Cecilia D. Esquer

              Arizona Latina Trailblazers Vol III Stories of Courage, Hope and Determination By Dr. Christine Marin
Vol III
By
Christine Marin, Ph.D.
Published by
Latino Perspectives Media
and
Raul H. Castro Institute
Vol III
Copyright @ 2011
by Latino Perspectives Media and Raul H. Castro Institute
Phoenix, Arizona
Edited by: Joan Westlake / Phoenix College
Designed by: Alfredo Hernández / Phoenix College
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
The publishers grant permission to individual teachers to reproduce the contents of this
book for educational purposes and classroom use.
Limit of Liability/ Disclaimer of Warranty: While the author and the publishers have
used their best efforts in preparing this publication, they make no representations or
warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of its contents and specifically
disclaim any intent to defame or slight any people, places or organizations.
Printed in the United States of America
April 2011
Arizona Latina Trailblazers 2011
5
As Arizona approaches its Centennial
Celebration, it is an ideal occasion to
honor and celebrate six Latina Trailblazers
who represent more than 100 years of
contributions that continue to be vital to
this state. The life journeys of these women
are filled with compelling stories that
reflect the strength of their vision, their
courageous actions, and their thoughtful
advocacy.
It was 1872 when Manuela Sotelo
brought her family to the Salt River Valley.
A widow, she was legendary for her astute
land purchases and for sharing her frontier-honed
skills with all. She and her daughter,
María Sotelo Miller, saw grandchildren go
on to teach after being trained at the school
Manuela and María helped to establish —
Tempe Territorial Normal School.
In search of the American Dream, two
generations of the Cajero family came to
mine in Morenci, Ariz. in the early 1900s.
They had a dream of a better life for both
their family and community. This vision
was instilled in Bernardo and Carmen
Cajero, and was fulfilled through their
work in the legislature. This dream continues
today, through the work of their daughter,
State Senator Olivia Cajero Bedford.
Cecilia Esquer and Maricopa County
Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox left their
mining community of Superior to pursue
an education during the turbulent 60s.
The Chicano Movement helped to direct
their pursuit of equality. Excelling in their
varied careers, their contributions to the
Democratic Party are legendary, as are
their achievements on behalf of the poor,
the dispossessed, women and children, the
sick, and the elderly.
These six Latina Trailblazers represent a
rich heritage of moral courage, sacrifice and
fortitude. They come from communities
that taught lessons of cultural survival while
tending the love of la familia in the heart.
The lives of these Trailblazers shine a light
on the path of service and social conscience.
We honor them and all that they represent
as strong role models and pioneers who
forged our rich cultural heritage. They are
extraordinary women of Arizona.
INTRODUCTION
14
Cecilia Teyechea Denogeán Esquer liked
to use the words of Supreme Court
Justice Sonia Sotomayor to describe her-self:
“…an ordinary person who has been
blessed with extraordinary opportunities
and experiences.” However, many thought
Cecilia was far from ordinary. She was fear-less
and spoke her mind, especially when it
came to matters of social injustice, racism
and politics. Just thinking about the preju-dice
she grew up with in the copper mining
town of Superior, Ariz., made her angry.
When she was an elementary school girl in
the early 1950s, social injustice and racism
against Mexicanos was common.
The town of Superior in Pinal County
was laid out in the early 1900s on the site of
an early mining camp called Hastings. The
camp drew prospectors and frontiersmen
to the area, hoping to make their fortunes.
Cecilia D. Esquer
Chicana Activist Lived An Extraordinary Life
Cover of book, “The Lie About My Inferiority-Evolution of a
Chicana Activist,” by Cecilia D. Esquer
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
15
Cecilia D. Esquer
The prospect of work in the copper mines
eventually drew Cecilia’s Teyechea and
Denogeán ancestral families to the area
of Superior.
The Teyechea and Denogeán families
emigrated from Mexico and, by 1853,
became residents of the United States.
Their descendants made their way to
California and Arizona. It is said that the
Teyechea men carried the U.S. mail in
stagecoaches from Hayden to Winkelman,
managed an ore mill in Hayden, or
were blacksmiths and mechanics in the
same area. The Teyechea women lived
in California and became self-sufficient
through education and hard work. Isaura
Teyechea Rosas graduated from the
University of Southern California and her
sister, Amelia Teyechea Rosas, was a
costume designer and a seamstress
in Hollywood.
Cecilia’s mother, Bertina Teyechea,
came to Superior from Hayden, Ariz. in
1928 when she was 10 years old. In 1934, at
the age of 16, she married Cecilia’s father,
Ramón Reel Denogeán. They struggled
through the Great Depression and raised a
family of nine. Bertina took great pride in
her children, their accomplishments and
overcoming challenges for her family.
In 1929, Cecilia’s father, Ramón was
16, and working as a laborer at the Magma
Copper Co.’s smelter. The work was dan-gerous,
requiring the miners to lift, move
and carry heavy bars of steel, machinery,
stacks of timber and wood beams. By 1940,
he had advanced to power shovel operator
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
Ramón & Bertina Denogeán; 1956
16
and had earned a reputation for being
hard working as well as outspoken when
treated unfairly.
Cecilia attended Superior’s Mexican
school, Harding Elementary, through the
seventh grade. She said her teachers made
her feel inferior, un-American and insisted
that she claim she was Spanish instead of
Mexican. Cecilia and her classmates were
punished for speaking Spanish, even outside
the classroom. Her parents shared similar
experiences in Hayden and Superior.
For her children, Bertina wanted a bet-ter
education and more opportunities for a
better life than what they had in the town
of Superior. It was a combination of her
mother’s strength and initiative and respect
for education and her father’s willingness to
make the move that made it possible for the
family to come to Phoenix in 1954. Ramón
commuted from Phoenix to Superior until
1961, when he began working for the City
Cecilia D. Esquer
Cecilia D. Esquer (front row, 4th from left); 1947, Mrs. Foraker’s class, I-A Harding Elementary School
(picture to the right) Cecilia D. Esquer; 1947,
Superior, Ariz., Mrs. Foraker and class, 1-A Harding
Elementary School
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
Cecilia D. Esquer
17
of Phoenix.
In the Valley, Bertina’s hopes for her
children became a reality. Cecilia attended
Lowell Elementary School and, with the
assistance of a faculty scholarship of $50,
graduated from Phoenix Union High School
in 1959. She received a two-year scholar-ship
to Arizona State University, where she
was named Outstanding Business Education
Student and became the president of the
local chapter of the honor society, Pi
Omega Pi. With her bachelor’s in hand,
Cecilia accepted a position at Ray High
School in Kearny, Arizona. She returned
to ASU in 1964 and earned a master’s in
Spanish and Latin American Literature.
In 1965, she married Elias Esquer.
He was the youngest child of a prominent
Latino family in Tempe. His parents,
Eduardo and Rita Esquer, came to Tempe
to work the farms in 1940. Six years later,
they moved with their 10 children into the
predominantly Mexican American Victory
Acres neighborhood. In 2007, the city
named Esquer Park after Elias’ family.
Cecilia was hired to teach Spanish at
McClintock High School in Tempe in 1965
through 1966 and again in 1968 through
1970. It was there that she confronted
the unjust ways in which the Yaqui Indian
and Mexican American students from
Guadalupe, Ariz. were mistreated by some
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
Cecilia and Elias Esquer; June 5, 1965, wedding day
Cecilia D. Esquer
18
of the administrators and teachers. She
spoke out against the racism knowing she
risked losing her job. Cecilia often cited this
experience as the catalyst that turned her
into a Chicana activist. She preferred adding
“Chicana,” explaining that it was a political
term describing a Mexican American woman
who believes in “La Causa.”
During this time, she and her husband
Elias joined the United Farm Workers
Organizing committee, an experience that
turned out to be life changing. They spent
many weekends going door to door to regis-ter
voters, often as many as 300 in a week-end.
With their children Andrea and Marcos,
they attended weekly rallies.
“My husband and I were fortunate to
become politically active during the late
1960s and early 1970s,” Cecilia said. “I can’t
recall a more exciting time for young people
to become involved, than those ‘wild and
crazy’ years.”
In 1970, Elias was the first Latino elected
to the Tempe Union High School District
board. Cecilia was elected a precinct com-mitteewoman
in 1972. The next year, she
was the first Chicana elected as a member-at-large
of the Democratic National Committee.
It was at an organizing rally that Cecilia
was moved by a call from Cesar Chavez for
Cecilia D. Esquer; 1976, law school graduation
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
Cecilia D. Esquer
19
more Mexican American lawyers, and in
the fall of 1973, she became a student at the
ASU College of Law. Cecilia earned her Juris
Doctorate in 1976 and began to practice
civil law in Tempe. She established a solid
reputation as a political adviser and a civil
rights advocate. Her tireless work for the
Democratic Party and on political campaigns
for human dignity and justice
is legendary.
As an assistant attorney general for
Governor Bruce Babbitt, Cecilia worked on
education issues that led to her appointment
to President Jimmy Carter’s Legal Services
Corporation Board of Directors in 1978.
Among her colleagues in the corporation was
Hillary Rodham Clinton, whose friendship
she maintained over the many years.
In 1981, ASU hired Cecilia as an assistant
professor in its College of Business, the only
ethnic minority woman in a tenure-track
position in the college. Her upper-division
classes were always popular and often she
found herself in the role of mentor. She
served on college committees and coor-dinated
the Revlon Project, a $100,000
grant for the College of Business to recruit
Mexican American students from Arizona’s
high schools for ASU’s business department.
In one year, she visited 17 high schools,
appeared on local media talk shows and made
countless presentations to community and
civil rights organizations. The Revlon Project
was successful throughout its four-year grant
period.
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
Cecilia D. Esquer and Hillary Clinton
Cecilia D. Esquer
20
Over the following decades, Cecilia faced
numerous civil rights and political challenges.
She provided legal advice to school district
administrators and non-profit corporations.
In the 1990s, she accepted a faculty posi-tion
in the Department of Justice and Legal
Studies at Phoenix College and became its
chair and director of the Legal Assisting
Program. She remained with the college for
13 years.
She “retired” to work on the campaigns
of candidates for city and state offices for and
within the Democratic Party. When Terry
Goddard was elected Arizona attorney gen-eral
in November 2002, he asked Cecilia to
be his chief counsel for the Public Advocacy
Division, which included the Consumer
Protection and Advocacy Section and
Environmental Enforcement. She managed
the work of more than 100 state employees.
Throughout her career, Cecilia’s ideals
were rooted in the decision of Brown v. Board
of Education – equality, freedom and oppor-tunity.
When its 50th anniversary rolled
around in 2004, Cecilia asked Attorney
General Goddard what he was doing to mark
the important date. When he admitted it had
been overlooked, she handed him a draft that
she had written outlining the importance
of the decision. Together, she and Goddard
made final edits and posted it on the attorney
general’s website.
Cecilia was also a great champion of the
Dream Act, first introduced nearly a decade
ago, that would provide a path to citizen-ship
for undocumented young people if they
served in the military or attended college.
Cecilia believed that the Dream Act could
enable these youth to develop their own
Elias Esquer (left), Terry Goddard, Cecilia Esquer; election
night–Terry Goddard campaign for Arizona Attorney General
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
21
dream of an education encompassing 21st-century
skills: collaboration, critical thinking,
digital literacy and problem-solving abilities
– the tools that help students, young or old,
thrive in today’s world.
After a long and notable career, Cecilia
passed away at the age of 68 on Dec. 4,
2010. Her memorial service was filled with
family and friends who had been touched by
Cecilia’s spark. Friend and colleague Attorney
General Terry Goddard delivered a heartfelt
eulogy and noted that Cecilia had changed
Arizona. “It has been our privilege to know
Cecilia Esquer, to fight along side of her, to
learn from her, to be inspired by her. With
her, in spite of imposing odds, we definitely
won more than we lost. She was an incredible
leader, with a style we will not see again and
will greatly miss.”
Goddard added, “Long before the term
‘wise Latina’ became part of the Supreme
Court confirmation process, she exemplified
sabiduría.”
It was the teacher in Cecilia who advo-cated
for classroom and political leaders to set
ambitious visions and to rally others to work
hard to achieve those visions. The teacher in
her also believed that students need to know
and understand the history that brought all
of us, and our state of Arizona, to where we
are today. Cecilia’s dream for equality lives
on in her autobiography, “The Lie About My
Inferiority: Evolution of a Chicana Activist,”
published in September of 2010.
Cecilia liked to end her passages with a
quote by Senator Ted Kennedy: “The work
goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives
and the dreams shall never die.” Her own
legacy is one of hope and inspiration.
Cecilia D. Esquer
Cecilia and Elias Esquer; 2006, immigration rally
Image courtesy of Elias Esquer
DeterminationAs educators, social workers, labor leaders, entrepreneurs, scholars, judicial representatives, home makers, nurses, ranch wives, or political representa-tives, Latinas and Hispanas have long been at the forefront of Arizona’s history. It is important that we recognize the impact of their individual contributions, and imperitive that their collective stories be recalled and shared, especially as we approach Arizona’s 100th anniversary of statehood in 2012.The life journeys of the Arizona Latina Trailblazers are filled with compelling stories that reflect the strength of their vision, their courageous actions, and their thoughtful advocacy. Their outstanding leadership formed strong cultural cornerstones, laying the foundation for women in leadership roles today. And so we honor them and all that they represent, pioneers who forged our rich cultural heritage and strong role models.Raul H. Castro InstitutePUBLIC POLICY | EDUCATION | LEADERSHIPVol Stories Remain Important in Arizona‘s History