UTEP’s Bracero Project Wins National Recognition

Mexican Worker Program Addressed Agriculture Labor Shortage During WW2,
UTEP Preserves its History

The National Council on Public History has awarded this year’s Public History Project Award to the Bracero History Archive (braceroarchive.org). The archive is a joint effort between The University of Texas at El Paso’s Institute of Oral History, led by Director Kristine Navarro-McElhaney; the Center for History and New Media at George Mason University; the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at Brown University and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.

Navarro-McElhaney is the collections director for the project.

“I am thrilled and honored that the Bracero History Archive has been recognized by the National Council on Public History,” she said. “This project is a great example of what can be achieved when different groups work together around a shared goal. The stories and artifacts in the archive will be an important resource for current and future generations to learn about the Bracero Program and its impact on history.”

The Bracero History Archive is a collection of oral histories and artifacts from the Bracero Program, a guest worker initiative that brought millions of Mexican agricultural workers to the United States from 1942 to 1964. More than 50 of the oral histories come from people living in El Paso and Las Cruces, Navarro-McElhaney said, including secretaries, security guards and bookkeepers who worked on the farms that processed Bracero Program workers.

The $1,000 Outstanding Public History Project Award recognizes a project that contributes to a broader public reflection and appreciation of the past or that serves as a model of professional public history practice, according to the National Council on Public History’s Web site (ncph.org). The Bracero History Archive project organizers will share the award with sponsors of the Nevada Test Site Oral History Project.

The award will be presented March 13 at the National Council on Public History conference in Portland, Ore. The Bracero History Archive exhibit, called Bittersweet Harvest: The Bracero Program 1942-1964, will be on display at the Chamizal National Memorial Nov. 20 through Jan. 30, 2011.