A legacy, once lost: Part 3

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Flexing newfound political muscle

The battlefields of World War II had given Latinos courage and vision to fight the discrimination and prejudice they saw back home. As decorated American heroes, Phoenix Latinos were poised to make big changes through political and social activism.

This spirited civil rights movement also was taking root in barrios and ghettos across the country.

Latino-led advocacy groups such as American Legion Post 41, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the Latin American Club and a local chapter of the national Community Service Organization (of which Arizona-born Cesar Chavez was a leader), began a bold push for Hispanic political power in Phoenix.

Strong Latino leaders, including James Carreón and Manuel “Lito” Peña (among the first Hispanic state Legislators); Adam Diaz and Valdemar Cordova (the first two Latinos elected to Phoenix City Council), and others were elected from a single political base: Thunderbird American Legion Post 41.

In addition, political advocates like Maria Garcia, who founded the first LULAC Council #110 in Phoenix, were leading the struggle for civil and political rights.

The most effective of these groups was Post 41, organized by veterans Ray Martinez and Frank “Pipa” Fuentes in 1945. The organization’s membership grew from 300 in 1947 to 900 by 1950.

Former post commander Martinez relates that the group’s strategy was to build on the patriotic feelings inspired by veterans.

“When we got out of the service, some of us knew we had a mission, because we were not going to go back to the discrimination we had suffered before. We were determined that, by golly, you know, now’s the time to do something,” Martinez says in a KAET Channel 8 Arizona Stories feature.

The post’s active membership focused on discrimination against Hispanics in housing, in schools, in the city pools and particularly in the political arena.

Latinas of the Post’s Women’s Auxiliary organized voter registration drives and canvassed barrios on behalf of Hispanic and non-Hispanic candidates. They also pushed votes for bond elections to help Hispanic neighborhoods.

Anglo candidates knew the Post’s endorsement was key to being elected. Future Sen. Barry Goldwater became a lifetime member, and Arizona governors were Post supporters.

It was community-minded Mexican American leaders like Adam Diaz who opened the doors for political change in Phoenix.

Diaz was an active member of Post 41, the Latino American Club, the Spanish American Club, and worked closely with Placida Garcia Smith, director of the Friendly House in Diaz’s neighborhood, Grant Park.

He was a proven community leader, and well respected by the Anglo political brokers. When the Phoenix Charter Government Committee formed the political slate for the 1954 city council election, they asked Diaz to join its candidates.

Diaz recalls, “I said it was a little early. Hispanics are not considered material for political office like that (by Anglos)…They said, ‘No, we’d like you to run.’ ”

Diaz, who served from 1953 to 1955, helped to address social issues that affected the Hispanic community. More important, Diaz broke down barriers for future Latino council members.

The bold and outspoken efforts of these early activists paved the way for equal participation in politics by Phoenix Hispanics.

In postwar Phoenix returning Hispanic veterans had proven their loyalty and bravery. They and other minority vets were ready to fight for the right to live in city areas formerly seen as off limits.

During World War II, 375,000 to 500,000 Mexican Americans served in the United States military nationwide. Many won awards for their bravery and valor. However, as honorably as they served in the global conflict abroad, when Latino soldiers came back they found they still had to fight to buy housing at home.

Phoenix resident Silvestre Herrera, earned the Congressional Medal of Honor for his bravery during the war. Ironically, the same week Herrera enjoyed a hero’s parade down Central Avenue, the governor of Arizona had to order the removal of signs that said “No Mexican Trade Wanted” outside city businesses.

By the late ‘40s young Phoenix Hispanics began to call for greater inclusion and equal treatment in all areas of city life, but especially in decisions where they could live. Unfortunately, segregation still existed.

In a well-documented instance, David Perez, a member of the famed Bushmasters of World War II, tried to use his G.I. Bill rights to finance a family home. Racial deed restrictions and banks’ refusal to finance mortgages south of Van Buren frustrated Perez and other veterans.

But in the summer of 1946 one organization challenged — and beat — Phoenix’s housing discrimination: the newly formed Thunderbird American Legion Post No. 41.

Located off Central and 1^st avenues, Post No. 41 became a training ground for Latino leadership. Its members included former judge Valdemar Cordova, future Phoenix City Councilman Adam Diaz, and future state Legislator Manuel “Lito” Pena.

The Legion’s members fought for the integration of a housing subdivision being built at 16^th Street and Roosevelt. The local neighborhood association, led by White property owners, fought the integration. The association’s leader, Eddie Poole, voiced his views during a Phoenix City Council meeting. He said Mexican American residents would decrease property values and commit crimes such as robbery and rape.

Ray Martinez, a Post 41 founder, recalls that integration advocates pointed out they had just been through a war motivated by hate, and yet racist views were being heard in Phoenix. Council members voted to integrate the housing project.

Post 41 vets won another battle when Latino member Donald Gaylien was refused a home in a subdivision at 27^th Avenue and Adams Street.

Armed with a new law against discrimination in federally financed housing, Martinez repeatedly tried to meet with the development company’s president. Finally, Martinez threatened to halt the FHA/VA funding of the project if the company didn’t sell to Mexican American home buyers.

The company president quickly backed down and Mexican Americans integrated the subdivision.

In 1948 the U.S. Supreme Court would rule in Shelly v. Kraemer that racially restrictive housing covenants were illegal.

A plaque installed that same year at Post 41’s building dedication imparts the veterans’ dedication to pursuing their rights as Americans:

“Ever since it can be remembered, Americans of Spanish-speaking ancestry have striven to promote the welfare of our country, to uphold and defend its constitution and to fight for it proudly in time of war. It is not intended to drop the battle of Justice, Freedom and Democracy merely because the sound of gunfire has stilled.” 

Healing in the Hispanic community

When they fell ill, most Mexican Americans living in the barrios south of Phoenix’s railroad tracks relied on folk remedies to cure minor illnesses.

Common sicknesses were treated with herbal remedies from pharmacy and yerberia (herb) shop shelves. For example, plants such as ruda (prairie clover) were used to ease ear aches.

By the 1940s, the nearest hospitals were St. Joseph’s or Good Samaritan, where medical treatment could be too expensive for poorer Hispanic families.

Pharmacies were important sources of health advice for the Hispanic community. Friendly employees at downtown drugstores like the Botica Mexicana and Ramona Drug Store often gave advice while selling medicines.

For more serious health problems, families called in doctors for home visits. Worried families often called Dr. Winston Hackett, an African American doctor, for treatment.

Only two Hispanic doctors practiced in Phoenix in the 1940s. Dr. A.G. Valle de Lugo lived on south 1^st Avenue in the Grant Park neighborhood. The other doctor was Dr. Alberto Alvarez, who changed office locations frequently.

Other medical services were provided at Maricopa County clinics and volunteer clinics.

However, when a chance came to build a hospital at 7^th Avenue and Buckeye Road, Hispanics raised funds to make it a reality.

The Rev. Emmett McLoughlin, a Catholic priest, was a champion for Mexican American and African American residents of Phoenix. McLoughlin knew these communities suffered from a lack of medical services. He opened a small maternity clinic in an old barbershop next to St. Monica’s Mission. This clinic was the beginning of St. Monica’s Hospital (later renamed Memorial Hospital).

Registered nurses, hospital interns and student nurses provided free services at the clinic to the needy residents of the area.

One of these student nurses was Clara Yanez, wife of Roy Yanez, the Marcos de Niza Housing Project manager. She recalls: “We went over there to help the doctors deliver the babies…it was mostly Blacks and Mexicans (who came to the clini sc.)”

In the early ‘40s, St. Monica’s board of directors began planning for a 50-room hospital. Soldiers were returning from the war and needed treatment.

The federal government approved some funding for St. Monica’s in 1942, but the bulk of fundraising fell upon the minorities who would use the facility.

Latinos responded in the same spirit with which they had built earlier churches and community buildings: they pitched through fundraising barbecues, bazaars, newspaper subscription drives and personal donations.

They raised $9,000 to buy a 14-acre cotton field south of Buckeye Road. St. Monica’s Hospital was completed in 1944. St. Monica’s Nursing School opened in October 1944, the first interracial nursing school west of the Mississippi River. Young Mexican American women landed nursing jobs or were service workers at St. Monica’s.

In the fall of 1946, Dr. Trevor Browne added an outpatient children’s clinic.

In 1948, McLoughlin left the priesthood but stayed as hospital superintendent. In 1949, St. Monica’s was renamed Memorial Hospital.

Recognizing the value of having a medical center in their midst, Hispanic barrio residents were more than willing to offer money, time and service to ensure their families’ health needs were met.

Hispanics and the campaign to desegregate schools

In the 1940s Mexican American children were still attending Phoenix-area schools under the notion of “separate but equal” education, but this policy would be challenged through legal actions led by Latinos.

The campaign to end school segregation was fueled by a legal case in Tolleson. The court victory eventually would have repercussions as far as the U.S. Supreme Court, influencing its decision to make school segregation illegal in 1954.

The town of Tolleson was an area of farms and fields west of Phoenix. Hispanics lived in separate parts of town from Whites. Many students attending Tolleson School District were children of migrant farm workers.

In Tolleson, White students attended a more modern school building, while Hispanic students attended an older, dilapidated school.

In 1947, town resident and future state senator Manuel “Lito” Peña and other Latinos formed a committee to legally end segregation. Ralph Estrada, a Tempe lawyer active in Alianza Hispano Americana, and Greg Garcia, a Phoenix lawyer who also was a member of Alianza, advised the committee. In addition, Al Wirin, a Los Angeles lawyer with the American Jewish Council, joined the group.

In 1952, the committee filed a lawsuit against Tolleson School District in which they argued that the unequal school buildings were a violation of the 14^th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The goal of the suit was to obtain the right for all Latinos to choose the schools their children would attend.

School district attorneys defended segregation, saying it was needed because Hispanic students spoke mainly Spanish. The committee showed the district had never tested the students to see if they were deficient in English. Committee members also testified that students of all races should attend school together to help Hispanic students to assimilate.

In 1955, federal Judge David Ling mandated that Tolleson must desegregate its schools based on his earlier 1952 ruling that the district had violated the 14^th Amendment. In 1954 the famous corresponding case Brown v. Board of Education, the Tolleson decision was cited by advocates who argued in the U.S. Supreme Court that segregation must end.

Hispanic parents celebrated the national and local court decisions, which were followed by other groups filing cases in other Valley cities. In 1955, Glendale schools also were desegregated. Phoenix school districts officially desegregated its elementary and high schools by the end of 1954.

At last, the city’s minority and White students could attend school together, opening the doors of education to all.

In 1954, South Mountain High School, the first high school south of the Salt River, opened to serve all students of south Phoenix.

In 1957, when Carl Hayden High School was built, it included Hispanic students. In fact, Silvestre Herrera Jr., son of the WWII Congressional Medal of Honor winner, was elected its first student body president.

The Tolleson case was a successful example of how Latinos used federal law to make sure their children received the best education available.