“I always like to say it’s for the grandchildren,” said Margarita Sandoval, a volunteer at the Wisconsin Hispanic Scholarship Foundation in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The foundation has meticulously archived nearly 150 years of Mexican history in Milwaukee within its file cabinets.
In “Much of Wisconsin’s rich Latino history was lost to time,” Gina Lee Castro, a Public Investigator reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel writes that Sandoval, a retired genealogist and librarian has collected photographs of 69 Mexican families who moved to Milwaukee between 1910 and 1940, also called Los Primeros — a term local historians use to refer to the first generation of Mexicans to arrive in Milwaukee.
Wisconsin Latino News spoke with Castro about her report on Los Primeros and preserving important stories about Latino resilience, community and pride.
“The Primeros were basically Milwaukee’s first Mexican community,” she said. “They were brought from Texas, Mexico to come work at factories here in Milwaukee. They started the foundation of the Mexican community that continues to thrive here.”
Castro also shared insights about a previous story she wrote centered on the complicated conversation of how the diverse community popularly labeled Hispanic, Latino in the U.S. self identifies.
In ‘I am 100% more Latina than Hispanic’: Wisconsin Latinos discuss how they describe their identity, Castro writes: When Ruth Orellana is asked her ethnicity, she says either “Guatemalteca” — Spanish for “Guatemalan” — or “Latina.” Never “Hispanic,” she said.
In the article, Castro also shares: As for me, I grew up hearing terms that incorporated my family’s complex history, like “Afro-Latina,” to recognize my maternal family’s Yoruba and Puerto Rican heritage, and “Nuyorican,” to celebrate my mother and father’s roots in both New York and Puerto Rico.
While Hispanic and Latino are often used interchangeably, the difference between them is language and geography. Hispanic is likened to people from or tracing their roots to countries where Spanish is the dominant language. Latino refers to people from or tracing their origins to countries in the western hemisphere, primarily from Mexico to Argentina. So, a Spaniard is considered Hispanic but not Latino, and a Brazilian is considered Latino but not Hispanic. However, a person from a Western country like Mexico is regarded as both. It is important to note that Hispanic and Latino are terms only used in the US.
Cover Photo: Ricardo Gonzalez, from left, original owner of the The Cardinal Bar, shares a toast with the new co-owners Carrie Tobias and Anthony Rineer, and Andy Hansen as they go through archived images of The Cardinal Bar in Madison. Jovanny Hernandez / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel