.”
- Adela Mancias

The Forty Acres Delano, CA
30168 Garces Hwy, Delano, CA 93215

In the 1960s the United Farm Workers of America (UFW) organized for better wages and better working conditions for migrant workers working on grape harvests in Delano, California. The UFW brought attention to the farmworkers (both Chicano and Filipino) struggle with their nationwide grape boycott and strike in the late 1960s to the 1970s.¹ Union leader César Chávez became a notable farm rights activist, and the UFW movement sprouted seeds amongst young Chicano activists. In 1966 a parcel of land in Delano became known as The Forty Acres and as the UFW headquarters.²

“I spent a lot of time in California, too, though. All my summers, I'd spend in California. San Jose and in Los Angeles.”

Raul Valdez³

“We were teenagers. We liked to hang out downtown and stuff, and we'd go work for a week or something like that picking apricots, pears. Strawberries, forget it, man. That was hard work. We quit. I walked off of that job. But I have a lot of respect for farm workers. As a matter of fact, I still participate in their events with the UFW and things like that. I always volunteer and try to do what I can to support the cause.”

Raul Valdez⁴

“Well, first of all, they would pay you $1.25 for a big old box. I had to fill it up to the top, I mean totally full. It took us like half a day to get one box. Even in the '60s, you know. That's when it was. That was, it was a lot of work, man and I didn't know how to do it. Once you get it, you know. There were some people that had been doing it for years, and they'd pass me up and they'd be way out there, and I'd be still over here looking for strawberries and all. So, it wasn't an easy job if you don't know what you're doing or how to do it.”

Raul Valdez⁵

_{[1] La Huelga! Delano and After, Irving J. Cohen.
[2] The Forty Acres Delano, California
[3] Raul Valdez Oral History Interview, August 26, 2012, By Ester Diaz Martin, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 1.
[4] Raul Valdez Oral History Interview, August 26, 2012, By Ester Diaz Martin, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 3.
[5] Raul Valdez Oral History Interview, August 26, 2012, By Ester Diaz Martin, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 3.}

The University of Texas at Austin
306 Inner Campus Drive, Austin, TX 78712

In 1955, the University of Texas Board of Regents voted to follow the supreme court precedent established in Brown v. Board of Education and admit African American undergraduate students starting in the fall semester of 1956. Into the 1960s, Chicano students rallied around the creation of Mexican American programs at the Universities. Chicano organizations at UT included the Mexican American Youth Organization (MAYO). Student protest led to the establishment of the Center for Mexican American Studies, first housed in the Dorothy E. Gebauer building and then in the Architecture & Planning Library. Chicano undergraduates played an integral part in the Chicano Movement in Austin. University of Texas students occasionally engaged within the East Austin neighborhood through protests and demonstrations.¹

_{[1] Austin Library | Desegregation in Austin}

Traverse City, MI

For a large part of the twentieth century Latino migrant workers and their families made annual trips across the United States visiting farms from California and Michigan. Many young Chicanos hold memories of working as migrant farm labor. In the 1960s Austin artist, Raul Valdez arrived in California in his late teens picking fruits and vegetables. When he was a child Brown Beret member Gavino Fernandez along with his entire family worked as migrant workers picking cherries, onions, and tomatoes in Michigan.

“Well, first of all, they would pay you $1.25 for a big old box. I had to fill it up to the top, I mean totally full. It took us like half a day to get one box. Even in the '60s, you know. That's when it was. That was, it was a lot of work, man and I didn't know how to do it. Once you get it, you know. There were some people that had been doing it for years, and they'd pass me up and they'd be way out there, and I'd be still over here looking for strawberries and all. So, it wasn't an easy job if you don't know what you're doing or how to do it.”

Raul Valdez¹

“We would go every summer to pick, we would go to Michigan every summer. We would hang out. There's three or four families and every summer around May, later May, we'd take off to Michigan, cherry, pickle, onions, tomatoes, and when you'd go pick tomatoes you'd see the big families, eight, nine, ten. Everybody getting their own cart. That's when it dawned on you, oh, no wonder they have. That was the reason why families had large families. Because of the labor part. We'd go pick cotton. Same thing. I mean, you would see rows of just endless rows.”

Gavino Fernandez²

_{[1] Raul Valdez Oral History Interview, August 26, 2012, By Ester Diaz Martin, Austin History Center: Oral History Center, Page 3.
[2] Gavino Fernandez, July 2, 2016, By Steve Arionus and Vinicio Sinta, Civil Rights in Black and Brown Oral History Project: Texas Christian University, Page 6.}

UFW Headquarters
Cesar Chavez National Monument
29700 Woodford-Tehachapi Rd, Keene, CA 93531

For a large part of the twentieth century Latino migrant workers and their families made annual trips across the United States visiting farms from California to Michigan. Many young Chicanos like Gilberto Rivera, Adela Mancias, Raul Valdez and Gavino Fernandez hold memories of working as migrant farm labor. In the 1960s Austin artist, Raul Valdez arrived in California in his late teens picking fruits and vegetables.

In the 1960s the United Farm Workers of America (UFW) organized for better wages and better working conditions for migrant workers in California. The UFW started the Delano grape boycott, which lasted nearly five years. The boycott strategies brought attention to Chicano workers as well as their pinoy brethren. Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta became the faces of the farm labor movement; Chicano activists sought to emulate much of the UFW movement across the United States. Raul Valdez helped spread the word.

“I spent a lot of time in California, too, though. All my summers, I'd spend in California. San Jose and in Los Angeles.”

Raul Valdez

“We were teenagers. We liked to hang out downtown and stuff, and we'd go work for a week or something like that picking apricots, pears. Strawberries, forget it, man. That was hard work. We quit. I walked off of that job. But I have a lot of respect for farm workers. As a matter of fact, I still participate in their events with the UFW and things like that. I always volunteer and try to do what I can to support the cause.”

Raul Valdez

“Well, first of all, they would pay you $1.25 for a big old box. I had to fill it up to the top, I mean totally full. It took us like half a day to get one box. Even in the '60s, you know. That's when it was. That was, it was a lot of work, man and I didn't know how to do it. Once you get it, you know. There were some people that had been doing it for years, and they'd pass me up and they'd be way out there, and I'd be still over here looking for strawberries and all. So, it wasn't an easy job if you don't know what you're doing or how to do it.”

Raul Valdez

Yerba Buena High School
1855 Lucretia Ave,
San Jose, CA 95122

For a large part of the twentieth century Latino migrant workers and their families made annual trips across the United States visiting farms from California to Michigan. Many young Chicanos like Gilberto Rivera, Adela Mancias, Raul Valdez and Gavino Fernandez hold memories of working as migrant farm labor. In the 1960s Austin artist, Raul Valdez arrived in California in his late teens picking fruits and vegetables.

In the 1960s the United Farm Workers of America (UFW) organized for better wages and better working conditions for migrant workers in California. The UFW formed the Chicano Movement of the 1960s bringing attention to the Chicano struggle with their nationwide grape boycott and strike in the late 1960s to the 1970s. Cesar Chavez became a notable farm rights activist, and the UFW movement sprouted seeds amongst young Chicano activists.

“I spent a lot of time in California, too, though. All my summers, I'd spend in California. San Jose and in Los Angeles.”

Raul Valdez

“We were teenagers. We liked to hang out downtown and stuff, and we'd go work for a week or something like that picking apricots, pears. Strawberries, forget it, man. That was hard work. We quit. I walked off of that job. But I have a lot of respect for farm workers. As a matter of fact, I still participate in their events with the UFW and things like that. I always volunteer and try to do what I can to support the cause.”

Raul Valdez

“Well, first of all, they would pay you $1.25 for a big old box. I had to fill it up to the top, I mean totally full. It took us like half a day to get one box. Even in the '60s, you know. That's when it was. That was, it was a lot of work, man and I didn't know how to do it. Once you get it, you know. There were some people that had been doing it for years, and they'd pass me up and they'd be way out there, and I'd be still over here looking for strawberries and all. So, it wasn't an easy job if you don't know what you're doing or how to do it.”

Raul Valdez

Vietnam
Cam Ranh Bay U.S. Army Base
Nha Trang, Khanh Hoa Province, Vietnam

By the mid-1960s over half a million American troops occupied Vietnam, including many young Mexican Americans. Back home an anti-war movement was beginning to grow, allowing for a new gateway into activism for American college students. Chicano opposition to the way introduced young Mexican Americans to anti-war demonstration, and into organizing amongst themselves for problems they faced beyond the war in Vietnam. Fights poverty, racism, and discrimination in America made Chicanos rethink their brothers and sisters along with their own involvement in the Vietnam War. During 1970s the National Chicano Moratorium Committee held over a dozen anti-war demonstrations across the United States leading to a massive August march in Los Angeles with attendance between twenty to thirty thousand people.[1] The anti-war sentiment amongst young Chicanos existed in Texas as well as California, for many young Chicanos their entrance into political identities was through anti-war efforts, but also through their own involvement with the war. For Brown Beret Samuel Hernandez returning from his time in Vietnam created a space to quickly enter into community organizing having realized Americans involvement in Vietnam. Artist and Brown Beret ally Raul Valdez came back and used his energy and time to spread pro-Chicano and pre-colonial art and music into his community.

_{[1] Lorena Oropeza, “!Raza Si! !Guerra No!: Chicano Protest and Patriotism During the Vietnam War Era”, University of California Press, 2005.}