Growing up in Yakima
• Blanca Estella
Garza and Frank Martinez were children of farm workers.
Their families moved from Texas to the Pacific NW when they were
young.
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• Frank remembers how schools in the Yakima
Valley in the 1960s made Hispanic children feel
inferior and ashamed of their heritage. He talks
about the school policy of “assimilation”—the idea that children
should set aside Hispanic culture and identity. The Chicano movement
would fight against this concept.
Blanca Estella Martinez and Frank Martinez met at the UW where both were active in MEChA. Today they both teach high school in the Yakima Valley. (2 min)