Links and Study Guide – Weaving The Past: Journey of Discovery

Read more about Mexican anarchists, Mexican culture & history, U.S. border states history and the people who contributed to this project:

Books by Ward S. Albro

To Die on Your Feet: The Life Times and Writing of Praxedis Guerrero by Ward S. Albro -Texas Christian University Press, 1996. Wonderful historical biography on Praxedis Guerrero; poet and passionate advocate of human rights. One of Mexico’s true heroic figures.

Always A Rebel: Ricardo Flores Magon and the Mexican Revolution by Ward S. Albro – Texas Christian University Press, 2003. Compelling study of Ricardo Flores Magon and the Partido Liberal Mexicano (PLM) activities in Mexico and the U.S. Southwest.

Day of the Dead: Dia de Muertos by Denis Defibaugh and Ward S. Albro – Texas Christian University Press, 2007. Gorgeous photographic images of this Mexican tradition of honoring the ancestors. With intriguing commentary by Ward S. Albro.

Books on Mexican History

Mexico: A Brief History by Alicia Hernandez Chavez – UC Press, 2006. An excellent and highly readable presentation of Mexico’s turbulent and exraordinary history by one of Mexico’s most respected historians. (English language edition).

Mexico: Biography of Power by Enrique Krauze – Harper Perennial Edition, 1998. Focuses on important and intriguing Mexican figures who changed the course of Mexican history. Reads almost like a novel.

Zapata and the Mexican Revolution by John Womack Jr. – Vintage Books, 1970. This definitive study of the great revolutionary leader written by an outstanding Harvard historian.

Villa and Zapata: A History of the Mexican Revolution by Frank McLynn – Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2000. This stirring book recounts the rise and fall of Mexico’s most famous revolutionaries.

Books on U.S./Mexico Border History & Chicano Studies

The U.S. – Mexican War by Carol and Thomas Christensen – Bay Books, 1998. Beautifully Illustrated and well researched companion volume to the eye-opening and compelling four hour PBS documentary, “The U.S.-Mexican War, 1846-1848,” which accurately depicts the dark and tragic episode in which the United States invaded Mexico and ended up taking half of it’s territory.

Whitewashed Adobe: The Rise of Los Angeles and the Remaking of Its Mexican Past by William Deverell – UC Press, 2004. This is a must read book that exposes how the history of Los Angeles’ Mexican origins and the travails of its continuing Mexican culture have been hidden by racial deceits and omissions. Well-documented and highly readable.

El Pueblo: The Historic Heart of Los Angeles by Jean Bruce Poole and Tevvy Ball – Getty Publications, 2002. Recounts with wonderful illustrations and photos the story of “El Pueblo de Los Angeles” – the birthplace of the city of Los Angeles. El Pueblo is one of’ Southern California’s most enduring and complex cultural symbols.

Roots of Chicano Politics, 1600-1940 by Juan Gomez-Quinones – University of New Mexico Press, 1994. Sweeping synthesis reinterprets from the Mexican perspective the history of the United States borderlands (the lands once belonging to New Spain, and then Mexico: Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, California, Nevada and Utah, and parts of Colorado and Wyoming).

The Mexican Outsiders: A Community History of Marginalization and Discrimination in California by Martha Menchaca – University of Texas Press, 1995. A well-researched study of the history of racism and discrimination of Mexicans and Mexican- Americans within the microcosm of a small rural town in the U.S. southwest – Santa Paula, California.

Mexican American Labor, 1790-1990 by Juan Gomez-Quinones – University of New Mexico Press, 1994. A ground-breaking study that documents two centuries of the exploitation of Mexican American workers within the United States, and the history of their attempts to redress economic, ethnic and gender inequality. Dr. Gomez-Quinones is a venerable historian at UCLA.

Chicanos in a Changing Society: From Mexican Pueblos to American Barrios in Santa Barbara and Southern California by Albert Camarillo – Southern Methodist University Press, 2005.

Chicanos in California: A History of Mexican Americans in California by Albert Camarillo – Materials for Today’s Learning Inc., Nevada, 1990.

Fit to be Citizens: Public Health and Race in Los Angeles, 1879-1940 by Natalia Molina – University of California Press, 2006.

California Vieja: Culture and Memory in a Modern American Place by Phoebe S. Kropp – University of California Press, 2006.

Street Meeting: Multiethnic Neighborhoods in Early Twentieth Century Los Angeles by Mark Wild – University of California Press, 2005.

Becoming Mexican American: Ethnicity and Culture and Identity in Chicano Los Angeles, 1900-1945 by George J. Sanchez – Oxford University Press, 1993.

Books on the History of Methodism

Wesley and the People Called Methodists by Richard P. Heitzenrater – Abingdon Press, 1995. Important study of John Wesley’s relation to the dynamics of the religious movement that he set into motion. Heitzenrater is Professor of Church History and Wesley Studies at the Divinity School, Duke University.

Mexican & Border Culture, Art & Music Links

Ward Albro’s Mexico Tours
Michael Heralda
Catalina Delgado Trunk
Shelley Morrison
Lila Downs
El Pueblo Historical Monument

Los Angeles History Documentary Project

Whitewashed Adobe: The Rise of Los Angeles – Walter Dominguez’s ground breaking documentary project that examines the cultural and ethnic interactions that transformed Los Angeles from a small Mexican pueblo to a major American and world metropolis. Based on the acclaimed book Whitewashed Adobe: The Rise of Los Angeles and the Remaking of its Mexican Past by William Deverell.