Strong Women #6: Dolores Huerta

The Camel and the Scorpion is a book inspired by true events. It is the story of #StrongWomen - Caroline, Lydia, Anna - who spoke out for a good world despite the personal and professional risks to themselves in doing so.

This post is the sixth in my Strong Women Series. The series honors women and girls of courage.

Dolores Fernandez Huerta. Credit: Gage Skidmore

Never heard of Dolores Fernandez Huerta?

I'm embarrassed to say I hadn't heard of Ms. Huerta until I recently watched a movie about Cesar Chavez, and I thought: Who is that woman who stands by him as a fellow organizer? Why don't I know of her? She is astounding.

Amy Goodman, Democracy Now, called Ms. Huerta "one of the greatest civil rights leaders in this country's history."

Dolores Huerta originated the phrase, "Sí, se puede" - "yes, it's possible" - which Barack Obama adapted for his "Yes, we can" motto.

With Cesar Chaves, Ms. Huerta founded the National Farmworkers Association, which later became the United Farmworkers Association. It was Ms. Huerta who served as the union's contract negotiator with the growers, who eventually came to the bargaining table after years of grinding, bloody work by Ms. Huerta, Mr. Chavez, and the farmworkers.

But let's go back to a time before the creation of the National Farmworkers Association. 

Born in 1930, Ms. Huerta was a feminist from a young age, inspired by her mother, Alicia. Ms. Huerta's mother, after many years of saving, bought and ran a 70-room hotel in Stockton, California, that served low-wage workers in their agricultural community of Mexican, Filipino, African-American, Japanese and Chinese working families.  Alicia charged room rates that the workers could afford, frequently waiving the cost entirely.

After college graduation, Ms. Huerta became a teacher in Stockton, and this experience presented another inspiration that would shape her future as a world-changer: Some of her students came to school hungry and without even shoes to wear.

Involved in the Stockton Community Service Organization, Ms. Huerta learned and honed essential skills in community organization, advocacy, being the proverbial squeaky wheel, and surmounting obstacles from within and without a community.

Can you imagine the environment in the early 1950s, when Ms. Huerta came of age - a woman, a woman of color, a woman who championed low-wage workers - during the McCarthy Era, when all social- and economic-justice movements were branded as Communist?

However, about that time, organizing the farmworkers, Ms. Huerta said: "You had this ambiance around you that you could really change the world."

I invite you to watch this C-Span video narrated by Ms. Huerta about her life's work for economic and social justice.

And below, a half-hour Democracy Now segment on Ms. Huerta below, lauding the release of a film documentary on Ms. Huerta's life and work:

Women of courage like Dolores Huerta? They are who kept me writing The Camel and the Scorpion for 20 years, so I could share the stories of women like The Camel and the Scorpion protagonists, Caroline, Lydia, and Anna.

Honorable, imperfect, brave, vulnerable champions, all of them. Risking their personal and professional lives to stand up for their ideals.