00:00:01.260 --> 00:00:03.810
- I think they're used to
treating the Mexican American

00:00:03.810 --> 00:00:07.170
and the Filipino like slaves,
I would say so.

00:00:07.170 --> 00:00:11.909
And they don't wanna treat us like humans.

00:00:11.909 --> 00:00:16.909
- I had a dream that the
only reason the employers

00:00:16.986 --> 00:00:20.430
were so powerful was not
because they, in fact,

00:00:20.430 --> 00:00:24.420
had much power in terms
of dealing with the lives

00:00:24.420 --> 00:00:26.820
of their workers at will,

00:00:26.820 --> 00:00:29.760
but that what made them truly powerful

00:00:29.760 --> 00:00:31.245
was that we were weak.

00:00:31.245 --> 00:00:34.860
[tools clanking]
[lively Norteño music]

00:00:34.860 --> 00:00:37.854
- And it's not just a question of wages.

00:00:37.854 --> 00:00:40.740
It's a question, a basic
question of hope for the future.

00:00:40.740 --> 00:00:42.780
- Don't you believe in democracy?

00:00:42.780 --> 00:00:43.842
Then why don't you let
us have an election?

00:00:43.842 --> 00:00:45.310
[Protestors] Boycott grapes!

00:00:45.310 --> 00:00:47.018
Boycott grapes!

00:00:47.018 --> 00:00:47.851
Boycott grapes!

00:00:47.851 --> 00:00:50.100
- Cesar comes along and
says, "Hey, wait a minute.

00:00:50.100 --> 00:00:50.940
This is America.

00:00:50.940 --> 00:00:53.130
Everybody's equal, and we want our power."

00:00:53.130 --> 00:00:55.429
[Protestors] Boycott grapes!

00:00:55.429 --> 00:00:56.933
Boycott grapes!

00:00:56.933 --> 00:00:58.234
Boycott grapes!

00:00:58.234 --> 00:01:01.517
[protestors chanting]

00:01:01.517 --> 00:01:04.050
[protestors yelling]

00:01:04.050 --> 00:01:05.747
- And here's who aided us,
we had priests,

00:01:06.870 --> 00:01:09.630
and nuns who frequently had mini-skirts,

00:01:09.630 --> 00:01:14.370
and hundreds and hundreds
of Ivy League students

00:01:14.370 --> 00:01:17.844
who were out here for the
fun of fighting the growers.

00:01:17.844 --> 00:01:20.370
[vocalists singing in Spanish]

00:01:20.370 --> 00:01:22.320
- [Narrator] The story
of organizing farmworkers

00:01:22.320 --> 00:01:24.990
started long before he was born,

00:01:24.990 --> 00:01:27.434
and will go on long after his death.

00:01:27.434 --> 00:01:28.950
But during his lifetime,

00:01:28.950 --> 00:01:32.250
Cesar Chavez came to
represent that struggle.

00:01:32.250 --> 00:01:33.810
He brought the farmworkers' faces

00:01:33.810 --> 00:01:35.820
and stories to the American public

00:01:35.820 --> 00:01:37.080
and, in the process,

00:01:37.080 --> 00:01:40.680
helped them achieve a measure
of dignity and respect.

00:01:40.680 --> 00:01:43.470
This is the story of the
farmworkers' movement

00:01:43.470 --> 00:01:45.637
and of the man who inspired it.

00:01:45.637 --> 00:01:50.220
[vocalists singing in Spanish]

00:01:55.770 --> 00:01:58.982
- [Vocalist] Viva la huelga!

00:01:58.982 --> 00:02:02.565
[relaxed country-rock music]

00:02:15.360 --> 00:02:18.150
- [Narrator] California's
great Central Valley,

00:02:18.150 --> 00:02:20.455
glimmering in gold and green.

00:02:20.455 --> 00:02:24.210
This great valley provides
much of the food for the nation

00:02:24.210 --> 00:02:27.297
and great wealth for a few.

00:02:27.297 --> 00:02:29.310
For well over a century,

00:02:29.310 --> 00:02:31.920
agriculture has reigned as the largest

00:02:31.920 --> 00:02:34.623
and most powerful industry
in this golden state.

00:02:38.010 --> 00:02:42.153
But as you travel up the
valley spine, Highway 99,

00:02:43.110 --> 00:02:44.640
there is nothing which reflects

00:02:44.640 --> 00:02:47.103
a 100-year battle in these fields.

00:02:48.060 --> 00:02:51.180
No public tributes to the field workers,

00:02:51.180 --> 00:02:54.063
the Native American, the Chinese,

00:02:54.990 --> 00:02:57.393
Japanese, Mexican,

00:02:59.310 --> 00:03:01.863
Filipino, Black,

00:03:02.760 --> 00:03:04.320
and white,

00:03:04.320 --> 00:03:09.210
men, women, and children who
built this agribusiness empire

00:03:09.210 --> 00:03:10.983
with their backbreaking labor.

00:03:16.307 --> 00:03:20.940
[tense country-blues music]

00:03:20.940 --> 00:03:23.253
Hidden from view are the migrant camps,

00:03:24.630 --> 00:03:26.370
the homes and the union halls

00:03:26.370 --> 00:03:30.960
which generated long, bitter,
and often bloody struggles

00:03:30.960 --> 00:03:33.783
against conditions approaching slavery.

00:03:38.790 --> 00:03:41.430
California's agricultural boom

00:03:41.430 --> 00:03:45.093
began in the 1860s with
the end of the gold rush.

00:03:45.990 --> 00:03:49.980
Workers were needed to cultivate
huge, undeveloped tracts.

00:03:49.980 --> 00:03:51.630
With no jobs in the mines,

00:03:51.630 --> 00:03:56.280
unemployed Chinese men
provided an instant labor pool.

00:03:56.280 --> 00:04:00.480
Then, the Japanese and
the Filipinos arrived.

00:04:00.480 --> 00:04:03.944
They provided a skilled
and stable workforce

00:04:03.944 --> 00:04:06.535
for these factories in the fields.

00:04:08.010 --> 00:04:11.280
But whenever they
organized for higher wages

00:04:11.280 --> 00:04:14.280
or attempted to operate their own farms,

00:04:14.280 --> 00:04:18.453
they were met with shootings,
beatings, and deportations.

00:04:21.414 --> 00:04:25.140
[gentle country-folk music]

00:04:25.140 --> 00:04:29.040
A new wave of Mexicans
joined Mexican Americans

00:04:29.040 --> 00:04:31.110
whose ancestors had worked these lands

00:04:31.110 --> 00:04:33.039
a century before them.

00:04:33.039 --> 00:04:37.290
The newcomers provided a
large, cheap labor force

00:04:37.290 --> 00:04:40.200
which could be brought
in for temporary work,

00:04:40.200 --> 00:04:43.503
then returned to Mexico when
they were no longer needed.

00:04:45.150 --> 00:04:49.087
From 1910 to 1930, more
than one million people

00:04:49.087 --> 00:04:52.230
made the journey north to work

00:04:52.230 --> 00:04:55.443
and to escape the ravages
of revolution and war.

00:04:58.080 --> 00:05:01.053
For most, it was a journey
into a familiar homeland,

00:05:03.900 --> 00:05:06.483
a land which once had been Mexico.

00:05:11.640 --> 00:05:14.280
Once they embarked on the migrant trail,

00:05:14.280 --> 00:05:17.240
they would find that their
lot would be no different

00:05:17.240 --> 00:05:19.443
than those who had come before them.

00:05:22.096 --> 00:05:25.679
[gentle country-folk music]

00:05:34.383 --> 00:05:37.633
[wistful Norteño music]

00:05:47.874 --> 00:05:51.420
The North Gila Valley near Yuma, Arizona,

00:05:51.420 --> 00:05:54.990
an arid desert that starts
in the Sonora range in Mexico

00:05:54.990 --> 00:05:57.183
and stretches northward towards Canada.

00:06:01.668 --> 00:06:05.790
It was here that Juana and
Librado Chavez met and married,

00:06:05.790 --> 00:06:08.463
and it was here that their second child,

00:06:08.463 --> 00:06:13.461
Cesario Estrada Chavez, was
born on March 31st, 1927.

00:06:20.820 --> 00:06:22.470
- Well, we lived in a farm.

00:06:22.470 --> 00:06:23.580
Actually, it was a homestead

00:06:23.580 --> 00:06:25.935
that my grandfather had homesteaded,

00:06:25.935 --> 00:06:28.287
and then he sent it on to my dad.

00:06:28.287 --> 00:06:29.370
And we had a lot of fun.

00:06:29.370 --> 00:06:33.150
Like during the summer, we
just hike all over the place

00:06:33.150 --> 00:06:36.330
and swim in the canal
all day long, and fish.

00:06:36.330 --> 00:06:38.729
And so it was very nice.

00:06:38.729 --> 00:06:40.800
[birds chirping]

00:06:40.800 --> 00:06:42.720
- Well, all that summer before school,

00:06:42.720 --> 00:06:44.220
we played, you know, school.

00:06:44.220 --> 00:06:46.890
I was a teacher, of course,
and they were the students.

00:06:46.890 --> 00:06:49.987
And I got Cesar ready, and I told him,

00:06:49.987 --> 00:06:52.625
"When you go to school, the
teacher's gonna ask you,

00:06:52.625 --> 00:06:53.810
'What's your name, little boy?'"

00:06:53.810 --> 00:06:54.997
"Cesar Chavez."

00:06:54.997 --> 00:06:55.830
"How old are you?"

00:06:55.830 --> 00:06:56.663
"I'm six."

00:06:56.663 --> 00:06:58.080
You know, all those questions.

00:06:58.080 --> 00:06:58.913
He was ready.

00:06:58.913 --> 00:06:59.760
We went to school,

00:06:59.760 --> 00:07:02.490
and the teacher says,
"Okay, Cesar, let's sit here

00:07:02.490 --> 00:07:04.867
and, you know, your sister has to go."

00:07:04.867 --> 00:07:07.500
"Oh, no," he says, "I'm
sitting with my sister."

00:07:07.500 --> 00:07:09.720
Then he took off the
door and I ran after him.

00:07:09.720 --> 00:07:10.740
Then, finally, he agreed

00:07:10.740 --> 00:07:12.570
he had to go with the first graders.

00:07:12.570 --> 00:07:15.079
But he won that first
battle, right? [laughs]

00:07:15.079 --> 00:07:18.829
[contemplative piano music]

00:07:23.340 --> 00:07:25.590
- [Narrator] Juana
Chavez was a gentle woman

00:07:25.590 --> 00:07:27.123
with a deep religious faith.

00:07:27.990 --> 00:07:31.533
She gave young Cesar his
first lessons in nonviolence.

00:07:33.030 --> 00:07:34.800
- She didn't believe in violent.

00:07:34.800 --> 00:07:36.350
She would always say, you know,

00:07:37.679 --> 00:07:39.180
"If somebody wants to fight with you

00:07:39.180 --> 00:07:40.470
and you go ahead and fight back,

00:07:40.470 --> 00:07:41.670
that fighting will never end.

00:07:41.670 --> 00:07:44.700
So, you have to be the one to
stop it right then and there.

00:07:44.700 --> 00:07:46.098
Don't continue the fight."

00:07:46.098 --> 00:07:50.015
[wistful piano music]

00:07:54.000 --> 00:07:55.140
- [Narrator] Although the Chavez children

00:07:55.140 --> 00:07:56.490
were barely aware of it,

00:07:56.490 --> 00:07:59.670
the country was in the middle
of the Great Depression.

00:07:59.670 --> 00:08:02.250
All across the country,
factories were shut down,

00:08:02.250 --> 00:08:06.853
and millions had lost their
jobs, farms, and homes.

00:08:06.853 --> 00:08:09.900
The Chavez family still had their farm,

00:08:09.900 --> 00:08:12.020
but many others had nothing.

00:08:12.020 --> 00:08:15.278
[wistful piano music]

00:08:20.191 --> 00:08:23.040
[dog barking]

00:08:23.040 --> 00:08:25.530
- I even hate to think back to it.

00:08:25.530 --> 00:08:28.443
We lived on tents that
didn't have a floor.

00:08:29.640 --> 00:08:30.473
Just dirt.

00:08:30.473 --> 00:08:32.280
Mud, I would say.

00:08:32.280 --> 00:08:35.880
And we went cold and
hungry during the winter

00:08:35.880 --> 00:08:37.170
because there was no work.

00:08:37.170 --> 00:08:41.430
We survived by going
out on the ditch banks

00:08:41.430 --> 00:08:43.380
and picking mustard greens,

00:08:43.380 --> 00:08:48.024
and my brothers would go out
getting fish from the canals.

00:08:48.024 --> 00:08:51.774
[somber country-blues music]

00:08:57.570 --> 00:08:59.940
- [Narrator] California
seemed like the promised land

00:08:59.940 --> 00:09:02.940
to thousands of small
farmers and sharecroppers

00:09:02.940 --> 00:09:06.183
from Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.

00:09:09.250 --> 00:09:12.000
[wind howling

00:09:14.130 --> 00:09:17.550
Driven from their farms by winds, drought,

00:09:17.550 --> 00:09:22.290
and bank foreclosures, they
formed a never-ending stream

00:09:22.290 --> 00:09:24.625
of broken-down jalopies heading west.

00:09:24.625 --> 00:09:29.625
[car engines rattling]
[gentle orchestral music]

00:09:38.238 --> 00:09:40.020
- [Archive Film Narrator] But
they go to the lettuce fields.

00:09:40.020 --> 00:09:41.850
And what do they find?

00:09:41.850 --> 00:09:44.765
Filipinos and Mexicans do the work.

00:09:44.765 --> 00:09:46.500
While the work is hard,

00:09:46.500 --> 00:09:49.530
and Filipinos and Mexicans are strong

00:09:49.530 --> 00:09:51.263
and can do it better.

00:09:51.263 --> 00:09:54.150
[gentle country-folk music]

00:09:54.150 --> 00:09:58.397
- [Narrator] In 1938, the
Chavez family lost their farm.

00:09:58.397 --> 00:10:01.350
They packed everything they
owned into an old Studebaker

00:10:01.350 --> 00:10:03.496
and set out for California.

00:10:06.510 --> 00:10:07.800
- It was awful.

00:10:07.800 --> 00:10:08.970
It was really bad,

00:10:08.970 --> 00:10:11.940
'cause we had never worked,
you know, for anybody else.

00:10:11.940 --> 00:10:14.280
We never lived out of our home.

00:10:14.280 --> 00:10:18.750
Here we came to California, and
we were lucky we got a tent,

00:10:18.750 --> 00:10:21.270
but most of the time we
were living under a tree

00:10:21.270 --> 00:10:23.040
with just a canvas on top of us,

00:10:23.040 --> 00:10:25.066
and sometimes in the car.

00:10:25.066 --> 00:10:27.721
[gentle country-folk music]

00:10:27.721 --> 00:10:30.022
[truck engine rumbling]

00:10:30.022 --> 00:10:32.429
- [Narrator] Cesar left
school after the eighth grade

00:10:32.429 --> 00:10:34.770
to work with the rest of the family,

00:10:34.770 --> 00:10:38.013
following the crops north
from Oxnard to San Jose.

00:10:39.090 --> 00:10:42.180
Sometimes they moved on
when the job was over,