Photo: Joel Levine, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Cesar Chavez was born near Yuma, Arizona, in 1927. During the Depression his family lost its farm and became migrant workers in California. He left school after eighth grade to work in the fields.
After serving in the Navy, he worked as an organizer for the Community Service Organization, registering Mexican American voters.
Building a union
In 1962 Chavez and Dolores Huerta started the National Farm Workers Association in Delano, California. In 1965 it joined a grape strike begun by Filipino workers. The groups later merged into the United Farm Workers.
Chavez called on Americans to stop buying table grapes. The boycott spread across the country. In 1970 many growers signed contracts that raised pay and improved conditions.
He used nonviolent tactics, including a 25-day fast in 1968 and a march from Delano to Sacramento in 1966.
Legacy
In 1975 California passed a law giving farmworkers the right to organize. Chavez died in 1993 in Arizona. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom the next year, and March 31, his birthday, is a state holiday in California.
