On December 19, 1969, Seattle Mayor Wes Uhlman names Cesar Chavez (1927-1993) "First Citizen" during the union organizer's Seattle visit to promote the United Farm Workers grape boycott. Cesar Estrada Chavez founded and led the first successful farm workers union in U.S. history -- United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO.
An American Life
He was born on a farm in Yuma, Arizona, in 1927. His parents lost the farm during the Great Depression and the family began working as migrant farm laborers. Chavez served in the Navy during World War II. In 1948 he married Helen Fabela, whom he met while laboring in a Delano, California, vineyard.
In 1952, while working in an apricot orchard, Cesar met an organizer for the Community Service Organization, a barrio-based self-help group sponsored by Saul Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation. Within weeks he was working as a full time organizer. He became the national director in the late 1950s. But, in 1962, after failing to convince the organization to focus on migrant labor, he resigned.
He and his wife moved their eight children to Delano, California, and there in 1962, Chavez founded the National Farm Workers Association.
The Grape Boycott and Strike
The now-historic table-grape boycott and strike against the growers began in September 1965, when Cesar's National Farm Workers Association, with 1200 member families, joined an AFL-CIO sponsored union in a strike against major Delano area table and wine grape growers. The two unions merged in 1966 to form the United Farm Workers of America, and it became affiliated with the AFL-CIO.
The arduous and ultimately successful strike/boycott lasted for five years. Millions of college students, church groups, union and community groups, and consumers rallied to the cause. They declined to buy table grapes or wines from unfair growers: Many people during those years forgot what table grapes tasted like.
By 1970, most of the table grape growers had signed contracts with the United Farm Workers. But in 1973, most of these growers signed with the Teamsters to avoid negotiating once again with the union -- the United Farm Workers -- working for humanly decent conditions for migrant field laborers.
The struggle has continued in the varying political conditions since then.
An American Hero
When Cesar Chavez died in 1993, more than 40,000 mourners attended his funeral. Robert F. Kennedy had called him "one of the heroic figures of our time."
Cesar Chavez received the Aguila Azteca, Mexico's highest award to Mexicans who make their contributions outside of Mexico. In 1994, President Bill Clinton presented him posthumously with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He was the second Mexican American to receive this honor.
