Ruben Salazar 1928–1970

Name ______Class ______Date ______A Time of Social Change Biography Ruben Salazar 1928–1970

WHY HE MADE HISTORY Ruben Salazar was an award-winning journalist who focused public attention on the prejudice and social injustice suffered by Mexican Americans.

As you read the biography below, consider the price Ruben Salazar paid in his fight for social justice. Was he a hero? Was he a martyr?

Ruben Salazar was born in Cíudad Juarez, across the Bettmann/CORBIS © river from El Paso, Texas, in 1928. He moved to El Paso with his family when he was a baby and eventually became a naturalized U.S. citizen. After high school, he joined the U.S. Army and served for two years. Then he earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Texas at El Paso. While still in college Salazar worked as a reporter for the El Paso Herald-Post. It was there that Salazar first reported on alleged abuses against Mexican Americans by police and in prisons. It was an issue he would continue to investigate throughout his career. Salazar went on to work for the Santa Rosa (California) Press Democrat and the San Francisco News, finally landing at the Los Angeles Times in 1959. There, he covered Mexican American issues, writing about prejudice experienced by Latinos and taking a special interest in the problems Chicanos, or Mexican Americans, faced in public schools. He earned journalism awards for a series of stories on the Los Angeles Latino community. The Times sent Salazar to cover the Vietnam War for two years, then made him bureau chief in Mexico City. He was called back to Los Angeles in 1968 to cover the city’s rising Chicano movement. When Salazar took a job at KMEX, a Spanish-language television station in Los Angeles, the Times asked him to continue writing weekly columns about the Chicano community. In his columns, Salazar reported the high rate at which Latinos were dying in the Vietnam War. He spoke out against police abuses, racism, residential segregation, and substandard education. Along with William Restrepo of KMEX, Salazar began investigating allegations that Los Angeles police officers and sheriff’s deputies had beaten residents and planted evidence when arresting people. Salazar’s writings did not make him popular with the law enforcement

Copyright © by Holt, Rinehart and Winston. All rights reserved. 6 A Time of Social Change Name ______Class ______Date ______A Time of Social Change Biography community. In the eyes of some, Salazar was a radical and a danger to the country. FBI files released later through the Freedom of Information Act show that Salazar was being monitored and investigated. He was also under surveillance by the Los Angeles Police Department. In 1970 some 30,000 antiwar demonstrators gathered in an East Los Angeles park to protest U.S. involvement in Vietnam and the disproportionate number of Mexican Americans dying in the war. Salazar, Restrepo, and a cameraman were covering the event for KMEX. Interactions between police and demonstrators became violent and erupted into a riot, and police threw tear gas to break up the crowd. As the disturbance was ending the KMEX crew went to a local café, either to take shelter or to rest. While they were inside, a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy shot a 10-inch tear gas canister into the building. The projectile hit Salazar in the head, killing him instantly. The coroner ruled that Salazar’s death was an accident and no charges were ever brought against the deputy. Controversy over the incident raged. Many Chicanos believed Salazar had been killed intentionally. Salazar’s family filed a civil suit against the county, which admitted no wrongdoing but paid the family $700,000 to settle the suit. For many Mexican Americans, Salazar was a hero who gave his life to help Chicanos achieve true equality in America. After his death Salazar received a special Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award. Today a library in Santa Rosa, where Salazar once worked as a reporter, bears his name. The park where the 1970 demonstration took place has been renamed Ruben Salazar Park. Salazar has also received one of the highest honors for Mexican Americans. A corrida—a song about his contributions to his people—was composed in his honor.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN? 1. Recall How did Ruben Salazar’s journalism career develop?

______

______2. Evaluate Return now to the questions suggested before you read the biography. Do you think Ruben Salazar was a hero? Was he a martyr? Explain your answer.

______

ACTIVITY Do some research to learn more about corridas. Who do you think should be honored with a corrida? Write the words for a corrida honoring this person. Add music if you like, and share your song with the class.