Highlights Archives
Hispanic Heritage Month
Hispanic Heritage Month began on September 15, the anniversary of independence for five Latin American countries. This monthlong celebration highlights the history and culture of the many different Spanish-speaking peoples who have made the U.S. their home. Today, more than 42 million Americans identify themselves as Hispanic or Latino, including nearly 200,000 in Wisconsin.
Hispanic explorers, of course, were the first to view North America. Decades before their French or English counterparts, the DeSoto expedition of 1539-1543 had explored territory that today covers 11 states between Florida and Arkansas, and the Coronado expedition had penetrated territory stretching from California to Kansas in 1540-1542. Spanish-speaking colonists arrived in Florida in 1513, and the first Spanish city (St. Augustine, 1565) was flourishiing in Florida long before the Pilgrims set foot on Plymouth Rock. You can see eyewitness accounts from the classic Spanish explorations in our American Journeys digital collection at www.americanjourneys.org.
The earliest Hispanic encounters with Wisconsin occurred during the fur trade era. Throughout the 18th century, Spanish officials kept a close eye on the trade between St. Louis and Prairie du Chien. In 1721 a Ho-Chunk Indian showed Father Pierre Charlevoix Spanish guns, shoes and medicine he had acquired from neighboring tribes. During the American Revolution the Spanish supported the American cause and raided British supplies stored at Prairie du Chien. Most of the important documents on these early contacts between Hispanic Americans and Wisconsin settlers can be found in digital form at Wisconsin Historical Collections.
Wisconsin's Spanish-speaking communities date back to 1910, when early Mexican immigrants settled here following the outbreak of the Mexican revolution. Census reports show only 200 Hispanics in Wisconsin in 1940 and only about 1,000 in 1950, out of a total population of more than 3 million. These figures are misleading, however, since they omit seasonal and temporary workers recruited by Wisconsin manufacturers and agricultural firms. By 1925, for example, a fluid community of about 9,000 Mexican Americans lived in Milwaukee, and from then until the 1970s thousands of Spanish-speaking workers and their families moved into Wisconsin every year. You can view a short history of Hispanic immigration to Wisconsin in Turning Points in Wisconsin History.
During World War II, increased demand for food and a labor shortage expanded the need for farm workers. The federal Emergency Farm Labor Program, adopted in 1943, allowed employers to hire non-residents to work in the fields, and Wisconsin growers imported male farm hands from British Honduras and Mexico. Their living conditions are described in this 1950 report on Door and Kewaunee county cherry pickers, and a typical migrant worker's family is shown in this 1948 photo from Plymouth, in Sheboygan County.
After the war, the importation of Mexican workers continued under the federal "Bracero" program, which brought millions of Mexican farm laborers north until it was discontinued in 1964. In the early 1950s, about 12,000 migrant workers came to Wisconsin each summer. Their living conditions are revealed in this survey prepared by the Wisconsin Canners Association, and the educational needs of their children are summarized in this short report by state officials. Racism and discrimination were commonplace for Hispanic families 50 years ago, before basic civil rights laws had been passed. The necessities of daily life were difficult for Hispanic Americans to obtain, as shown by this second 1950 report by the Governor's Commission on Human Rights. A decade later the situation had hardly improved.
Seasonal workers in farm fields and canning factories were not the only Spanish-speaking immigrants who entered Wisconsin in the middle of the last century. By 1970 more than 40,000 Hispanic residents called Wisconsin their permanent home, the majority living in Milwaukee and Racine counties and working in factories alongside their German, African American, Polish and Scandinavian neighbors. Mexicans are the largest Spanish-speaking group in Wisconsin. Arriving in large numbers in the 1950s and after, they found an established community to join, particularly in Milwaukee and other cites in the southeast part of the state. Another fast-growing group of Spanish speakers is Puerto Ricans, who began arriving in Wisconsin in the late 1940s, drawn to industrial jobs in Milwaukee, Kenosha and Racine counties. The history of Milwaukee's Hispanic Community is told in this 1976 pamphlet, which is based in part on interviews with residents.
Today Hispanic Americans live in every Wisconsin county — more than 194,000 in all, or about 4.3 percent of the total population (census table). In addition to our large Mexican and Puerto Rican communities, Wisconsin is also home to political refugees and other immigrants from Cuba, El Salvador, Columbia and Nicaragua. A book-length bibliography and resource guide about Hispanic Americans in Wisconsin is available for free online at Turning Points in Wisconsin History.
:: Posted September 27, 2006
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