Many of these women have agreed to be profiled as una voz primera. I will be adding to this list as I meet mujeres primeras.  Virginia Martinez: First Chicana to pass the bar in the State of Illinois Maria Mangual: Founder of Mujeres Latinas en Accion Evette Cardona: Founding member, Amigas Latinas  Juanita ‘Jane’ Gonzales (deceased),Muskegon Heights, Michigan: [...]

So after I had this epiphany on the subway and I called mom to tell her about the rest of my new life, her first words (after she stopped chuckling) were ‘you’re going to need a mentor–call Virginia’. The Virginia she was referring to is Virginia Martinez, otra primera from the 70′s and still active [...]

Many of these womens stories include their involvement in Chicana Caucus in various forms, the National Women’s Political Caucus and the International Womens Year National Womens Conference in Houston 1977. I too have a perspective of those four days in Houston. I was there, as a seventeen year old administrative aide, knowing everything about life and what was [...]

Four years ago, standing in a funeral chapel in a small town in Eastern Texas I stood in front of a collage of photographs that told the story of my cousin Magdalena Garcia. In those pictures I saw a defiant activist’s fist raised against a hospital board resistant to the hiring of Latinos. I saw [...]