From September 15 to October 15, National Hispanic Heritage Month aims to shine a light on Latino and Hispanic cultures and pay tribute to the generations of people who helped build and shape America as a nation.
Beginning in 1968 with President Lyndon B. Johnson as Hispanic Heritage Week, it was later extended to a full month by President Ronald Reagan in 1988. Since then, it has raised awareness and celebrated Hispanic and Latino Americans and it can now be seen being observed in communities that have never observed it before.
Thelma Castillo moderated the Hispanic American Heritage Celebration and is the CEO/President of the Blue Water Area Chamber of Commerce. In Port Huron, according to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a Hispanic population of about 1,800 people, or 6.2% of the community’s nearly 29,000 residents. Through the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion led by Haran Stanley and Jessica Brown, St. Louis County Community College Clair (SC4) is working to spread awareness about these cultures and those who are often marginalized in society.
SC4 recently held its inaugural celebration of Hispanic American Heritage at the Fine Arts Theater on October 7th. Thelma Castillo, CEO/President of the Blue Water Area Chamber of Commerce, moderated the event that featured live music from Detroit’s Latin jazz band PanaMO, Latin American food prepared by Doña Marina’s LLC, and a panel of local individuals who shared about the culture and their experience of being Hispanic in America.
Heather Fagan, owner of Doña Marina’s LLC, was one of the panelists at the event. A Nicaraguan-American, Fagan was born on a US Navy base and raised in Miami, Florida until age 10, when she and her family moved to Michigan. Today the Port Huron resident is President and Co-Founder of the Seed & Soul Society, a local nonprofit that empowers local communities toward sustainable agriculture and mutual growth.
Heather Fagan is the owner of Doña Marina’s LLC as well as President and Co-Founder of Seed & Soul Society.
As a first-generation U.S.-born Nicaraguan, Fagan says her family’s move was due to hard times in their country.
“My family moved here during the Sandinista regime to make a better life for themselves,” she says. “My mom and dad met in California and the rest is history.”
When it comes to race relations and how the Latino community is viewed in the U.S., Fagan believes that much of the hatred or intolerance stems from ignorance and racial propaganda.
“We’ve often heard the narrative that immigrants are here to hurt us, or other things that are not true and harmful to how our people are perceived in this country,” she says. “It’s fearmongering, which paints a lot of really good people here with good intentions in an unpleasant light, and that’s not fair. I believe that race relations are improving, there is still a lot of work to be done, but we need to overcome the stereotypes painted by the media.”
One of her favorite aspects of her culture is the close family dynamic.
“I loved the holidays when I was little,” says Fagan. “Everyone would wear their best clothes and we’d have these big parties with people dancing and listening to music, but you always had to eat dinner beforehand because we wouldn’t eat until eleven or twelve at night because of all holidays.”
Maggie Toole, Business Development Officer for Michigan Women Forward, was another panel speaker during SC4’s Hispanic American Heritage Celebration. A resident of Burtchville Township, Toole is very active in the community and serves on the Business Education Committee of the Blue Water Chamber of Commerce.
Second generation born, Toole identifies as 100% Mexican with all of her grandparents originating from Mexico. Raised in Port Huron, Toole also spent time in northern Florida for a short period during her childhood years.
Maggie Toole is the Business Development Officer for Michigan Women Forward.
“I went through a lot of racism living in Florida,” she says. “There were some places where we could not stop or visit, such as certain gas stations or parts of the city because of the color of the skin”.
Many of the panelists talked about these kinds of experiences from which our community is not exempt. When it comes to her own experience, Toole says she experienced obstacles not only from those outside her own culture, but also within the Hispanic and Latino communities against them.
“My father did not teach us the language [Spanish] with the goal of preventing us from becoming isolated and being able to assimilate into society and protect us from the racism that they had experienced while living here,” she says. “Many of us in the Hispanic culture were raised this way and although they meant well, it causes some of our family members to disown us or treat us differently because we don’t have strong cultural influences or because we don’t speak our language. mother tongue.”
Toole says she loves her culture, especially the close-knit family structure. One of her favorite celebrations is Día de los Muertos, commonly known as Day of the Dead. During the two-day Mexican holiday, families honor their loved ones who have passed away in a celebration of life highlighted by costumes, parades and food.
“It instilled feelings of pride and love for my culture by hearing all the stories and experiences our panel shared,” says Castillo, a Mexican-American and Croswell resident. “The way to get rid of discrimination and ignorance is through education and sharing our experiences with others who may not be aware of certain aspects of our culture. Although we are considered a minority, we are just regular people like you who love our families, contribute to society and want the best for our neighbors.”
