Posted on 06/07/2016 11:09:47 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Helen Chavez, the widow of civil rights leader Cesar Chavez, died Monday at a Bakersfield, California, hospital with many of her seven surviving children, 31 grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren by her side, according to the United Farm Workers. She was 88.
Helen Chavez helped her husband launch and sustain what became the first enduring farm workers union in the United States. She used her fierce determination to help change the lives of thousands of farm workers and millions of others who were inspired by La Causa, the UFW said on its Facebook page.
"If it wasn't for her, Cesar would not have been able to do any of his work," said Rudy Medina, Chavez's nephew.
Helen Chavez was quiet and humble but fiercely determined and strong-willed, the union said. She didn’t speak in public or talk with reporters, but she held deep convictions.
"She was right there as a steadfast foundation," Medina said. "She kept him going ... and she never wavered."
Born Helen Fabela on Jan. 21, 1928, in the Imperial Valley town of Brawley, California, her family lived in a converted horse barn outside McFarland before moving to Delano. She met Cesar in the mid-1940s. They were married in 1948 after his discharge from the U.S. Navy, and they had eight children.
Cesar and Helen left a comfortable middle-class life in East Los Angeles in 1962 and moved back to Delano to begin organizing farm workers, the UFW said. Helen often had to raise the children by herself while Cesar was on the road. She returned to field work while Cesar organized up and down California’s vast Central Valley; on weekends Cesar and some of the older children joined her, the union said.
"They say behind every great man is a great woman," Medina said. "That's Helen Chavez." Cesar Chavez died in 1993 at the age of 66.
Details on services for Helen Chavez will be issued Tuesday.
Will she lay in STATE in the Rotunda?
I think that would be nice perhaps on a bed of lettuce ?
Cesar Chavez actually deployed teams to the border in order to physically beat illegal aliens, and they in fact did beat illegal aliens severely.
Really never heard of he. Her husband was a card carrying member of the communist party. Bet she would have voted for bernie
RIP.
How many are on welfare.
Now if the State legislature really wants to support farm workers, then they should support the valley farmers by allocating as much water as possible. Rather, they keep obscure species alive.
CC’s birthday, March 31, is an optional state holiday.
Probably none. Being a major commie/fascist/labor leader/thugee/activist operating in his neck of the fields, you can bet the lettuce farm that he left an estate for his family we peons could only dream about.
There should be little doubt that untraceable huge cash donations from evil sources poured into his pocket during all the years he was a hero of the left and the saviour of the downtrodden "shirtless ones".
Leni
I am so sick of these marxists being held up on pedestals as if they were gods. Caesar Chavez was a thug, plain and simple.
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