Oral History Transcript - Soila and Linda Rodriguez - January 23, 2008
Interview with Soila and Linda Rodriguez
Interviewer: Barbara Thibodeaux
Date of Interview: January 23, 2008
Location: San Marcos, Texas
_____________________
Interviewees:
Soila Rodriguez – Mrs. Rodriguez is a long-time resident of San Marcos and a graduate of Texas State University with a BA in Spanish (1951) and an M.Ed in Counseling and Guidance (1955). She was the first director of Upward Bound at Texas State University, the Assistant Principal at San Marcos High School, and Principal at Lamar Intermediate School. Mrs. Rodriguez served as a board member of LBJ Museum-San Marcos and Hispanic Historical Committee. Soila Rodriguez was married to Richard Rodriguez, formerly with the Gary Job Corps Center. Both Mr. and Mrs. Rodriguez were active in community and local political activities.
Linda Rodriguez, daughter of Soila and Richard Rodriguez, is a Hays County Court at Law Judge and a board member of LBJ Museum-San Marcos.
Topics: Texas State University (Southwest Texas), Upward Bound, San Marcos CISD, Gary Job Corps Center, Support for LBJ campaign in South Texas.
(This transcript has been edited for nonessential words and conversation for the sake of clarity.)
BARBARA THIBODEAUX: This recording is part of the LBJ Centennial Celebration Oral History Project sponsored by Texas State University. Today is Wednesday, January 23, 2008. My name is Barbara Thibodeaux. I am interviewing Soila Rodriguez in San Marcos, Texas. [Linda Rodriguez also participated in this interview].
Mrs. Rodriguez, even though you have agreed to the terms and conditions of the release pertaining to this interview, will you also verbally acknowledge your acceptance with a yes or no.
SOILA RODRIGUEZ.: Yes.
THIBODEAUX: Thank you very much. I really didn’t have a lot of background information. If you could start out with some background on you and your husband. Were you born and raised in San Marcos?
SOILA R.: No, I was born in the Valley in Pharr, Texas. I came to school here in San Marcos because my mother liked LBJ. She liked everything about him and she said LBJ had come to school here, and so that it would be nice if I came over here. Well I started out at A and I in Kingsville, and I didn’t like it. (laughs) So then Mother said, “Well let’s try San Marcos.” So I came here in 19…
LINDA R.: When you went to school it was1940.
SOILA R.: 40…
LINDA RODRIGUEZ: Trying to remember. ’49?
SOILA R.: ’40, no, we got married in ’49, ’45. Then I got a job teaching because…
LINDA R.: Talk about how you met Dad.
SOILA R.: Huh?
LINDA R.: You might want to talk about how you met Dad.
SOILA R.: Well, yes. (laughs) The first day I got here, he and his friends had gone to see the new crop of girls coming to the college. (laughs) So I met him that first day I was here. And then, of course, two years later we got married.
But I started teaching without a degree because it was during the war and all the men were gone so they hired me to teach. So I was teaching over there in the Valley, and then I would come over here in the summer and I got my degree and my masters. Then we got married in ’49 and we lived there for eight years and then we moved.
LINDA R.: Went where?
SOILA R.: In the Valley.
LINDA R.: Okay.
SOILA R.: And then we moved over here because my husband was offered a job at Gary Job Corps. Then when I was here, one of the teachers at Southwest Texas called me and said they needed somebody to work in the scholarship office. So I worked there two years and then the superintendent that was here, that came over here, was a superintendent in the Valley were I went to school. So he called me one day and he said he needed a Spanish teacher, and he knew that I had majored in Spanish. I taught three months at the high school here. Then they made me assistant principal.
THIBODEAUX: After three months?
SOILA R.: Um hmm.
THIBODEAUX: Oh my goodness. You must have been outstanding. (laughs)
SOILA R.: Well, I don’t think so, but (laughs) anyway I taught at the high school four years.
LINDA R.: You were assistant principal.
SOILA R.: Yeah. I was assistant principal at the high school and then they made me principal of the Lamar [Intermediate] School which was a sixth grade school. I was there for ten years and then I retired.
THIBODEAUX: Let me back up to your husband [Richard Rodriguez]. When he started working at the Gary Job Corps Center, was that at the beginning of the center when it first opened?
SOILA R.: No, I think it was about…
LINDA R.: It was a year after or two years.
SOILA R.: Two years.
LINDA R.: It opened in ’65 or ’66.
SOILA R.: Yes.
THIBODEAUX: What was his position at the Gary Job Corps Center?
SOILA R.: He started out as a teacher, but then they made him, let’s see, they called it manager; he was the principal. (laughs)
THIBODEAUX: So did he help the programs at the center?
SOILA R.: Yes, yes.
THIBODEAUX: Did the Job Corps Center benefit the community?
SOILA R.: Oh yes, yes.
THIBODEAUX: It was pretty well equally accessible by African-Americans…
SOILA R.: Yes.
THIBODEAUX: Hispanics?
SOILA R.: Yes, yes.
LINDA R.: Are you talking about students?
THIBODEAUX: Students. Students. I’m sorry.
LINDA R.: Because surely the faculty- the students were coming from all over.
THIBODEAUX: Well that’s a good question. What about the faculty – where they pretty well distributed, was there a good distribution?
SOILA R.: Oh yes, yes.
THIBODEAUX: What did your husband feel was his major contribution at the Gary Job Corps Center? He was there for what – 25 years?
SOILA R.: Yes, yes, yes.
THIBODEAUX: He has a long history there. What did he feel like his major contribution was at the center? Did he ever verbalize how he felt about it?
SOILA R.: Oh yes. People would ask him here in town, why don’t you teach here. “No, I like it over there,” because he was looking at the students that had dropped of high school and then their getting a vocation and finishing up high school over there. So he thought that was great. He really liked it. He enjoyed it very much.
THIBODEAUX: Was there a follow-up of statistics on how successful it was finding these students jobs?
SOILA R.: Oh yes, oh yes.
THIBODEAUX: So they were very successful in placing them.
SOILA R.: Yes.
THIBODEAUX: I know some of the job corps centers around the country didn’t quite make it, but Gary Job Corps Center was very successful.
You answered so many of my questions already.
LINDA R.: I just wanted to correct something though, Mom. As you were going through it you said you worked at the scholarship office at the university. It wasn’t a scholarship office. When you first came to town it was Upward Bound.
SOILA R.: Well that’s where the scholarships are.
LINDA R.: Well that was a separate department though. Upward Bound was its own program which I’m sure she wants to hear about also – the two years that you were there at Upward Bound. You skipped that. (laughs)
THIBODEAUX: Thank you. I was going to ask you specifically about the Upward Bound program, another one of the Johnson administration programs that seem to have survived successfully.
SOILA R.: Yes.
THIBODEAUX: Were you the first director of Upward Bound?
SOILA R.: Yes.
THIBODEAUX: So you developed the program? Can you run with that – tell me how it developed?
SOILA R.: Well,
THIBODEAUX: I’m sorry, let’s back up a little bit. How did the whole program develop at the university and how did you come to be the director?
SOILA R.: Well LBJ started it. He was the one who suggested it. And it was wonderful because I got a lot of help from everybody at the university. They were always willing to help. It was just wonderful.
THIBODEAUX: So what was your mission at Upward Bound?
SOILA R.: Well, I was director and I would call high schools and tell them, in this area, like San Antonio, the high schools around here, that we had the scholarships, and explained to them what the scholarships were all about – San Antonio, Austin, and all the surrounding little towns that had a high school.
THIBODEAUX: So the Upward Bound program offered scholarships for students to come to Southwest Texas?
SOILA R.: Um hmm.
THIBODEAUX: Did they offer any other services to the students?
SOILA R.: Oh yeah, yeah.
LINDA R.: It got them while they were still in high school, they weren’t in college yet. [It] exposed them to college classes in the summertime. I think their junior and senior year, I think mostly.
SOILA R.: And several high schools invited me to come over and talk to the students.
THIBODEAUX: Was there any kind of mentoring program involved with that?
SOILA R.: What?
THIBODEAUX: Mentoring. Like once they came…
LINDA R.: They had college students helping these kids, you know, get acquainted with how classes were conducted and how to study and prepare. They were mostly kids, and I’m sure you know what the program is, that probably would not have been able or thinking about going to college. The scholarship counseling in the financial aid counseling was one part of it, but just exposing them to college life, I think, was the main purpose.
THIBODEAUX: It sounds like the program you developed is basically the same as it is today so you certainly did a wonderful thing. Do you remember at the time, was this a voluntary program at Southwest Texas or was it mandated by federal law?
SOILA R.: No, it was the college.
THIBODEAUX: What is your evaluation of taking this kind of visionary idea that President Johnson had to bring in, as you said students who would not normally go to college and turning it into a practical program. Do you feel it has been successful?
SOILA R.: Oh yes, oh yes.
THIBODEAUX: Could you tell from enrollment? Did you actually see more minority student enrollment than had before?
SOILA R.: Yes, yes, and especially the black students. I worked with them, and of course, the Hispanic and the Anglos, with everybody. I didn’t leave them out. One of the teachers over there, professors over there told me that the black students weren’t encouraged to go to college. And I said, “Well, that’s not right.” So I worked with all of them.
THIBODEAUX: Did you work with families too?
SOILA R.: Yes, because some families called me and mostly Hispanic and Negro parents would call me.
LINDA R.: Do you want to talk about Joel Martinez?
SOILA R.: Joel Martinez was the first one that got a scholarship to go to college. His family was very, very poor and he didn’t have any intentions of going to college. So his mother called me and said that she wondered if I could talk to him. I said, “Sure, I would be very glad to talk to him.” So I would go to the high school and talk to the principal and asked him if I could talk to some students about going to college. He said, “Oh yes, of course.” Several parents called me. Several, well a lot of them.
LINDA R.: Joel ended up going to dental school. He’s a very successful dentist down in South Texas.
THIBODEAUX: He would be a wonderful person to interview too.
LINDA R.: Yeah, you might want to interview him.
THIBODEAUX: Joel.
LINDA R.: Martinez.
THIBODEAUX: Martinez.
LINDA R.: He married, well, they were both from San Marcos, but his wife is Norma Vasquez who is Ofelia Vasquez-Philo’s daughter. She would know how to- the contact numbers and stuff.
THIBODEAUX: Okay.
LINDA R.: They live in McAllen. (pause) Norma went to Upward Bound too.
THIBODEAUX: (pause) That would be great. Did Upward Bound get very much support from the university? Were they very supportive of the program?
SOILA R.: Oh yes, yes. Thank God that they did.
THIBODEAUX: As assistant principal, did you find any special challenges as a Hispanic administrator? Did you see any changes that needed to be made?
SOILA R.: Yes, yes. I would talk to them. Several of the teachers would tell me why don’t you talk to so and so, and I did. They went to college and now they are teachers. I’m so glad.
THIBODEAUX: So your experience with Upward Bound gave you a boost as an assistant principal.
SOILA R.: Um hmm.
THIBODEAUX: I am going back in time. I was reading in the book [Dreams and Memories of the Past: A Community History of Mexican Americans in San Marcos, Texas, Hays County Historical Commission, 2000] about how in San Marcos education was segregated before Brown vs. Board of Education. But you weren’t here yet. In the Valley, after Brown vs. Board of Education, did it make any difference in the school system?
SOILA R.: After what?
THIBODEAUX: The case Brown vs. Board of Education?
LINDA R.: Not in the Valley, I imagine, because it is all Hispanic, (laughs) but here in San Marcos, my Dad was from San Marcos.
THIBODEAUX: Okay.
LINDA R.: He use to talk a lot about sitting upstairs in the movie theaters, because that was the only place they could sit, not being allowed in certain places, and even just being able to participate fully in sports when he was going to high school. That would have been in the ‘40s before Brown.
THIBODEAUX: Did he ever talk about any change in the education system?
LINDA R.: I don’t recall him talking about that. He didn’t graduate; he left to join the service and then came back and went to school, went to college, but he didn’t talk much about that.
SOILA R.: He became a teacher. (laughs)
THIBODEAUX: What federal legislation do you think worked in tandem with Hispanic activism to create the biggest change in educational opportunities?
LINDA R.: I think definitely the Higher Education Act that created these programs.
SOILA R.: Yes, yes.
THIBODEAUX: Back to when you were assistant principal, do you remember the 1972 walkout. I was reading [in Dreams and Memories of the Past] about that when the students walked out. (laughs) Were you part of that? What was the dress code you were protesting?
LINDA R.: Oh, at that point the boys had to have their hair above the collar and girls fingertip length for skirts. That was the main thing though. Several guys in my class would wear wigs to school and as soon as school was out they would take those wigs off and their hair would be long. (laughs) I was there at that time.
THIBODEAUX: So were you part of the walkout?
LINDA R.: (laughs) I’m afraid I was.
THIBODEAUX: Did that cause a problem with you being assistant principal?
SOILA R.: No.
LINDA R.: It wasn’t a big deal. They made more of it than it was. Everybody just kind of went back to class afterwards.
THIBODEAUX: Well it sounded like fun. It said in the book it lasted about four days. (laughs) This has to do with the Gary Job Corps Center. Do you know if LBJ visited the Gary Job Corps Center while your husband was there?
SOILA R.: Yes, yes he did.
LINDA R.: I can’t remember though when.
SOILA R.: I can’t remember the date but he was there.
THIBODEAUX: Were you there at the time he visited?
SOILA R.: Yes, yes.
THIBODEAUX: What was your impression of him at that time?
SOILA R.: Oh, I thought he was wonderful because Mother admired him so much. Mother, when he was running for office, she read the newspaper every morning and she could speak English. She was one of the very few mothers who could speak English because I lived in the Valley and it’s mostly Hispanic. Mother taught us from the day that we were born to speak English and Spanish both so when you went to school, we all could speak Spanish, I mean English.
The people in the neighborhood would ask my mother before they voted who to vote for because they didn’t know who to vote for because they couldn’t read English and they only spoke Spanish. Mother was the only one in the vicinity who spoke English. When LBJ was running for office, they came by the house and of course Mother told them that he would be a good one. And so they all voted for him.
THIBODEAUX: Was that for his presidential or earlier race?
SOILA R.: Presidential.
THIBODEAUX: You and your husband were active in the Democratic Party?
SOILA R.: Yes.
THIBODEAUX: Did you work or your husband work on any of Johnson’s campaign?
SOILA R.: Yes. Yes we did.
THIBODEAUX: Did you have any association with the Johnson family through the Democratic Party?
SOILA R.: They came over here a lot and we met them. I met Lady Bird and the two daughters. They weren’t married yet.
THIBODEAUX: I bet that pleased your mother that you were able to meet them.
SOILA R.: Yes. Oh yes. I called her and told her. (laughs)
THIBODEAUX: There was a relationship between the GI Forum and LBJ. Are you aware of that? Do you have any information about the relationship, especially between Dr. Garcia and LBJ?
SOILA R.: Where was Dr. Garcia from?
LINDA R.: The founder of GI Forum was from Corpus. His daughter lives in Austin someplace. Her name was Wanda Garcia. The last I heard of she use to work for Senator Bentsen many years ago. I haven’t heard of her for several years. I might be able to find somebody who does know how to contact her.
THIBODEAUX: That would be wonderful. They seem to have such an interesting relationship because I think the GI Forum was suppose to be nonpartisan so they never could come out and campaign for him openly and at the same time, from what I’ve read, LBJ would never come out and openly support the forum either. (laughs) But he had a relationship with Dr. Garcia, kind of like they were meeting behind closed doors and things like that to see what was possible. There were many times LBJ said no can’t do it for you sorry. Whether he could or not, I’m not sure. It just seems like they had such an interesting relationship, maybe kind of secret relationship.
LINDA R.: I’ll see if I can find her.
THIBODEAUX: There was a story related in Dreams and Memories of the Past about poll taxes. When were you first registered to vote? Did you have to pay a poll tax in those early years to vote?
SOILA R.: I don’t remember. Maybe.
THIBODEAUX: It was an interesting story about the GI Forum. The poll tax was $1.75 and candidates were not allowed to pay the poll tax so the GI Forum held a dance. The entrance to the dance was the same price as the poll tax.
Do you have any other stories related to Lyndon Johnson or the family? Did you ever go to the picnics at the university?
SOILA R.: No.
THIBODEAUX: Oh good, you have some notes. I appreciate that. (pause)
SOILA R.: Well I told you all of this. (laughs)
THIBODEAUX: Anything to share about how the programs in the War on Poverty and the Great Society affected the Hispanic in San Marcos and in South Texas?
SOILA R.: It was wonderful because he would – when we went to the voting places, he was very congenial and he spoke to everyone, the blacks, Hispanics, and everybody. He was very, very wonderful – speaking to everybody and I think that’s one of the reasons he got elected because he didn’t just talk to the Anglos because a lot of them running for office only talked to the Anglos. But the Hispanic and black people are there and they want to vote. So he was very congenial.
THIBODEAUX: So he realized that the Hispanic vote was very important.
SOILA R.: Yes, and his family was very congenial too.
That’s right. You said you met his daughters before they were married.
SOILA R.: Um hmm.
THIBODEAUX: I’m sorry. You just told me. Was that a visit to the university that you met the daughters?
SOILA R.: Yes. I met them at the university and then I met them somewhere else. There was something going on here in town. Forgot what it was, but they came.
THIBODEAUX: You said he was here frequently so many residents got to experience LBJ.
Is there anything that you can think of that I have totally skipped over?
LINDA R.: I can’t think of anything. I’ll try to get you those contact numbers.
THIBODEAUX: That is wonderful. In fact, Pat Murdock sent me on a mission to ask if y’all knew of anyone else who would be good to interview. I think that would be fabulous, especially Wanda Garcia.
LINDA R.: I will try to find her.
THIBODEAUX: That would be terrific. Well, I can’t think of anything else at this time unless you have something else.
LINDA R.: I don’t think so.
SOILA R.: He was a wonderful president, and especially because he was from Texas! (laughs)
THIBODEAUX: Absolutely. He certainly brought a lot of prestige to the university.
SOILA R.: Yes he did. Yes he did.
THIBODEAUX: Did he visit the university while you were there between ’68 and ’70?
SOILA R.: Yes.
LINDA R.: I seem to remember him. I don’t know whether the Bilingual Act was in there during those dates. I remember him coming down and there being sort of a rally and he wasn’t running. It must have been in conjunction with one of those later educational type bills be passed. I think the Bilingual Act went through about that time.
THIBODEAUX: Must have been. He did like to start his programs here. He introduced the Job Corps Center as one of the first. He certainly appreciated the San Marcos area.
Well thank you very much.
SOILA R.: Well thank you. (end of interview)