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Medrano / The Matriarch and Her Family

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Mr. Medrano-This is in front of the , this is the Santos Rodriquez, this is my father, this is the Santos Rodriquez demonstration. That is the day we were getting ready to, this is my brother right here. Interviewer-"Ok" Mr. Medrano-When you have your [?] lol! That guy looks familiar, my father. Interviewer-" Well, I wanted to ask, we know a lot about your father, but what was your mother doing? Was she taking this [?]?" Mr. Medrano-[?] they said matriarch of the family, as he traveled, he kept the family together. She-"If you'll don't behave, I have a hotel that he's staying at, I'm going to call him right now and tell him." Interviewer-"Lol!" Mr. Medrano-"I'm going to tell him, and when he comes back, you'll going to get a whoopin'." I'm telling you she did, she did, we were scared of him, just on his voice, "Better mind your mother and when I get there, when I get there, you know what's coming to you." Fear. So, she kept the family together and as we do these campaigns, lunches, food, the whole works, then she turned around and kept the community, what is it that you lacked, that you go to school, and sure enough provided clothes pantry, food pantry, food pantry, would tell thier parents. Parents would say, "Seek to it that my child goes to school because we got to go to work at 6:00 in the morning, and go by there, if you got time, and see if they made it to school. Turn around, see them on the street, playing hookie, playing up and down. Ohhh, Mrs. Suzy, see it, go in the afternoon and 5:00, tell em, they got a whippin. They didn't like it cause my mother is the one that told them for not going to school and that's the kind of person she was. And thats what the community knew about it and thats what they named at the school after. Interviewer-"So, she wasn't just like a matriarch of the family, she was like a matriarch of the community." Mr. Medrano-Yea, yea, also, you know about our grocery story, right? Interviewer-"Yea, that's something that we didn't get to cover that I wanna mention." Mr. Medrano-There it is, there it is right there. Its a grocery store and thats where my mother would buy on Friday night would buy 200, 300 lengues, and boil em, and would start selling Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday by the pound. I don't know how much was it per pound, we boil it, you know how the lengue smells, get the pound, put it [?] and sell it 200 lengues in three days, we sell in this community. It would come from West Dallas [?] drive over here to sell the [?] lengues. My mother [?] boil, but boil to the right temperature and right duration, you know eight hours, nine hours, ten hours, what it take [?] they would come, seasoning [?] Now. thats all of us right there, thats Pauline, [?] thats city council. Interviewer-"What year was that?" Mr. Medrano-"Oh, I don't know [?] I don't even know, she did four terms, the two years, she did limitations, and as soon as she stepped down, Adams resighned from city council, from the school board, and then ran from that position, and then we turned around and selected [?] which is the school board and we told [?] you are, we didn't have anybody from our family [?] so you are, your leadership and your sensitivity is you can take this road for us for the school board, you know what its all about: the kids, so he took it on Harvard graduate, the whole works, we knew that he could play the role and I didn't know he was that tough, dedication, hours, fourteen years, he told me the other day, its my second year, I'm ready to get out of here. Interviewer-"LOL" Mr. Medrano-There's no [?] and this and that......

Interview Interview with Robert Medrano
Subjects Oral Tradition
Family › Parenting
Work › Latino/a-Owned Businesses
Community Organizations › Community outreach
Education › Parent and Community Involvement in Education
Electoral Politics
Chicano Power › Chicano Power and Community Organizing
Family › Parents
Tags Medrano, Esperanza
Fundraising
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Interview date 2015-06-10
Interview source CRBB Summer 2015
Interviewees Medrano, Robert
Interviewers Acuña-Gurrola, Moisés
Duration 00:05:02
Citation "The Matriarch and Her Family," from Robert Medrano oral history interview with Moisés Acuña-Gurrola,  June 10, 2015, Dallas, TX, Civil Rights in Black and Brown Interview Database, https://crbb.tcu.edu/clips/891/the-matriarch-and-her-family, accessed November 21, 2025