This Orlando basketball shirt was collected in a remote part of the Sonoran Desert near the Mexican border. The past 20 years has seen a rise in unauthorized border crossing, border enforcement procedures, and debates about who and how migrants should be let into the country.
As the US federal immigration enforcement strategy known as Prevention Through Deterrence (PTD) increased the security presence around urban ports of entry in the mid-1990s, there was a shift in undocumented migration towards more remote regions of the American Southwest. Those making the perilous journey through this inhospitable desert landscape faced extreme temperatures (summer temperatures as high as 100° F/38° C and winter temperatures approaching freezing), rugged terrain, abuse from coyotes (human smugglers), and the risk of getting caught by the Border Patrol.
The site this was found most likely served as a way station used by human smugglers or a site of Border Patrol apprehension. Typical items found at these sites include personal hygiene products such as this comb, as well as backpacks, excess clothes, as well as empty water bottles.
Sr. Reynaldo Robledo, now a landholder and winemaker in Sonoma, began his career in the industry through the bracero program, migrating to Napa from Michoacán in the 1960s.
The stool was made in Mexico about 2000 and is part of a larger set of furniture used in the Robledo Family Winery tasting room, a winery started in 1990 in Sonoma, CA. The Robledo Winery is one of only a handful of Mexican-American owned wineries in California. The back is carved with the Robledo Family Winery crest—a horseshoe and grape motif that blends the family’s cattle ranching beginnings in Mexico with its more recent identity as wine growers and producers. The winery setting evokes a hacienda from Mexico, a style unlike others in the area.
Hector Aguilar, trusted journalist and senior anchor at WNJU in New Jersey wore this jacket. Aguilar, a Cuban refugee who migrated to the United States in the 1960s, worked in broadcasting from an early age and made a career in radio and television. He chose stylish but formal clothing to signal his respect for the news and his audiences; he took both seriously and became a respected personality that viewers turned to for the news.
His daughter, Margarita Aguilar noted that he was “very fashion conscious and liked fabrics like tweed, pure wools and other natural fibers. He also admired great tailoring and fine design. He never wore a suit but well-tailored jackets such as this one ... with made-to-order pants from his tailor.”
In the 1950s, consumers made television the centerpiece of the home, fueling competition among broadcasters to create new products, new programming, new stations, and even new networks. Innovators, such as those behind the creation of independent Spanish-language stations and eventually the Spanish International Network (SIN), challenged established broadcasting companies by creating new programming in Spanish and catering to underserved audiences. Established in the early 1960s, SIN knit together independents and created new stations to serve a national audience. With a complex business and legal history, SIN eventually became Univision in the 1980s. In the decades after 1980, Spanish-language programing options grew with recognition of Latinx communities as powerful consumer groups and the advent of new broadcasting technologies such as cable and digital TV.
Description (Spanish)
Héctor Aguilar, periodista de renombre y presentador principal de WNJU en Nueva Jersey uso esta chaqueta. Aguilar, refugiado cubano que emigró a Estados Unidos en la década de 1960, comenzó a trabajar en radiodifusión desde temprana edad e hizo carrera en la radio y la televisión. Eligió ropa elegante y formal, para manifestar respeto por las noticias y por su audiencia; se dedicó con seriedad a ambos y se convirtió en una personalidad respetada a la que los espectadores acudían para mantenerse informados.
Su hija, Margarita Aguilar, señaló que él era “muy consciente de la moda y le gustaban las telas como tweed, las lanas puras y otras fibras naturales. También admiraba la gran sastrería y el diseño fino. Nunca vestía de traje, pero sí usaba chaquetas bien confeccionadas como esta ... con pantalones hechos a medida por su sastre ".
En la década de 1950, los consumidores hicieron de la televisión un componente central de sus hogares, fomentando la competencia entre las difusoras para crear nuevos productos, nueva programación, nuevas estaciones, e incluso nuevas redes. Los innovadores, como los creadores de los canales independientes de habla hispana y el Spanish International Network (SIN), desafiaron a las emisoras establecidas creando nuevos programas en español centradas en audiencias históricamente ignoradas. Establecido a principios de los sesenta, SIN unió a difusoras independentes y creó nuevas estaciones para responder a una audiencia nacional. Tras una compleja trayectoria empresarial y legal, SIN se convertiría en Univisión en la década de 1980. Durante las próximas décadas, las opciones de programación en español crecieron gracias al reconocimiento de la comunidad Latinx, como poderoso grupo de consumidores, y a la introducción de nuevas tecnologías de difusión, como el cable y la televisión digital.
A plastic gallon water bottle with blue cap and burlap cover. The burlap is tied at the bottom. This bottle was collected in a remote part of the Sonoran Desert near the Mexican border. The past 20 years has seen a rise in unauthorized border crossing, border enforcement procedures, and debates about who and how migrants should be let into the country.
As the US federal immigration enforcement strategy known as Prevention Through Deterrence (PTD) increased the security presence around urban ports of entry in the mid-1990s, there was a shift in undocumented migration towards more remote regions of the American Southwest. Those making the perilous journey through this inhospitable desert landscape faced extreme temperatures (summer temperatures as high as 100° F/38° C and winter temperatures approaching freezing), rugged terrain, abuse from coyotes (human smugglers), and the risk of getting caught by the Border Patrol.
The site where this was found likely served as a way station used by human smugglers or a site of Border Patrol apprehension. Typical items found at these sites include personal hygiene products such as combs, backpacks, excess clothes, and empty water bottles. In preparation for the journey across the desert, migrants packed items necessary for survival, including plastic water bottles like this one to hold drinking water. Migrants often modified these bottles with cloth/fabric covers to make carrying them easier or to camouflage them to prevent detection by the authorities. Migrants often carried no more than two gallons of water and many reported extreme dehydration and hyperthermia as a result of the lack of drinking water. Along the way, many resorted to drinking water from bacteria-laden cattle tanks for survival.
