When I was 16 years of age and in high school, I had an English teacher who I especially liked. She made learning fun teaching the class new words every week and making us look up their meanings so that we could use them on book report assignments. When I look back and remember what she taught and shared with me, I suspect that she was probably one of the first Environmentalists that I or my classmates were ever exposed to. Follow me below the fold for a story about how young people can be influenced to care about the environment and change the world for the better. We must never stop trying. My diary is focusing on farmworkers who have no voice against those in power who have used poisons on them as they work in the fields in the past, and who are still working today under similar dangerous working conditions. Would you work under these conditions? Stephen Colbert has a show this week in which he will be presenting a tongue-in-cheek show called "Take Our Jobs" campaign.
My English high school teacher first introduced me to Rachel Carson’s "Silent Spring". I read about DDT and its role in causing the near extinction of many bird species. I remember how sad I felt when I first read this book and how I wanted to help in some way. I asked her a lot of questions later on in the year about what I could do to help. She introduced me to the Greenpeace organization when they first arrived on the scene. Since that time I have been a member off and on either through donations or other activities that promote Environmental awareness.
I never realized how much Rachel Carson’s work would mean to me later in life as a Chicana whose parents, grandparents, uncles and aunts toiled in the sun to harvest crops from California to Texas as farmworkers. I remember my mom talking about how hot it was on some days as she, her 10 brothers and sisters, and my grandparents Lorenzo and Petra picked tomatoes, oranges, or strawberries. She would tell me how they did not have very much water to drink and how they would wash their hands by squishing tomatoes together. She shared with me about how frightened she was when they would pick tomatoes and found black widows crawling around underneath them.
When they traveled up and down the coast from Southern California to Northern California, they frequently set up camp underneath the trees along the highway. My grandmother Petra would pull out some old cots for everyone to sleep in, and then prepare a huge pot of beans. She’d also bring along some tortillas that she had made earlier in the day so that they could have something to eat with the beans after a hard day’s work in the fields.
My father the "Tejano", and his family were sharecroppers in West Texas. His parents Concepcion and Josefina and his 3 brothers and sister would ‘chuck’ corn as he called it, for a nickel a bushel. They also picked cotton as well. They lived on the farm in West Texas which was very far away from the town’s stores. They frequently had to buy their goods from the farmer who owned the farm and things were pretty expensive. When my parents talked about these times, they remember that they were hungry all the time, and yet they also remember how as kids they managed to find a little joy running around and playing out in the fields. Earlier in my grandfather Concepcion’s life, he worked for the Atcheson, Topeka and Santa Fe railroad. He lived in one of the railroad cars with my grandmother and at least my dad, 3 other brothers, and sister. They traveled with my grandfather to wherever the train took them. Living in railroad cars was not uncommon for poor families to do back then.
I cannot tell you for sure whether any of them were exposed to DDT or other pesticides, but I suspect that at times while they worked in the fields or lived in railroad cars, they were exposed to chemicals now known to be dangerous as well as many other unsafe working conditions. It never occurred to me even while conducting family history investigations to ask them about any unusual illnesses that might have been an indication of pesticide exposure.
As an adult who has changed careers for a few reasons and it would probably take a few diaries to explain, I am now pursuing a BA degree in Chicano and Latino Ethnic Studies and minoring in Health Care Administration. I've met many young Chicano students who laughed when one of my professors brought up the subject of Environmentalism. They did not realize that many neighborhoods in which we live are subjected to constant pollution through freeways, bad drinking water, and living next to railroads.
One of my best friends turns out to be a young Iraqi War Veteran who used to call me a "Treehugger" in class, all in jest of course. I did a research paper in class on the affects of Katrina and the Superfund sites throughout Louisiana's low income neighborhoods. Katrina really disturbed me on so many levels that this event would also require a few diaries from me. Now after learning of the affects of pollution disproportionately in low income neighborhoods, he is singing a different tune. He now has children of his own and sees the link between environmental awareness and how it impacts people of color.
I am grateful for people like Rachel Carson who alerted us to the dangers of using pesticides in our environment, and for reminding us to respect Mother Earth. I am also grateful to Cesar Chavez and the Farmworkers in America for standing up to those who exploit and abuse those who harvest in the hot sun so that we can enjoy the fruits of their labor. We must always ensure that we tell our grandchildren, children, nieces, and nephews about the importance of the environment. I send my nieces and nephew in the U.K. all of my Greenpeace, Defender’s of Wildlife, and even Color of Change petitions. They sign the petitions and then circulate them at school to their friends. They are still at an age where whatever we share with them will be taken in and will have some lasting impact, just as my English teacher impacted me.
Please sign this petition to stop Giumarra Vineyards and Farms from using toxic chemicals which places the health of farmworkers in jeopardy as well as the public.
Water and nature have always been a theme in my life. The Gulf of Mexico will not have a silent spring forever, the birds and sea life will return one day. I believe we’ll see light on the other side of the ‘river’, all is not lost, we must not despair.
This music is dedicated to the Gulf Watchers and to those whose lives have been touched in some way by what goes on in our natural world.
"El Otro Lado del Rio" – "The Other Side of the River" by Jorge Drexler
From the movie Motorcycle Diaries.
Appearing on a CBS documentary about Silent Spring shortly before her death from breast cancer in April 14, 1964 at the age of 56, Rachel Carson remarked:
"Man's attitude toward nature is today critically important simply because we have now acquired a fateful power to alter and destroy nature. But man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself. [We are] challenged as mankind has never been challenged before to prove our maturity and our mastery, not of nature, but of ourselves."
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WWC's grandparents Petra and Lorenzo were Farmworkers working the fields in both Southern California and Northern California from early 1900's through late 1950's. |
WWC with father, uncle, brother. Photo taken in Galveston, Texas on the beach. WWC little girl in white dress with father and brother on the right hand side of photo. WWC's uncle and cousin on the left. |
Orange pickers - WWC's grandfather is the second man from the left. Picking oranges in field in Southern California around 1920. |
Update:
I was asked about what types of Pesticides or chemicals are being used today out in the fields of America. Here are some:
- Methyl Iodide
- Round Up weed killer
- Methyl Bromide a pesticide
- Chlorpyrifos: An organophosphorus insecticide that is neurotoxic to both insects and mammals