Soy de Duval

Excerpted from my Master’s Thesis P OSTED BY: CARDENAS.AE@GMAIL.COM FEBRUARY 14, 2019 Students and teachers at Ignacia Alvarez's private school in San Diego, Texas, circa 1914. UTSA General Photograph Collection Education was an early priority of citizens of Duval County. The first school in Duval County opened at the end of the Civil War. In 1873, the San Diego school had one teacher “and as many assistants as may be needed.” Mexican Americans, such as Juan Saenz at Piedras Pintas had a keen interest in education. Saenz donated land to Duval County for use as a public school on his ranch. The Second Biannual Report of the State Board of Education, 1879-1880 indicated that 653 school children between the age of eight and fourteen attended Duval County schools. The state, however, did not count Mexican Americans separately but were included in the “white” count. Using percentages derived from census data on the children who indicated they were in school in 1880-1910 an estimated s...

POSTED BY: CARDENAS.AE@GMAIL.COM FEBRUARY 4, 2019 (This past week, the Bullock Texas State History Museum in Austin hosted a two-day conference, underwritten by the National Endowment for the Humanities, commemorating “The Centennial of the 1919 Canales Investigation.” Entitled “Reverberations of Memory, Violence, and History,” the conference reviewed the courageous undertaking by J.T. Canales, the only Mexican American Texas legislator at that time, who took on the Anglo society’s venerated Texas Rangers. I was able to attend the first day’s sessions and it was a truly inspiring event, featuring a number of noted historians of Texas history. Below, I share a portion of my Master’s thesis that dealt with the Texas Rangers’ involvement in Duval County.) Texas Rangers stationed in Duval County. With their political success, Mexican Americans invited special scrutiny. To some in the halls of power in Austin and other power centers in South Texas, Mexican Americans in Duval County may hav...