By Joshua Bessex

La Raza del Noroeste

“Somos Aztlán,” a mural on the ceiling of the ethnic cultural center at the University of Washington, has been inspiring Chicano students since it was first painted in 1971.

It depicts the territories lost in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848, hunger, racism, oppression experienced by Mexican Americans in the United States. The mural survived a renovation of the building thanks to student efforts, And it reminds UW junior Maria Guillen, 25, of the Chicanos who created a pathway for her to higher education.

“’Aztlan is more like a form of struggle and overcoming that,” Guillen said, standing recently in the Samuel E. Kelly Ethnic Cultural Center (ECC). “So any place I am at and I see an injustice, its an Aztlàn for me even though I’m not part of the states [in the mural] that are taken over.”

The muralist, Emilio Aguayo, 75, says the mural speaks to the self-determination of the Chicano Movement. He should know, he was right in the middle of it.

Aguayo enrolled at the UW in 1970 at the age of 30 after transferring from Seattle Central Community College (SCCC). But as part of only the second wave of Chicano/a students to attend, he was not immediately welcomed.

“Right before I got there it was so bad that the fraternity would harass our females,” Aguayo said. “So we had to send escorts to stop that kind of harassment.”

Already immersed in activism from his time at SCCC, Aguayo continued in the fight for civil rights, whether it had to do with the rights of Chicano farm workers, students or veterans.

“We were being treated bad across the board — socially, economically, politically, educationally — excluded from the participation in the American system,” Aguayo said.

Although activism was important in Aguayo’s life, one thing still took priority: education.

It was a lesson his parents ingrained in him and his siblings.

Aguayo’s father came to the United States in 1915 with an eighth-grade education,; his mother came a few years after with even less. They came as refugees, escaping the turmoil of the Mexican Revolution.

His father got a job working on the Union Pacific Railroad making $400 a month, barely enough to support a family with six children. He would sometimes slaughter one of the hogs or cows the family raised to keep food on the table.

“They always stressed that this was the land of opportunity. It is the place in the north where things have to be better than the turmoil that was Mexico during their time,” Aguayo said of his parents. “Education was the way you make the most of the land of opportunity, and through hell or high water we were going to get our diplomas.”

All six children graduated college. Between them, they have 17 degrees.

Aguayo spread this message to students throughout Washington when he worked as a recruiter for the UW while in school, traveling as far south as Vancouver and as far east as Yakima.

He said he was disheartened to learn the about the dramatic drop-out rate amongst students in eastern Washington and tried to push for them to get an education anywhere, even if it wasn’t the UW.

Throughout this, he continued his efforts in civil rights. He wrote a weekly article for the campus newspaper, The Daily of The University of Washington, called “La Chispa,” which explored issues Latinos faced and some of the Chicano-driven efforts to address them.

One such issue was the United Farm Workers (UFW) hop strike, in which Aguayo was an organizer. It was a wildcat strike, and laborers and reinforcements like Aguayo picketed the Big Chief and Little Chief Hop ranches in the lower Yakima Valley, demanding better living conditions, wages and fewer pesticides. He also led boycotts in the Seattle area to put economic pressure on those farms.

As time went on, efforts died down and Aguayo was disappointed in the outcome.

“You know the [UFW] came with good intentions and they told us we can strike and just tighten our belts…but what do you tell a child who cries that he’s hungry?” Aguayo said.

While workers eventually got higher wages and some breaks, few wanted to unionize and keep fighting for better treatment. It wasn’t until Aguayo met Cesar Chavez in Seattle that he realized the impact they had made.

He told Chavez the movement was a failure, and that in the end it didn’t have the impact they were hoping for. He still remembers Chavez’s response.

“This will soothe your minds: If you study the history of the labor movement, you’ll see a lot of instances like this,” Chavez told Aguayo. “But seen all together, each was a step in the right direction.”

Aguayo carries that message with him to this day.

“From the time you’re a child you are taught to do the right thing.” Aguayo said. Participating in the civil rights movement “was just the right thing to do.”

Aguayo passed this knowledge to his son, Ricardo Aguayo, 27, a recent UW graduate who was involved in UW MEChA and saw his father’s mural during every meeting.

“It was cool seeing people praise the work [my father] had done and the mural that represents the Chicano Movement,” Aguayo said.

Emilio Aguayo hopes the mural will serve as a reminder of what he and others in the Seattle area did in their time, and will inspire the future generations of students to make their life better.

“Do anything, but do something. Get an education too.” Aguayo said. “Not doing something to make life better is unthinkable to me.”

Reach Reporter Joshua Bessex at joshuabessex@gmail.com

Twitter: @Bessex_Joshua