Oral History Collaborations

In this interview, originally conducted in person, Shirley Ancheta speaks with Dr. Steve McKay, a member of the Watsonville is in the Heart team. Shirley describes her father, Julio Ancheta's immigration from the Philippines to Kauai, HI in 1927 to work on the sugar plantations and his subsequent move to California where he worked as a migrant agricultural laborer. She provides an overview of his military service in the First Filipino Regiment during World War II and discusses how Julio met and married a Filipina named Delfina Rivera. She speaks about her family's small farm in Watsonville, her father's career in construction, and his passionate involvement in the AFLO-CIO union. Shirley also shares memories of manong who she came to know by visiting the labor camps and participating in Filipino dances. Throughout the interview, Shirely also speaks about her relationship with her life long partner, Jeff Tagami. She describes how she and Jeff developed their political and intellectual consciousnesses through ethnic studies education as well as through participation in Third World liberation struggles and social justice activism. Additionally, she speaks about her and Jeff's careers as writers, specifically their poetry inspired by their upbringing in Watsonville, stories of the manong, and the histories of working-class people of color in the Pajaro and Salinas Valleys.