David Montejano

“The failure of memory, then is as much sociological as it is historical.”
― David Montejano, Anglos and Mexicans in the Making of Texas, 1836-1986

“In Corpus Christi, where the American high school accommodated a few Mexicans, Mexican students spoke bitterly about hazing and wanted a separate high school. In Dimmit County, many parents, both Anglo and Mexican, believed that separation was necessary to keep the peace, that separation avoided fighting. And some school officials in both Dimmit and Nueces frankly attributed the low attendance of Mexican children to the antagonism they encountered from Anglo students and teachers. Such antagonism, not surprisingly, often relied on the lessons learned from Texas history. One Texas Mexican recalled that “when we were told of the Alamo in school, some of the Mexicans stayed away from school and some never returned.”38 On and off the school grounds, schoolchildren and their parents often seemed to be re-enacting the battles of Texas history. The calls to war were not for the prizes of land or markets but for the prizes of honor, privilege, and purity. Thus, Anglo girls were protected aggressively from Mexican boys. Suspicion of any touch invited immediate and serious retribution.39 The Mexican consul stationed in El Paso described a case in this connection: “A seven-year-old American girl stumbled and cut her face. The mother asked, ‘Did the Mexican boy hit you?’ The child replied yes, although this was not true. The result was that the Mexican mother was injured by [omission in manuscript], who also shot her two sons in alleged self-defense. These sons were American-born Mexicans.”40 The actions of Anglo children and their parents were, of course, understandable in the context of local norms and practices; they were normal. Mexicans were untouchable inferiors, and disciplining those who stepped out of place was no offense.”
― David Montejano, Anglos and Mexicans in the Making of Texas, 1836–1986