American Latino Heritage: People

Dolores Huerta was born Dolores Clara Fernández on April 10, 1930, in the mining town of Dawson, New Mexico. She was the daughter of Juan Fernández and Alicia Chávez. Her father was a farm worker, miner, and union activist elected to the New Mexico legislature in 1938. When she was three, her parents divorced. Huerta moved with her two brothers and mother to Stockton, California, where she spent most of her childhood and early adult life.

Ynes Mexia was a botanist, conservationist, and early pioneer in fighting to preserve the redwood forest of Northern California. Even after starting her career at 55, Ynes Mexia became one of the most successful female botanists of her time. She was a part of the evolving environmental movement in the Bay Area and was an early member of Save the Redwood League. Ynes Mexia helped pave the way for future women of color in the fields of science and conservation.

Emma Tenayuca was a Mexican American labor organizer and civil rights activist. She led a wave of strikes by women workers in Texas in the 1930s. Her actions empowered her community and inspired workers across the country.

Dr. Helen Rodríguez Trías was a public health expert and women’s rights activist. She served as the first Latina director of the American Public Health Association. Her understanding of how social and economic inequality shapes people’s health guided her career.

Rosa was a "criolla," or American-born child of Spanish parents. We know nothing of her childhood except that she lived at one of Spain's most dangerous northern frontier outposts. She was mother of Juan Bautista de Anza who led an expedition to what would become San Francisco in 1776. After she was widowed, she managed the largest ranching enterprise in the Pimeria Alta.

Possibly the first woman of European descent to cross the Santa Fe Trail, Carmel Benavidas “was as brave as beautiful”. With her elite New Mexican heritage, Carmel’s marriage to French-Canadian fur trapper Antoine Robideaux helped establish a familial and business network that extended across states, nations, and even continents.

El milloinario (the Millionaire), Felipe Chávez was an incredibly successful businessman and entrepreneur who successfully invested in the Santa Fe Trail trade. Through diversification, international network building, and shrewd investing of his large inheritance, Chávez became one of the wealthiest people in New Mexico.

Hernando de Soto landed in Florida with 620 men and 220 horses in May of 1539. By 1540, the conquistadors were making their way along the coast of Georgia, South and North Carolina, and into the Ridge and Valley Province of Tennessee, northwest Georgia, and north Alabama looking for gold. Learn more about this Spanish explorer, his journey to and through the Americas.

In 1921, Otero-Warren ran for federal office, campaigning to be the Republican Party nominee for New Mexico to the US House of Representatives. She won the nomination, but lost the election by less than nine percent. She remained politically and socially active, and served as the Chairman of New Mexico’s Board of Health; an executive board member of the American Red Cross; and director of an adult literacy program in New Mexico for the Works Projects Administration.

Military history, LGB culture, immigrant stories, and much more make up GGNRA's roots. For José Sarria, a LGB activist in San Francisco, all the above apply. Born in the Bay Area to a single mother from Colombia, Sarria became the first openly gay, public figure. He ran for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1961.