TX

By Carrie Nelson

Manuela Ontiveros dedicated her life to her family and community and to preserving her treasured Mexican heritage and traditions.

"You instill in your children and grandchildren pride [in their heritage]," Ontiveros said. "Even though my grandchildren are half white, they know how to cook enchiladas and tamales.

"I try to pass on the traditions of the Mexican people, traditions that they have nothing to be ashamed of," she said.

"I'm 81 years old, so I've seen a lot," Ontiveros said. "I'm glad I grew up in this community."

By Caren Panzer

Arnif G. Nerio felt his life was really coming together in the fall of 1942. While so many were still out of work, he’d just landed a job at General Motors in Saginaw, Mich.

Just three months earlier, he’d married Trinidad Ayala, and they were expecting a child.

When he was drafted into the U.S. Army on Dec. 4, 1942, his life changed.

Nerio pleaded with the officials to let him wait until his daughter was born. The Army assured him that his family would be taken care of and shipped him to Little Rock, Ark., for basic training. He was 20.

By Allison Baxter

Dan Muñoz, Sr. grew up in the small community of San Fernando, Calif., a town that was segregated by race. At that time, he couldn’t even go to the white part of town after dark to go to a movie house without the fear of being arrested. Today, he’s the publisher of La Prensa San Diego, a newspaper that allows his words to be read by nearly 35,000 readers every week.

By Sarah Adams

Luis Martinez has had a hand in history.

He participated in one of the more famous New Deal projects, witnessed D-Day from the English shores and attended Gen. George S. Patton's funeral. But what he remembers most as a World War II veteran is meeting a young woman in the British Women's Auxiliary Territorial Service and falling in love.

By Christopher Trout

At home in Houston in the 1940s, Johnnie Martinez was a well-known entertainer. He eventually would own a nightclub, lead his own big band, the Johnnie Martinez Band, and even own his own record label, Alameda.

But during World War II, circumstances were different.

By Ernie Carrido

Jose M. Lopez is one of the 12 Latino World War II veterans to have received the Congressional Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military accolade. He had a difficult childhood, but maintained a fervent belief in the Virgen de Guadalupe, the patron saint of Mexico.

Lopez's father died in the Mexican Revolution; his mother eight, years later, when he was eight. Lopez never went to school, but worked in the cotton fields to help support himself.

By Joanna Watson

Although Joel Hernandez enlisted in the Army only because he couldn't find a job, he looks back on his military service as a blessing that enabled him to lead a fulfilling life.

The son of Mexican Revolution veteran Candelario Castillo Hernandez and Manuela Mendez Ramirez, Hernandez was born July 27, 1917, in Mackay, Texas, the oldest of seven children.

Looking back, Hernandez says his family was poor, and everyone had to constantly work hard.

By Connor Higgins

Agusti¬n Louis Hernandez's life has been one of service: to his country as an engineer/gunner on a B-24, to his community as a firefighter and lawman for 37 years, and to his family as a husband and father.

And as a retiree in Houston at the age of 81, he still struggles today with what is right and what is wrong in war and how it squares with his religious beliefs.

By Christa Desimone

She remembers the telephone call like it was yesterday. A man had rushed into the office where she was working in May of 1946, yelling to her that she had a phone call waiting for her across the street.

Victoria Partida dashed to the phone and heard the voice of the man from whom she’d been waiting to hear for two long years. It was her fiancé, Luis Guerrero, who’d been at war in the South Pacific. He said the words she’d long wanted to hear.

By Christine Pev

On Dec. 7, 1941, 20-year-old Pablo Gonzales heard on the radio in his hometown of Sabinal, Texas, that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor, and he immediately wanted to enlist in the military to help defend his country.

His mother, Julia Bocanegra Gonzales, wasn’t pleased. The second of 10 children and the oldest son, he was a significant contributor to the family’s income. Ever since Gonzales and his father, Rafael Gonzales, had worked together on a job mending fences and cutting cedar, they’d labored as a team.