• Home
    • Get the Podcasts
    • About
      • Contact Latinopia.com
      • Copyright Credits
      • Production Credits
      • Research Credits
      • Terms of Use
      • Teachers Guides
  • Art
    • LATINOPIA ART
    • INTERVIEWS
  • Film/TV
    • LATINOPIA CINEMA
    • LATINOPIA SHOWCASE
    • INTERVIEWS
    • FEATURES
  • Food
    • LATINOPIA FOOD
    • COOKING
    • RESTAURANTS
  • History
    • LATINOPIA EVENT
    • LATINOPIA HERO
    • TIMELINES
    • BIOGRAPHY
    • EVENT PROFILE
    • MOMENT IN TIME
    • DOCUMENTS
    • TEACHERS GUIDES
  • Lit
    • LATINOPIA WORD
    • LATINOPIA PLÁTICA
    • LATINOPIA BOOK REVIEW
    • PIONEER AMERICAN LATINA AUTHORS
    • INTERVIEWS
    • FEATURES
  • Music
    • LATINOPIA MUSIC
    • INTERVIEWS
    • FEATURES
  • Theater
    • LATINOPIA TEATRO
    • INTERVIEWS
  • Blogs
    • Angela’s Photo of the Week
    • Arnie & Porfi
    • Bravo Road with Don Felípe
    • Burundanga Boricua
    • Chicano Music Chronicles
    • Fierce Politics by Dr. Alvaro Huerta
    • Mirándolo Bien with Eduado Díaz
    • Political Salsa y Más
    • Mis Pensamientos
    • Latinopia Guest Blogs
    • Tales of Torres
    • Word Vision Harry Gamboa Jr.
    • Julio Medina Serendipity
    • ROMO DE TEJAS
    • Sara Ines Calderon
    • Ricky Luv Video
    • Zombie Mex Diaries
    • Tia Tenopia
  • Podcasts
    • Louie Perez’s Good Morning Aztlán
    • Mark Guerrero’s Chicano Music Chronicles
      • Yoga Talk with Julie Carmen

latinopia.com

Latino arts, history and culture

  • Home
    • Get the Podcasts
    • About
      • Contact Latinopia.com
      • Copyright Credits
      • Production Credits
      • Research Credits
      • Terms of Use
      • Teachers Guides
  • Art
    • LATINOPIA ART
    • INTERVIEWS
  • Film/TV
    • LATINOPIA CINEMA
    • LATINOPIA SHOWCASE
    • INTERVIEWS
    • FEATURES
  • Food
    • LATINOPIA FOOD
    • COOKING
    • RESTAURANTS
  • History
    • LATINOPIA EVENT
    • LATINOPIA HERO
    • TIMELINES
    • BIOGRAPHY
    • EVENT PROFILE
    • MOMENT IN TIME
    • DOCUMENTS
    • TEACHERS GUIDES
  • Lit
    • LATINOPIA WORD
    • LATINOPIA PLÁTICA
    • LATINOPIA BOOK REVIEW
    • PIONEER AMERICAN LATINA AUTHORS
    • INTERVIEWS
    • FEATURES
  • Music
    • LATINOPIA MUSIC
    • INTERVIEWS
    • FEATURES
  • Theater
    • LATINOPIA TEATRO
    • INTERVIEWS
  • Blogs
    • Angela’s Photo of the Week
    • Arnie & Porfi
    • Bravo Road with Don Felípe
    • Burundanga Boricua
    • Chicano Music Chronicles
    • Fierce Politics by Dr. Alvaro Huerta
    • Mirándolo Bien with Eduado Díaz
    • Political Salsa y Más
    • Mis Pensamientos
    • Latinopia Guest Blogs
    • Tales of Torres
    • Word Vision Harry Gamboa Jr.
    • Julio Medina Serendipity
    • ROMO DE TEJAS
    • Sara Ines Calderon
    • Ricky Luv Video
    • Zombie Mex Diaries
    • Tia Tenopia
  • Podcasts
    • Louie Perez’s Good Morning Aztlán
    • Mark Guerrero’s Chicano Music Chronicles
      • Yoga Talk with Julie Carmen
You are here: Home / History / BIOGRAPHY / BIOGRAPHY – EMMA TENAYUCA

BIOGRAPHY – EMMA TENAYUCA

March 6, 2010 by Breht Burri

EMMA TENAYUCA, LABOR ORGANIZER

Labor Leader Emma Tenayuca

Born on December 21, 1916, Emma Tenayuca was the eldest of eleven children who was raised by her maternal grandparents in San Antonio, Texas. Perhaps best known for her activities leading to the 1938 San Antonio Pecan Shellers strike, “La Pasionaria” (The Passionate One) as she was known, started her labor organizing at age 18 when she joined the Finch Cigar Company strike, made up largely of Mexican American women of San Antonio. Because of her activities as a chief organizer of the Finck Strike she was arrested. As her political awareness grew, Emma saw the injustices committed against Mexican Americans and Mexicans living in Texas. In particular, the repatriation of thousands of Mexicans and even some American citizens of Mexican descent to Mexico, caused her to join the Communist Party in 1936 where she was soon an advocate for Mexican American justice, protesting the deportations and police brutality.

By 1937 she had risen to be an important functionary of the Workers Alliance of America, a national labor movement. It was in her role as executive secretary of Texas chapters of the Workers Alliance that she became involved in the 1938 Pecan Sheller’s Strike of San Antonio. At the time, San Antonio was a leading center of pecan production and Mexican women made up the bulk of the labor force, shelling pecans by hand in poorly ventilated warehouses and being paid only five cents a day. When San Antonio companies opted to cut back on the price paid to workers to three cents a day, more than twelve thousand workers organized under the International Pecans Shellers Union local 172 (affiliated with the United Cannery and Agricultural Workers Packing and Allied Workers of America (UCAPAWA) went on strike. La Pasionaria soon became leader of the strike in which hundreds of strikers were arrested and beaten by police, among them Emma Tenayuca. The strike lasted for three months until Emma’s Communist Party affiliations compromised her effectiveness. Eventually she was replaced as head of the UCAPAWA chapter and a strike settlement was eventually negotiated.

In 1938 Emma married Homer Brooks, then head of the Texas Communist Party. She replaced Homer as Texas Chair of the Communist Party and made headlines once again in 1939, when she was scheduled to speak at San Antonio’s Municipal Auditorium. A crowd of thousands gathered outside the municipal auditorium to protest the Communist Party gathering and a riot soon erupted. Emma and her followers escaped with their lives but the municipal auditorium was vandalized. The death threats against Emma following the Municipal Auditorium riot and her inability to retain work, ended Emma’s labor organizing. She and Homer Brooks were divorced in 1941.

By 1946 she had left the Communist Party and labor organizing and resettled to San Francisco, California. In 1952 she received a BA degree from San Francisco State University and began a teaching career. In 1968 she returned to San Antonio where she earned a MA degree from Our Lady Of the Lake University and resumed a teaching career which she pursued until her retirement in 1982. In 1985 she was featured in the PBS documentary Yo Soy (I AM) and in the later years of her life became the subject of much attention from Chicana activists who were inspired by her previous activism. She died in San Antonio on July 23, 1999.

Filed Under: BIOGRAPHY, History

RICARDO ROMO’S TEJANO REPORT 2.20.21 “LESSONS FROM THE GREAT DEPRESSION”

February 20, 2021 By Tia Tenopia

Lessons of the Great Depression: A Latino Perspective By Ricardo Romo, PhD A New York Times front page article on Sunday [Feb. 7, 2021] titled “As Jobs Dry Up, Renters Pack in and Fall Behind” got my attention. When talking about today’s job losses, poverty, homelessness, and hunger, many commentators often cite statistics from the […]

POLITICAL SALSA Y MÁS with SALOMON BALDENEGRO 02.14.21

February 14, 2021 By Tia Tenopia

Trumpism: A Death Cult… “The (Republican) party is his. It doesn’t belong to anybody else.” QAnon Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) Whom are you not allowed to criticize? Following the dynamics of the Trump Impeachment – not only the Impeachment itself but also the events that led to it – is at the same time […]

PENSAMIENTOS WITH ALFREDO SANTOS 02.07.21

February 6, 2021 By Tia Tenopia

Bienvenidos otra vez a La Voz Newspaper. Primeramente, we would like to call to your attention a number of our stories in this issue. First is the article on page 4 about what the University of California is doing to help farm workers. A lot of people say that farm workers are essential workers, but […]

BURUNDANGA BORICUA DEL ZOCOTROCO “CRISIS DE LA ESPERANZA PARTE IV”

January 31, 2021 By Tia Tenopia

Crisis de la Esperanza Parte IV Esperanza Política Si aceptamos que la inmovilidad en la condición política mas indigna imaginable por seis siglos y bajo dos naciones, se presenta como uno de esos asuntos al que no se le ha dado solución, pues hay desesperanza para llorar hasta la eternidad. Pero de la esperanza vive […]

More Posts from this Category

New On Latinopia

LATINOPIA WORD RANDY JURADO ERTLL “HOPE IN TIMES OF DARKNESS”

By Tia Tenopia on February 9, 2014

Randy Jurado Ertll is a Salvadoran American author and political activist. He and his family fled the civil war in El Salvador by coming to the United States. He grew up in violence-torn South Central Los Angeles in the 1980s but managed to avoid gang life through the intervention of the A Better Chance Scholarship […]

Category: LATINOPIA WORD, Literature

LATINOPIA MUSIC LOS FABULOCOS “UNA PURA Y DOS CON SAL”

By Tia Tenopia on January 4, 2015

Delta Groove Music recording artist Los FabuLocos is a Southern California band whose unique sound, “Cali-Mex,”is a fusion of blues, Americana and Chicano soul music. Band members include Jesús Cuevas, accordion and vocals; Rubén Guaderama, guitar,bajo sexto, tres and vocals; James Barrios, bass and vocals; Mike Molina, drums and Kid Ramos, guitar( not in this […]

Category: LATINOPIA MUSIC, Music

LATINOPIA ART SONIA ROMERO 2

By Tia Tenopia on October 20, 2013

Sonia Romero is a graphic artist,muralist and print maker. In this second profile on Sonia and her work, Latinopia explores Sonia’s public murals, in particular the “Urban Oasis” mural at the MacArthur Park Metro Station in Los Angeles, California.

Category: Art, LATINOPIA ART

© 2021 latinopia.com · Pin It - Genesis - WordPress · Admin