Spanish-speaking Angelenos: A Culture in Search of a Name
February 24, 1963

Los Angeles has one of the largest Spanish-speaking urban populations in the Western Hemisphere. Most are "Mexicans," but historians tell

us this does not accurately describe these people because in many respects they are "indigenous" to Southern California and the Southwest. Though they also help make up what generally is known as California's "Spanish heritage," Spain is not their "mother country." They are so highly heterogeneous they can not be adequately understood by studying the cultures of Spain or Mexico. This is an attempt to trace where they came from, what they are and where they are going—first of six parts.

Three guys were arguing in an East Los Angeles bar and one said angrily: "The trouble with you is you're just a Mexican with a gray-flannel serape."

"That's better than being a cholo who professes love for 'la raza' and Mexico and yet came here to live, work and have your children," was the heated retort.

The third man argued against all such "self-defeating" terms as Mexican-American, cholo (slang for a Mexican immigrant), pocho (slang for an American-born Mexican), Spanish-American and Latin American.

Being from Texas he especially resented the last term because in parts of Texas a saying goes that a "a Latin American is a Mexican who has paid his poll tax."

"No, you're both wrong," he said. "We're American. . . . We're Spanish-speaking Americans."

Demonstrate Problem

However ludicrous such arguments may seem, they demonstrate how difficult it is to pinpoint just what more than 700,000 Los Angeles area residents really are. The complexity of definition is further aggravated by those who speak of Los Angeles' "Spanish heritage."

Romanticists like to think that El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora La Reina de Los Angeles de Porciuncula was settled by Spanish grandees and caballeros, sophisticated descendants of the "conquistadores."

Some story-tellers assure us that Spanish Gov. Felipe de Neve, leading a detachment of soldiers proudly bearing the banner of Spain, and followed by the original settlers, entered our city on Sept. 4, 1781, in a flurry of glory.

Not so, says Father Zephyrin Engelhardt, OFM. In his authoritative "San Gabriel Mission and the Beginnings of Los Angeles," a Mission

San Gabriel historical work published by the Franciscan Herald Press, he writes:

"It is a pity, and rather cruel, to spoil this [romantic] description of the founding of Los Angeles; but our duty is to supply accurate information and to correct misstatements or errors."

Lacked Enthusiasm

According to Father Engelhardt, Gov. de Neve had hoped to settle Los Angeles with Spaniards, but being unable to muster any enthusiasm from them he ordered the settlement made by whoever was available.

As a matter of fact, continues the Franciscan priest, the "sorry crowd of settlers" were led practically at gunpoint by a "corporal and three soldiers."

Father Engelhardt says Los Angeles' first settlers were "Jose de Lara, 50, a Spaniard, with an Indian wife and three children; Basilio Rosas, 68, an Indian, with a mulattress wife and six children.

"Antonio Mesa, 38, a Negro, with a mulattress wife and five children; . . . Antonio F. Felix Villavicencio, 30, a Spaniard with an Indian wife and one child; Jose Vanegas, 28, an Indian [Los Angeles' first 'alcalde' or mayor], with an Indian wife and one child."

"Alejandro Rosas, 25, an Indian, with an Indian wife; Pablo Rodriguez, 25, an Indian, with an Indian wife and a child; Manuel Camero, 30, a mulatto, with a mulattress wife; Luis Quintero, 55, a Negro, with a mulattress wife and five children; and Jose Moreno, 22, a mulatto with a mulattress wife."

Of the original settlers, then, including their wives, there were two Spaniards, one mestizo, two Negroes, eight mulattoes and nine Indians. Their children were four Spanish-Indian; five Spanish-Negro; eight Negro-Indian; three Spanish-Negro-Indian and two Indian.

Overshadowing Aspect

All of this, of course, is nothing to raise the eyebrows of anyone living in a democratic society. But it is curious how the "Spanish heritage" of Los Angeles has overshadowed all other historical aspects concerning the founding [of] our city.

Dr. Paul M. Sheldon, director of the Laboratory in Urban Culture, Occidental College, calls this "Spanish heritage" the "patina of romantic misinformation which attributes to the Spaniards a venture which was

essentially Mexican-Indian and remained substantially so until the village (Los Angeles) and surrounding 'ranchos' were taken over lock, stock and barrel by Anglos during the years from 1818 to the 1880s."

California itself was discovered by a Portuguese, Juan Cabrillo, who was in the employ of Spain. He came here in 1542, but it was not until 1769 that Father Junipero Serra came to establish the famous missions.

All told, however, only a few hundred Spaniards settled. Since then immigration from Spain has been negligible. (For 120 years— from 1820 to 1940 — the total Spanish immigration to the United States was about 175,000, most of which came after 1900.)

Historians say that though the Spaniards transplanted their language, their religion and many of their institutions in the Americas, they did so through other groups. Spanish culture, they say, was superimposed and inflicted on native peoples in the Americas, some of whom already were in the Southwest.

Even so, "Spanish heritage" is always stressed when the history of Mexican-Americans is honored in Los Angeles. Last year at an Olvera St. fiesta, for example, a much respected hotel owner and descendant of Hernando Cortes was named "padrino" or protector of the Mexican-American colony.

This was a well-intentioned gesture meant to please the many Mexican-Americans (for lack of a better term) in Los Angeles. But a Mexican-American community leader called The Times to complain that this was "historically grotesque."

"Naming a descendant of Cortes as a 'protector' of the Mexican-American population is like naming a descendant of King George as a 'protector' of the descendants of American revolutionists," he said with a chuckle.

Question Rises

If Mexican-Americans in Southern California are not "Spanish" or even their first cousins, then what are they—besides being Spanish-speaking Americans?

The Times asked this question recently of Dr. George I. Sanchez, University of Texas expert on ethnic groups in the Southwest.

"They defy categorical classification as a group and no term or phrase adequately describes them," he said.

"Biologically, they range over all the possible combinations of first their heterogeneous Spanish antecedents and, then, of the 'mestizaje'

(interbreeding) resulting from the crossing of Spaniards and various indigenous peoples of Mexico and the Southwest."

Were Already Here

(That in many respects the Mexican-Americans are "indigenous" to the Southwest is often mentioned by historians. They like to point out that the Spanish-language minority did not come from Spain and Mexico. They were already very much a part of the Southwest when the Anglo-Americans arrived here, experts tell us.)

"Historically," continued Dr. Sanchez, "they are both old and new to this region—some came with Onate in 1598, others with missionaries of the 18th century; some were part of the gold rush of '49, others came to build railroads a few decades later; many came as contract-labor during World War I."

"Culturally, reflecting their varied biological and historical backgrounds, they are many peoples—the 'californios,' the 'hispanos,' the 'mexico-tejanos,' and numerous other cultural personalities produced by the range of their antecedents and their environments, by their occupations, by their culture-contacts."

Language Not Single

Even their language, Dr. Sanchez points out, is heterogeneous.

"Their mother tongue, their vernacular, is usually Spanish—of every conceivable variation, that is. In fact, for some the home-language is English; for others a part-English, part-Spanish vernacular is the rule."

The reason the "Spanish heritage" is propagandized out of proportion at the expense of the Mexican-Indian heritage is the Anglo-American's attitude toward the so-called non-white races, several educators charged at a recent Mexican-American seminar in Phoenix.

"The Mexican-American is a victim of confusion, frustration and insecurity because he has been taught through social pressure to be ashamed of and even disown his ethnic ancestry," says Marcos de Leon, teacher of Spanish at Van Nuys High School.

Road to Disaster

"A very practical teaching of mental hygiene is that one cannot run away from himself, or what he is. To do so is to invite disaster."

"Somewhere along the way the Mexican-American must make a stand and recognize the fact that if there is to be progress against those barriers which prevent and obstruct a more functional citizenship, he must above all retrieve his dignity and work as a person with a specific ethnic antecedent, having a positive contribution to make to civilization."

"No man can find a true expression for living who is ashamed of himself or his people."