1927-1993
Labor Leader; Founder and President of the United Farm Workers of America

Migrant Years.

The son of Mexican immigrants, Cesar Chavez saw his parents lose their small farm in Yuma, Arizona, in the late 1930s. With no other possibilities, the family headed for California and joined the ranks of migrant workers traveling throughout the state picking such crops as apricots, figs, grapes, lettuce, peas, or tomatoes. But once knowing the independence of owning a farm, the Chavez family was not as docile as many other field laborers. Chavez remembered: "We were probably one of the strikingest families in California, the first ones to leave the fields if anyone shouted Huelga (Spanish for strike)!" The migratory life was hard on the young Chavez; constant travel made education difficult, and many of the Anglo teachers openly disdained such children. Together, these factors forced Chavez to drop out...