Baldemar velasquez biography
- Baldemar Velasquez was.
- Baldemar Velásquez (born February 15, 1947) is an American labor union activist.
- Born to a family of migrant farmworkers, Velásquez began assisting his parents in the fields picking sugar beets and tomatoes when he was 5 years old.
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Baldemar Velasquez
Template:TOCnestleftBaldemar Velasquez founded the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) in 1967. In 1979, FLOC was formally established as a labor union of farm workers working in the Midwest. Velásquez is the current president, as of March 18, 2010.[1]
Early life
Baldemar Velásquez was born in Pharr, Texas Feb. 15, 1947. His parents were migrant farmworkers, and Velasquez began working in the fields when he was six, picking berries and tomatoes.[2]
Education/honors
Velásquez attended Pan American University in Edinburg, Texas from 1965-66. Ohio Northern University in Ada 1966-67 and from 1967-69 attended Bluffton College, where he graduated with a BA in Sociology. During 1989-90, Velasquez received his degree in Practical Theology. He received his advanced degree in 1991 and was ordained that year as Chaplain to the farmworkers by Rapha Ministries. Two major honors came to Velasquez in 1994 when 29 national Hispanic organizations chose him as the recipient of the Hispanic Heritage Leadership Award. That year he also received Mexic
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Baldemar Velasquez
American labor union activist
Baldemar Velásquez | |
|---|---|
Melvin Rios and Baldemar Velasquez at the Columbus, Ohio, Rally for Immigrants Rights on 2006-03-26. | |
| Born | (1947-02-15) February 15, 1947 (age 77) Pharr, Texas, U.S. |
| Occupation | Labor leader |
| Known for | President, Farm Labor Organizing Committee |
Baldemar Velásquez (born February 15, 1947)[1] is an American labor unionactivist. He co-founded and is president of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, AFL-CIO. He was named a MacArthur Fellow (also known as the "Genius Grant") in 1989, and awarded the Order of the Aztec Eagle in 1994, the highest honor Mexico can bestow on a non-citizen.[2]
Early life and education
Velásquez was born in February 1947 in Pharr, Texas.[3] He was the third of nine children born to Cresencio and Vicenta Castillo Velásquez.[1][4][5] Baldemar's father was born into a Mexican-American family in Driscoll, Texas.[4] His grandfather died when Cresencio was just 11 years old, fo
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National Hispanic Heritage Month Profiles: Baldemar Velásquez
Baldemar Velásquez was born in 1947 in Pharr, Texas, the son of migrant farm workers who were the second generation to work in that field in the United States. By the time he was five years old, Velásquez joined his family picking sugar beets and tomatoes. He used that experience, along with the inspiration of Mahatma Gandhi, César Chávez and Martin Luther King Jr., to pursue a career improving the lives of migrant farm workers.
At the age of 12, he led his first strike, helping migrant workers at his summer job win better wages. After high school, he attended several colleges, graduating from Bluffton College in 1969 with a degree in sociology. He continued working while in college, and in 1967, Velásquez founded the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) with his father. The initial idea behind the committee was to organize farm workers to seek improvements in pay, housing and education for pickers. Soon, Velásquez and FLOC were organizing strikes and other actions to
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