Fronteras: 'History That's Been Written Doesn't Include Everyone' — The History Of The RGV

By Norma Martinez,

Published September 27, 2019 at 9:28 AM CDT

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Boys were prominent instruments of Americanization and offered opportunities for school children to enact patriotic war plays in the 1890s. Sons of several prominent Brownsville families are shown in this photograph.

Courtesy of Brownsville Historical Association, Brownsville TX

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Courtesy of Brownsville Historical Association, Brownsville TX

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Catarino Garza and Concepción González on heir wedding day, 23 May 1890, in San Diego TX. Garza's first wife had successfully sued for divorce from Garza in 1889 in Cameron County.";

Courtesy of the Pérez and Tijerina families.

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Catarino Garza and Concepción González on heir wedding day, 23 May 1890, in San Diego TX. Garza's first wife had successfully sued for divorce from Garza in 1889 in Cameron County.";

Courtesy of the Pérez and Tijerina families.

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Omar Valerio-Jiménez, associate professor of history at the University of Texas at San Antonio, explores the history of the Rio Grande region in his book, “River of Hope: Forging Identity and Nation in the Rio Grande Borderlands.”";s:3

Courtesy of UTSA

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Courtesy of UTSA

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Hateful language directed at people of color has a long, dirty history in the U.S. and along the border.

Mexicans and Mexican Texans living along the border in the 1800s were frequently described as greasers, monsters, demons, bandits, and criminals -- not just by Anglo Americans newly settled on the border but also by journalists who were telling faraway readers about the supposed lawlessness and backwardness of the borderlands. Just being Mexican could get you killed. That’s a fear many Hispanics have today, especially after the Aug. 3 mass shooting in El Paso.

Map of the twin cities along the lower Rio Grande, circa 1850s. Map adapted by William L. Nelson.

Historian Omar Valerio-Jiménez writes about how these stereotypes impacted the residents of the Texas Rio Grande Valley during Spanish colonization, Mexican independence, Texas independence and U.S. statehood. His book is “River of Hope: Forging Identity and Nation in the Rio Grande Borderlands.”

Valerio-Jiménez is a native of the border, born in Matamoros, across from Brownsville. He is an associate professor of history at the University of Texas at San Antonio.

Valerio-Jiménez joins us to talk about how anti-Mexican rhetoric directly affected his family’s immigration story, why the Rio Grande created so many “twin cities” along the border and how the river was a convenient barrier to cross when certain American or Mexican laws weren’t to the liking of 19th century residents of the Valley.

Norma Martinez can be reached by email at norma@tpr.org and on Twitter @NormDog1.

Lauren Terrazas can be reached by email at lauren@tpr.org and on Twitter @terrazas_lauren.