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Cesar Chavez was born
Cesar was born in Arizona and lived there until he was 11. -
Cesar lived in Arizona with his family
During the years 1927-1938 Cesar lived with his grandparents, siblings and parents in a small farm. They raised chickens and grew their own crops but it was still hard for them to eke out a living. -
Cesar and his family became migrant workers in California
By the year 1938, the Chavez family went broke. To survive, the family had to leave their home and find a job. They traveled from place to place, following the California crops. -
The dismal life of a migrant worker
The Chavez family was living in wretched cabins at the labor camps. The vile conditions were very unsanitary and many tragically lost their lives. The working conditions were terrible. They worked with dangerous equipment and deadly chemicals. And growers were still refusing to pay migrant workers fair wages. -
Cesar's impacted education
During 1938-1942, Cesar attended to more than 30 schools during the ages of 11-15. He dropped out of school in 8th grade because of his fathers' accident and had to support his family at work. -
Cesar gets married
At the age of 21 Cesar got married to a women named Helen. Later on Cesar became a father of eight kids. -
Cesar had his first steady Job
After working in the fields, Cesar was able to find a modest job and became a staff member at the Community Service Organization. The organization's purpose was to protect the civil rights of Mexican Americans. -
Cesar resigns to the CSO to continue his fight!
Cesar had about enough of the injustice towards migrant workers. He even stopped working at the one job that provided him with good stake. He wanted to dedicate his life to fight for migrants' rights, and because of that he had to sacrifice many belongings. -
Seeking for support
In the beginning of the year 1962 Cesar had traveled 15,000 miles seeking for workers with the intention of fighting for justice. In 1965 his union was officially founded and named United Farm Workers. -
Striking the growers
Together Cesar's union accompanied with the public's support, boycotted the grapes and protested. The event would end until the growers negotiated with the union. -
The union was losing hope
Cesar was a peaceful person and never used violence, until the members were tired of the farmers not listening to them. They were thinking about on killing one of the farmers. Before things got out of hand, on December of 1967, Cesar went on a fast that lasted 25 days until January of 1968. As a result, the members were reunited and they were more committed on making a change without violence. -
Farmers succumbed and agreed for change
The growers had finally succumbed and were obligated to accept the migrants. The farmers signed the first union contracts with the workers and justice was made for Mexican American migrants. -
Grape growers were still not backing down
Cesar's feud with the grape growers wasn't over yet. In fall of October 1970, the farmers were starting to get aggressive and had sprayed pesticides on the strikers. -
Cesar Chavez's death
Cesar Chavez is recognized as an non-violent activist that fought for the rights of Mexican American Migrant workers. Overall, he had reached his goal in improving wages and working conditions for migrant workers. Cesar Estrada Chavez peacefully passed away in his sleep on April 23, 1993 at age of 66 near Yuma, Arizona, a short distance from the small family farm where he was born.
