Get TPR's best stories of the day and a jump start to the weekend with the 321 Newsletter — straight to your inbox every day. Sign up for it here.
Google honored San Antonio media innovator Raoul A. Cortez on his 118th birthday with a Google Doodle.
Tuesday's honor turned the usual web engine search field into an artistic design featuring Cortez, a guitar singer, a classic microphone and television, and a scene of people assisting others.
Cortez founded KCOR, the first Spanish language radio station, in 1946. In 1955, he built the first Spanish language television station in the U.S. He later created Univision, the first Spanish language network in the U.S.
Guillermo Nicolas, Cortez' grandson, said that Cortez "was absolutely the American success story.”
“He came from Veracruz, Mexico, to Laredo and Laredo to San Antonio at the turn of the 20th century,” Nicolas explained. “And all he saw was great opportunity.”
Cortez worked for La Prensa, the city’s Spanish language newspaper, and then moved to producing Spanish content for the KMAC radio station.
Today's #GoogleDoodle honors Mexican American media pioneer who was the first to create Spanish radio and tv stations in the United States — Raoul A. Cortez!
— Google Doodles (@GoogleDoodles) October 17, 2023
Tune into his story —> https://t.co/uUSi607Rvn pic.twitter.com/ut94n31vDE
“He would produce a Spanish language music hour. And he also started to promote African-American music,” Nicolas said. “So he was very multicultural, and he was really a maverick in his industry.”
By the 1950s, he pitched the idea for Univision. But it wasn't easy.
“We as San Antonians gave it such little importance that ‘it’ left and went to Miami,” Nicolas explained. “And now Miami is host to both Telemundo and Univision when San Antonio had that original opportunity.”
Before Cortez, his grandson explained, Spanish-speaking people didn’t really exist on U.S. radio and TV.
“They weren't served at all until he came along and had the vision ... to do it,” Nicolas said. “Because, honestly, I couldn't even imagine doing something like that in today's world, much less in a world where he was turned away at fine restaurants because he was a little too dark.”
Cortez turned his media accomplishments into influence in the worlds of civil rights and politics.
“He was twice president of LULAC," Nicolas said, "and on a national scale. And he brokered the Bracero program between President Truman and President Aleman of Mexico."
Cortez died in 1971.
