Washington County Oral Histories

Isabelle and Raphael Mendoza oral history recording Part 1

Part 1 of an audio recording of an oral history of Isabelle and Raphael Mendoza. Recording sounds a bit distorted. Rafael was born in Michoacan, Mexico in 1958 and shares memories of poverty during his childhood. He describes his father coming and going between US and Mexico to do farm/field work. Rafael's first arrival to the U.S was to Stockton, CA where he then migrated to North Plains, OR to work at Jerry Stenker's camp. He shares his devastation in not finishing school to focus on work. Rafael met his wife, Isabel, in 1977. He shares how he and Isabel started their own business. Isabel was born in Wyoming in 1957. Her parents separated and they moved to Mora, New Mexico in 1962 with her mother's family. She shares fond memories of helping out with her family business as a child, as well as helping clean homes for people. She moved to Oregon in 1975. At minutes 29:49 she talks about the SETA program that helped her family find a job, which cemented their stay in Oregon. She describes her experience working at a mink farm as well as her experiences working at Washington County Community Action. Isabel shares how she and Rafael met, cultural differences between the two, and they both go into further detail starting their business in 1982 - which included constant travel to and from California. There is a transcript of Part 1.

Mendoza, Isabelle

Mendoza, Raphael

Latino Oral History collection

Washington County (Or.) -- History

Hispanic Americans -- History

Washington County (Or.)

1 sound file (1 hr., 6 min.)

English

WCM_OH_407a

In Copyright

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Five Oaks Museum

O'Rourke, Michael

MP3

Sound