WEBVTT
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Hi, I am Christina and this is Estodia's Unknown. This
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episode was supposed to be just one episode, but because
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we're going to be on vacation, we decided to split
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it into two in a place where it makes sense.
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If you are a member of our Patreon, then you
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will get this episode all together and we'll be back
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next week with the second part. Hi everyone, This is
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Carmen and Christina and this is estodia Is Unknown. A
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podcast where we talk about Latin American history. Sometimes it's
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horrible and deals with tibe topics like criticism, corruption, and genocide,
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but more than that, it's also about resistance, power and community.
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And I wanted to talk about well, I've been wanting
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to talk about who I'm talking about today for a
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very long time, and I was like, there's no better
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time than March, because one, it's Women's History Month, but
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also the events that take place during her story happened
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on March first, nineteen fifty four. Her story, not his story,
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exactly her story. So yeah, that's why I wanted to
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talk about. So what was the year because I just
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was thinking her story, Oh wow, Okay, March first, nineteen
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fifty four, fifty four Okay, I heard the March first
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prize and hear the year. Yeah. So here's my little
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thing before I introduce who I'm talking about. Hey, you mystery?
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Yeah yeah, Well, because I want to see if you
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know who it is after I say this a right,
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you know, I don't remember anyone. Okay, go on, I'm
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quizzing you, not a quiz, a pop quiz. Can sign
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up for a pop quiz. This is what I'm here for.
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I'm lean, okay. So on March first, nineteen fifty four,
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for Puerto Rican nationalists open fire on the House of
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Representatives chamber at the US Capitol. They were led by
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Lolita Lebron. Okay, a woman who you do know who
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she is? I knew of this, I know her generally,
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but in the moment, I'm glad you say her name
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because I was not gonna remember her name. Okay. No,
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I was always gonna say her name. Okay. I thought
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we're gonna be like, go and who is the andle
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them who led them to open fire on the House
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for person So not the first time that the capital
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saw an act of quote unquote terror, because I don't
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consider this an active terror. I'm sorry, but Okay, no,
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I'm FBI agent that's listening and I'm just kidding. No.
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Some and she's a very like polarizing figure. Some people
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see her as a hero as right, She's a hero
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to me, and others see her as a terrorist. I mean,
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I guess it depends on you ask like you just said, yeah,
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Like if you're asking me hero yeah, yeah. And even
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if people don't agree with what she did, she they
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still see her as a heroic figure in Puerto Rican
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history because not everyone agrees with what she did. Right
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that day, I'm a capital because some people were like, oh,
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it's too much violence, but we'll get into it. But yeah,
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that's what we're talking about today. Full name Dolores lebron
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Lolita lebron So. She was born in Lattis, Puerto Rico,
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on November nineteenth, nineteen nineteen, and she was one of
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five siblings. Her parents were Gonzalo lebron Bernard and Rafaela
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so To Luciano. Her sylings were Aurea, Agusto, Gonzalo Junior
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and Julio and they were raised in Ascienda Bezuelas in
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the Batrio of Bezuela in Lattice Puerto Rico, and her
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father worked as the ascienda's foreman, earning a wopping thirty
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dollars a month for this, Oh my god. But because
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she was foreman, they were given a small house on
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the essenda to live in, and they were also allowed
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to grow some food in this little house, and the
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Lebron children attended a small community school. But Lorita found
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herself unable to keep up with her siblings because she
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fell into a gutter when she was small was full
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of water, and this resulted in hurricane in pneumonia. Wow. Yeah.
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And after that she suffered from years of fatigue, and
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she grew up to be a little frail And who
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would think that this little frail girl would lead a shootout? Yes?
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Well what was a shooting? Yes? Yeah? And maybe because
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she couldn't keep up with her siblings anymore, she was
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she wasn't out there running a bunch with them in
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the neighborhood. It could have been the reason. It strengthened her,
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strengthened her want to read and like seeking knowledge and
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oh my god, I can't now I can't read, yes,
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thank you? And yeah, she just you know, spent time
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indoors reading and stuff like that. Eventually, the family moved
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from Besuela to Mirasol, a different neighborhood in Lattice. Here,
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her father, Gonzalo was the foreman of another ascent that
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owned by Emilio via Yes. And in Mirasol, Lolita was
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able to receive a better education. She attended the local
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public school and then after completing sixth grade, she attended
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the Seunda Rural that's her saving in Spanish, without a
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middle school in Bartholo, and this is a barrio right
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next to Mirasol, all in Lattice still and she finished
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eighth grade. And by now at this point in her life,
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she was known for her smarts and her beauty. She
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was just always described as gorgeous. And if you look
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at her picture of when she shootout, she's dressed, she's
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so well dressed. She just looks beautiful. I mean, she
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looks so cool. Yeah, she's got red LIPSTI gun and
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she's just like she's ready to you know. But yeah,
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she was known for her beauty. So she won first
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place in the annual Queen of the Flowers of may
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A beauty contest in Lattice. And even though her dad
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was an atheist, her mom was Catholic, and she, along
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with her siblings, were all baptized into Catholicism and she
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would eventually be super religious as well. When this baptism
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happened when she was fourteen, this is where she met
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Francisco Mattos Pauli, who she immediately liked and they started
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writing each other love letters poetry. This was her her
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first boyfriend, and I mean, for this time, secually's not
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that bad of an age gap. He was only four
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years older than her, making him eighteen and her fourteen. Yeah,
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to be worse, yeah, it could be a lot worse pose, Yeah,
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And while the two were in love, their families did
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not love this union. His family felt like the Lebrons
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were too poor and they considered her a hibaa a peasant,
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oh and not at their son's level. And her family
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was just worried that he was some rich snob and
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he was older, and that's why they opposed the relationship.
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Out of the two, they have a valid reason, I think,
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I agree, Yeah, And they did eventually break up because
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Fancisco Marcos Bauli moved out of Lattice and she also
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ended up leaving Lattice for San Juan to study sewing
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here or she picked back up with her love and
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they started seeing each other again. But then she ended
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up moving back to Lattice because her dad got super
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sick with tubertudosis and she felt like it was her
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duty to help her family, so she returned and her
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dad was too sick to work. They were forced to
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leave the Scienda because again him being the foremant of
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the scienda was the reason they had a free house
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on the scenda. Right, and this is why I don't
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know things like housing, health insurance. I don't know. I
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feel like you should be type to employment No. One
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hundred percent. And eventually the Scnda owner did provide them
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with the new house to live in. And it's like
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now they have to depend on the generosity of this
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rich person, which luckily he was generous enough to give
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them a house. Right, that's rare, so rare. Because he
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couldn't work anymore, so she took care of her dad.
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She would travel to the next town over to pick
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up his medicine. She then diligently gave him his medicine
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every seventy minutes for seven days. Wow. Yeah, and she
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didn't sleep or eat during these seven days because she
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was like, nope, I need to take care of him.
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And it took all her attention, but he did sadly
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die after the seven days, and so she started helping
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her family financially by weaving clothes because she was a
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trained seamstress. And it was right after this that her
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political ideologies would be shaped. She had already been a
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member of the Liberal Party from a very young age,
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but she wasn't very involved in politics. She was just
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like a member, that's it. She didn't go she didn't
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attend any meetings, nothing. But now at eighteen, she had
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been working as a seamstress for some time, she was
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dating a local engineer, and at this age eighteen, she
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witnessed what started as a peaceful protest then turned into
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a massacre. Oh no, the Ponte massacre. Oh I was
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gonna guess. I was, Yeah, I know. I figured you
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wouldn't know, yeah, or you would say that, and the
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next nose and yes, this is the Ponte massacre, the
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very one, yeah, which we talked about way back in
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episode twenty two twenty two. Wow, yeah, long ago. Yeah.
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And because we've already covered it, I'm not going to
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go into details but just know it was completely horrible.
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It was literally like a massacre. There's the reason why
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it's called the pont Samasacar. Yeah, it's truly truly horrible.
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Go back and listen if you have not listened to
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that episode, which I would just assume everyone has at
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this point because most people go in order. So this
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is the event that radicalized her into believing that the
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olin way forward was a free Puerto Rico, and she
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began to admire the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party, which we
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do mention a lot in the Ponts of Massacre. During
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all this, she ended up getting pregnant and had her
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first baby at twenty one, and like any mother, she
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wented to provide for her child, but she realized that
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there were no opportunities on the island for her to
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do this, especially after separating from her baby's father, so
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she left her baby with her mother and, like many
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other Puerto Ricans, migrated to New York in search of
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a better life to provide for her child. But this
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was not easy at all. It was difficult for her
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to find a job, especially because she didn't fully understand English.
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She found occasional work as a seamstress, but she was
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often fired because a lot of her bosses considered her
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a rebel. But all she really did was call out
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discrimination that she witnessed against Puerto Rican workers. Yeah, so
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they just expected you to lay there and take it,
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you know. Yeah, And she didn't. She wasn't like that.
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Sorry for the crudeness, Sorry for the crudeness. She's tired.
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The injustices she saw as a Puerto Rican trying to
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make a living in New York further solidified her nationalistic views.
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She found the local Puerto Rican Liberation Movement group and
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began meeting with them. She also enrolled in classes at
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George Rushton College and attended for two years when she
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was not at work, and then at twenty three ish,
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she married again. She had her second baby, who she
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also sent to live with her mom in Puerto Rico.
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She also left her husband after a year of marrying
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him because she felt like he was oppressing her. He
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probably will, I'm on her side, automatically. Automatically, No, right,
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you know, there's some schools of thoughts out there that
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that believes what I believe. Marriage is inherently oppressive to women,
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Like no matter what kind of marriage all marriage. Yeah, yeah,
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I can't say I fully disagree. Same And during this
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time that we're in nineteen forty three, there was an
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even greater migration from Puerto Ricans leaving the island for
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New York. And it has a name, the Great Migration.
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Oh yeah, fitting fitting name. A lot led to this
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great migration. I've talked about this book in our other
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Puerto Rico episodes, but Against All Puerto Ricans is a
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great book on this. But the very short version on
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what led to this great migration is a combination of
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the Great Depression, World War Two, and air travel being
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more accessible. But again, there was a lot of situations
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that led up to a lot of people leaving the island.
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We did talk about it also in the Mustard Gas episode.
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But one of the only jobs available in Puerto Rico
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is the military, something still true today. Perducans joined the
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military the most out of any Hispanic or Latino Latin
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group because it's one of the only things available. Other
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than that there's crime, really like, that's what it seems like. Yeah,
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and so this was true back then, so true today.
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On top of that, you know, there was an explosion
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in jobs in factories and ship docks in the US,
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which made it more lucrative than the jobs available in
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Puerto Rico, which were also dying down because of like
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a lot of reasons. Again that that book talks more
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about it. Most of the people leaving were hibaros aka peasants,
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the people working in the fields, so that also played
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a big role into who was leaving, and wood jobs
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where jobs were available, and so Lolita watched us more
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and more for people left their homeland only to be
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forced into poverty and prejudice in the US, and seeing
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all this, she began to work more within the liberation movement.
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She became an official member of the Puerto Rican National
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Party in nineteen forty six, and she came to develop
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a great admiration for Pedro Albiso Campos, the president of
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the party, which we did talk a little bit more
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about him in the Ponte massacre. There's going to be
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a separate episode on him because there's so much there.
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I feel like deep admiration isn't even enough force to
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cover what she felt of him. It wasn't like, you know, like, oh,
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I'm infatuated, like nothing like that. It was like such