"Griswold del Castillo and Garcia have written a biography of Chavez, but it is also a history of the Mexican American labor movement and the Mexican American struggle for civil rights....[T]his is a fine book."--- Choice

"[D]eserves to be read not only by persons studying the Mexican American experience but also by those interested in labor studies, U.S.-Mexican relations, and U.S. civilization in the 1960s and 1970s, including politics and society."--- Western Historical Quarterly

"Intended for scholars and general readers alike, the fascinating life story reads like a novel....[T]his sorely needed biography updates all the others."--- Multicultural Review

When farm worker and labor organizer César Chávez burst upon America's national scene in 1965, U.S. readers and viewers were witnessing the emergence of a new Mexican American, or Chicano, movement. This biography of Chávez by Richard Griswold del Castillo and Richard A. Garcia is the first to approach Chávez's life-his courageous acts, his turning points, his many perceived personas-in the context of Chicano and American history. It reveals a shy, quiet man who was launched by events into a maelstrom of campesino strikes, religious fervor, and nonviolent battles for justice. Among his friends and supporters he counted Martin Luther King Jr., Robert Kennedy, Jimmy Carter, and millions across America who rallied to his cause.

In Griswold del Castillo and Garcia's biography, Chávez's life mirrors major events in Mexican American history: Mexican immigration during the 1920s; forced repatriation in the 1930s; segregation in public schools; Mexican American contributions during World War II; the Zoot Suit Riots in Los Angeles; formation of Mexican American organizations to advance civil and political rights; the Chicano movement of the 1960s and early 1970s; the emergence of a conservative political backlash in the 1980s; and, finally, the "new immigration" in the 1990s. César Chávez was touched by all these ev