The last surviving matriarch of the historic Mendez, et al v. Westminster school desegregation case passed away last week. Virginia Guzman was 100 years old when God called la doña to assume her place in Heaven with the rest of the Latino fathers and mothers who made civil rights history in Orange County over 70 years ago.
Guzman was born in Santa Ana and attended a Mexican-only school, Fremont Elementary, in an era where school officials across Orange County subjected brown children to subpar learning conditions. As a kid, her principal would hit students with a rubber hose for speaking Spanish. Those memories were fresh in Virginia’s mind when her son, Billy, was required to attend Fremont in the mid-1940s. She took it upon herself to ask school officials about moving her son to a white, better school. When they declined, she and her husband William organized parents to try and convince the Santa Ana School Board to end their Mexican-only schools. When that didn’t work, the Guzmans unsuccessfully filed their own lawsuit to fight school segregation years before anyone else. And when that didn’t work, Virginia pulled her son from public schools, instead enrolling him in a Catholic one. “They didn’t care porque somos Mexicanos,” Virginia told a researcher decades later. “The Whites, they didn’t care. They didn’t care at all.”
My parents also were involved with REACT this was a civil service club which used ham radios. My parents handle was Tortilla flats
Virginia and William connected with parents in Westminster, El Modena, and Garden Grove and filed Mendez et al v. Westminster School District, which helped to end school segregation in California. But scholars shamefully ignored the story of Virginia and her husband for decades, focusing instead—if they ever bothered to pay attention to the case—on only the Mendez family and relegating the contributions of the other familias to their last names. I wrote about this brown-washing of history back in 2009, and nearly a decade later, there’s still no public monument at Fremont Elementary (which is now a different campus because the school Virginia and Billy attended was demolished during the 1970s) or anywhere in Santa Ana that marks the Guzman’s contributions to history.
Few historians have given a damn. One was Luis F. Fernandez, Executive Director of the Dominguez Rancho Adobe Museum, and the scholar who rescued the Doss v. Bernal housing covenant case from obscurity; he interviewed Virginia on his own in 2011. Virginia also got interviewed for a documentary at Fullerton College, and President Barack Obama sent her a letter of recognition last year, writing “We stand on the shoulders of giants who helped move us to a more perfect union..”
But Virginia and the other mothers in the Mendez, et al case (save for Felicitas Mendez, wife of Gonzalo Mendez, and who has an intermediate and high school named for her and her husband in Santa Ana and East Los Angeles, respectively), finally got a proper telling thanks to East Los Angeles College professor Nadine Bermudez, who took on the herstory in her 2014 doctoral dissertation “Mendez et al. v. Westminster School District et al: Mexican American Female Activism in the Age of De Jure Segregation.”
“As both a victim of and witness to institutionalized race discrimination,” Bermudez wrote, “Mrs. Guzman’s expertise contributed greatly to questions regarding the effects of segregated schooling and the motives and manner in which she and other women resisted.” Bermudez went on to describe Guzman’s actions as “one of the highest level of female involvement” in the case.
Virgina moved to Riverside in 1978 after the death of William, and lived there the rest of her life. But even in her golden years, she remained an activist. “Mom was a very independent woman, kind and very outgoing. Her desire was to always help people in need,” her daughter, Beverly Gallegos-Guzman, told the Weekly. “When she moved to Riverside, she became involved with the [Riverside County] Office on Aging. She used her own gasoline money to take seniors in need to run errands and to their doctor appointments.”
“I’m proud my husband had a part in changing history,” Guzman was quoted in the Orange County Register as saying in a 2007 presentation at Chapman University. But she did, too. And may her passing finally spark the rightful recognition she deserved that we didn’t give Virginia Guzman in life.
As write to you, I remember Mrs. Guzman. I am sorry to read of the death of Virginia Guzman but I am also very happy to read this acknowledgement of her story. The true story of her involvement in the Mendez et al v Westminister, Santa Ana, Garden Grove and El Modena School Districts. History is finally catching up with the truth of ALL (5) families involved in this case.
I wish Mrs. Guzman had lived a little longer. Santa Ana is going to vote on naming a building on the campus of Santa Ana College .
EVERYONE GET ON BOARD!
Phyllis Ramirez Zepeda
Hi Phyllis. So did that project ever take place at the college?
Hi Phyllis thank you for the love you express towards my grandma, as I read and heart about her in depth from my Aunt Beverly, it sounds like I have almost all of her traits/treasures I’ve is blessed with. When I was a little girl, Gramma would pick us up and take us to Bible study at a lovely home owned by a white family in Fountain valley I want to say BrookHurst and Hazard area … She owned a white (or was it black) Volkswagen! So I’m not sure, bye was there ever a campus named after the Guzman’s. I have devoted in the present, my time to be an asset to the”new committee Mr. Mike Ramirez founder along with my Aunt Bev. Historian, Speaker, spent many endearing years with her mother learning the case. I bet more than anyone can say today! For oven 20 years they have been Advocating for the Et Als of OC. (Mendez Et Al)
For some reason I’d like to leave off the last name, changing the case name, for the sake of shortening it, but my ethics and conscience won’t let me. A team is a team. Look at this example.. The VIP to the team is honored, and the actual members of the team are as well. Can you imagine turning a blind eye, and your back on the “team” or even sweeping them under a rug like that! The VIP couldn’t become VIP with out the help of the others. Kobe VIP, Ignore Shaquille O’Neill, Or Derrick Fisher , Robert Horey, Pau Gasoll! No way would that ever be done, if someone did that they would really be considered selfish AND malicious, In my book. I hope you find this comment after 7 years, to be on point still, instilled in your heart, be ready to see us stepping it up as Gustavo says, I’m Tracie Billy’s 3rd Child and I’m the self proclaimed coordinator of The Et Als Speak Out Committee.. Thank You Again.
I thank you Sir for being the giant “Blessing” that has been long overdue.
I am Tracie Guzman, the 3rd daughter of William Guzman Jr. I write to you today because I am “learning” about this Historical Event that I am very proud of and want to not just get my feet wet, but to just dive in. My Aunt Beverly is thee best. I mean as an Aunt, sister, Daughter, Mother, Grandmother she wears many hats and I am blessed to say that I carry a lot of my Grandmother Virginia and Aunt Beverly’s traits, in the sense of being giving, helping, caring, and much much more.
So as we humbly engage in the recognition July 15th, 2019 in Santa Ana, the whole Guzman clan will be present to witness the fruits of persistence and determination.
( thank you Phillis and all for your loving words…)
Truly proud,
Tracie Guzman
After the Regency Board meeting nothing became of it, DROPPED. Why you ask ? Because to many people believing the one story narrative by Sandra Robbie and Sylvia Mendez, named a school in Santa Ana after Mendez a few blocks from Santa Ana College. It would show the lack of research. Ms. Robbie had plenty of knowledge to correct the narration but refused new research the Ramirez Family presented to her so we decided to bring attention to the other families. Our journey started out as the Lorenzo A Ramirez committee, Prof. Sammy Rodriguez, Rudy Diaz, Phyllis Ramirez Zepeda and Mike Ramirez as researcher with success. Next step i formed “The Mendez ET.AL. Committee” partnering with the Guzman Family we finally got the City of Santa Ana to acknowledge her family with a proclamation!! but we will not stop there. Together we are on a journey, next is the Estrada Family. Bet you’d be surprised to learned they were also Plaintiff named from WESTMINSTER !! yup, two families named but only Mendez is what everyone has heard about. Gaining the trust of the Palomino Family has been difficult due to this one person narration. The Mexican Consul appointed brilliant lawyer David C. Marcus also been slow, but we have made positive contact with his grandsons. WE cannot let this single person did all narration bury the truth. find our family website mendezetalvwestminster.com , if you have a family member involved in this case, please get your story on our webpage. Lets get in a good fight to get the complete Class-action out at our schools!!
Hi Phyllis thank you for the love you express towards my grandma, as I read and heart about her in depth from my Aunt Beverly, it sounds like I have almost all of her traits/treasures I’ve is blessed with. When I was a little girl, Gramma would pick us up and take us to Bible study at a lovely home owned by a white family in Fountain valley I want to say BrookHurst and Hazard area … She owned a white (or was it black) Volkswagen! So I’m not sure, bye was there ever a campus named after the Guzman’s. I have devoted in the present, my time to be an asset to the”new committee Mr. Mike Ramirez founder along with my Aunt Bev. Historian, Speaker, spent many endearing years with her mother learning the case. I bet more than anyone can say today! For oven 20 years they have been Advocating for the Et Als of OC. (Mendez Et Al)
For some reason I’d like to leave off the last name, changing the case name, for the sake of shortening it, but my ethics and conscience won’t let me. A team is a team. Look at this example.. The VIP to the team is honored, and the actual members of the team are as well. Can you imagine turning a blind eye, and your back on the “team” or even sweeping them under a rug like that! The VIP couldn’t become VIP with out the help of the others. Kobe VIP, Ignore Shaquille O’Neill, Or Derrick Fisher , Robert Horey, Pau Gasoll! No way would that ever be done, if someone did that they would really be considered selfish AND malicious, In my book. I hope you find this comment after 7 years, to be on point still, instilled in your heart, be ready to see us stepping it up as Gustavo says, I’m Tracie Billy’s 3rd Child and I’m the self proclaimed coordinator of new The Et Als Speak Out Committee.. Thank You Again.