Background Information about the Bracero Program
A brief overview of the Bracero program that allowed Mexican agricultural workers to enter the U.S. legally to work as farm laborers.
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
Adapted from Richard B. Craig, <em>The Bracero Program</em>, (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1971; Marcelo M. Suarez-Orozco, ed., <em>Crossings: Mexican Immigration in Interdisciplinary Perspectives</em>, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998); and Carlos Martenes, "The Mexican Braceros," <em>The Farmworkers Website,</em>, http://www.farmworkers.org/benglish.html.
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
2008
Copyright American Social History Project/Center for Media and LearningÂ
<div><a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/"></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License</a>.</div>
English
Article/Essay
A Mexican Bracero's Identification Card
Work
Between 1942 and 1964, millions of Mexican agricultural workers entered the U.S. to work as surplus farm laborers during the government-sponsored Bracero Program. Working for lower wages than domestic farm workers, the Braceros were often victims of discrimination. While most were repatriated, many stayed in the United States where they remain the often-overlooked forefathers of later waves of migratory workers.
Santos Nunez Sotelo
Santos Nunez Sotelo, "Identification Card," in Bracero History Archive, Item #516, http://braceroarchive.org/items/show/516 (accessed 10 March 2010).
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
1955
English
Artifact
Postwar America (1946-1975)
Young Mexican and African-American Men Answer the Call for Farm Workers
Immigration and Migration
Work
The scale of the United States' war production effort during World War II touched every corner of the nation and millions of people. When traditional farm workers left for military service or higher paying jobs in war industries, the U.S. government looked south to Mexico. Several thousands braceros were invited to work in the United States, primarily in agriculture. This photograph of braceros in Texas cotton country, though, shows that in some places African Americans (especially men who were too young to join the army) worked alongside Mexican laborers. A bracero later recalled that harvesting cotton was the hardest work of all; one bracero corridista sang, "But I too came to pick cotton / and they have to pay me / for each hundred pounds a dollar / You can see I am quite skinny / From lack of food to eat."
John Vachon
John Vachon, "Corpus Christi, Texas. Mexican and Negro farm labor," Farm Security Administration-Office of War Information (Library of Congress), May 1943.
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
1943
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)
"Corrido of the Uprooted Ones"
Immigration and Migration
Work
Between 1942 and 1964, 4.6 million Mexicans came to the United States to perform the much needed but incredibly difficult "stoop work" of planting, tending, and harvesting crops. These men, called braceros, were initially invited by the United States government during World War II, when higher-paying industrial factory jobs lured away existing agricultural workers. Life for braceros was hard owing to the backbreaking labor they performed, the distance from loved ones, and the prejudices they encountered. Braceros often sang of their troubles in corridos, traditional Mexican folk songs.
Arnulfo Castillo
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
1942
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)
Themes and Formulas of Corridos
This handout describes the themes and formulas of corridos, Mexican and Mexican-American folk songs.
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning, 2010.
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
2010
Copyright American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
<div><a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/"></a><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License</a>.</div>
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)
<em>Spanish for Farmers</em>
Immigration and Migration
Braceros traveled to a country where they did not know the language or the customs. In order to help them understand their new surroundings, local committees prepared Spanish-English phrasebooks such as the one pictured below. This handbook instructs braceros to walk on the left side of the street, not to stand in the back of the trucks, and to be careful with cigarettes around gasoline. The words and phrases the authors found necessary to include are instructive of the kinds of dangers and work braceros encountered.
Samuel R. Skaggs and Amelia Montes Skaggs
Samuel R. Skaggs and Amelia Montes Skaggs, <em>Manual práctico de Inglés para los braceros (Spanish for farmers)</em>, Las Cruces (New Mexico) <em>Citizen</em>, c. 1953, courtesy the Southwest Collection of the New Mexico State Library.
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
1953 (Circa)
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)
<em>Nos creemos americanos:</em> Braceros in History and Song
Immigration and Migration
Work
In this activity students write original <em>corridos</em> (a type of Mexican folk song) based on the oral histories of braceros. Before writing their own <em>corridos</em>, students learn about the formulas and themes of <em>corridos</em> and analyze a World War II-era corrido. This lesson works best if students have basic background information on the bracero program.
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning, 2010.
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
2010
Copyright American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
<div><br />This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License</a>.</div>
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)
A Bracero's Identification Card Certifies He Is Ready to Work
Immigration and Migration
Work
Aaron Castañeda Gamez and thousands of other Mexican workers had to pass a series of examinations to enter the bracero program. Recruits reported to centers in Mexico where they were inspected for lice and disease. Braceros' hands were inspected to see if they had calluses, indicating they were familiar with manual labor. They were told to disrobe and were then sprayed with the pesticide DDT. The processing stage lasted for several days, most of which were spent standing in line. Finally, if the man passed all the exams, he was given an identification card that certified his acceptance in the program. This card notes that Castañeda was to perform "railroad track labor only" and, like all braceros, was exempt from the wartime requirement of registering for the draft.
Unknown
Aaron Castañeda Gamez, "Identification Card," 10 April 1944, in <em>Bracero History Archive</em>, Item #512, http://braceroarchive.org/items/show/512 (accessed 21 January 2010).
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
1944
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)
Two Braceros Harvest Potatoes
Work
The majority of braceros who came to the United States performed the most difficult types of agricultural labor: planting, tending, and harvesting crops. This type of work was called "stoop work" because it required laborers to spend all day bent over. Even during the worst years of the Great Depression, growers had a hard time finding people willing to do stoop work. The two men in this photo wear distinctive specialized clothing for their task: wide-brimmed hats to protect from the sun, heavy leather gloves, durable jeans, and picking belts for collecting harvested produce.
Unknown
Unnamed photograph, circa 1942-1964, Oregon State University Archives, http://oregondigital.org/u?/bracero,133; accessed from <em>The Braceros: The Emergency Farm Labor Supply Program</em>, http://www.opb.org/programs/oregonexperiencearchive/braceros/life.php, 21 January 2010.
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
1943
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)
A Bracero Compares Expectations versus Reality of Life in the United States
Immigration and Migration
Work
José Francisco Delgado Soto traveled extensively around the United States as a bracero. He worked in Michigan, California, Washington, and Texas picking apples, cherries, corn, eggplants, lettuce, pears, pumpkins, and sugar beets. He describes what Mexicans hoped to find in the United States and contrasts that with the often difficult labor and loneliness of bracero life. This interview was translated from the original Spanish.
Bracero History Archive
Violeta DomÃnguez, "José Francisco Delgado Soto," in Bracero History Archive, Item #126, http://braceroarchive.org/items/show/126 (accessed 26 January 2010), translated by Tony Paulino.
American Social History Project / Center for Media and Learning
2002
English
Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945)