Hispanic And Latinx Chatham Residents Honored For Heritage Month

CHATHAM, NJ — National Hispanic Heritage Month runs from Sept. 15 through Oct. 15, with the Chatham Borough Council having recognized achievements of Hispanic Americans with a proclamation, at their last meeting.

Mayor Thaddeus Kobylarz said during its Sept. 27 meeting that it was the borough council’s very first recognition of Hispanic Heritage Month.

As part of the proclamation, Councilman Len Resto, who received the proclamation copy from Kobylarz as a member of the Hispanic and Latinx community, read the various milestones for Hispanic and Latinx Americans.

He said in the 1960s, a “growing awareness” existed, of the multicultural identities of individuals throughout the United States, in conjunction with the Civil Rights movement. As part of that, U.S. Rep. George E. Brown from California, wanted to recognize the contributions of people of Hispanic and Latinx communities. Then-President Lyndon B. Johnson designated the first Hispanic Heritage Week in 1968. It was in 1987, Resto said, when U.S. Rep. Esteban E. Torres, also of California, helped to spearhead the observance time period between Sept. 15 and Oct. 15.

This time period was chosen, Resto added, to “coincide with Independence Day celebrations,” of the homelands for those with Latin American descent.

“American Hispanic and Latinx people have a long history in the United States, from well before the nation was formally established,” Resto said.

Among the significant time periods, he named the 1565 settlement of Spanish Admiral Pedro Menédez de Avilés of “San Agustín," today known as St. Augustine, Florida. Resto mentioned the 1718 establishment of the Alamo in Texas. In 1917, 20,000 residents of Puerto Rico were made American citizens, to help serve in World War I, he said., under then-President Woodrow Wilson, through the Jones-Shafroth Act.

In 1947, a court ruling for the Mendez versus Westminster case, through the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, Resto said, helped to pave the way to desegregation and later the historic Brown versus Board of Education, the Mendez case helping Mexican-American children to enter into California schools.

Cesar Chavez made monumental contributions in the 1960s, to help found the National Farm Workers Association, to protect Latino and Filipino farm workers, Resto also read.

In 2009, Resto said, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor became the first Hispanic Supreme Court Justice and third woman Justice of the Court.

Resto said this recognition touched him personally, as well as having been honored to have read it into the record. Having moved to Chatham 26 years ago, he believed he was then “the only Hispanic in town.”

“I was accepted by everyone [in Chatham] and we’ve seen an increase in diversity,” Resto added.

He says he’s also witnessed that diversity in the food distribution line, volunteering his time with the food pantry in Chatham.

“I think this [proclamation] recognizes the importance of the contributions made by Hispanic Americans,” he said. “We certainly have a good number of our work force in the borough that is of Hispanic heritage.”

“I am sure they are equally proud of being recognized,” Resto said.

Watch the presentation in the video below:

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