Oral history interview, Emma Gomez Martinez, 2013 (video and transcript)

Credits: 
Boulder County Latino History Project, Maria Rogers Oral History Program, and Carnegie Branch Library for Local History, Boulder Public Library. Click on the above link to access complete bibliographic information.
Detailed Summary: 
Emma Gomez Martinez has been a spokesperson and advocate for the Hispanic community in Boulder since the 1950s. She was born in Aguilar, between Trinidad and Walsenburg, in 1928. Her father had come from Mexico in the 20s; her mother’s family was from No. New Mexico (one grandmother was a Comanche Indian). Her parents came to Erie in 1929; her father worked in the coal mines in the winter and did field work in the summer. She talks about discrimination in the schools and the deportations of Mexicans in the 1930s; interesting comments about how discrimination was not discussed by Latinos but seared their souls. Husband John Martinez, from Boulder, returned from WW II after she had come to Boulder to work. After marriage she moved to Water + Goss Streets area of Boulder, where she describes lack of employment and housing for Latinos. Discusses influx of Latinos from other states in the 1950s and talks about the history of her work with OEO (Office of Economic Opportunity) and War on Poverty in Boulder in the 1960s and 1970s. Describes Canyon Park, the quonset huts, and relationships among Latinos and blacks in that neighborhood. She talks about the re-naming of Canyon Park in her honor.
ID: 
BCLHP-MKM-153
Location: 
Aguilar; Mexico; No. New Mexico; Erie. Colo.; Boulder
Date: 
9/3/2013
Time Period: 
1920s-30s
1940s
1950s-1965
1966-1970s
1980s-90s
2000-2013
Keywords: 
Oral history, Emma Gomez Martinez
People Shown or Mentioned: 
Emma Gomez Martinez; John Martinez; Ted Tedesco
Location of Original: 
Maria Rogers Oral History Program at Carnegie Branch Library for Local History, Boulder Public Library