Juana Chavez, 99; Son Founded Farm Workers’ Union

Juana Estrada Chavez, who inspired her son, Cesar, to seek nonviolent solutions in his struggle for better working conditions for farm workers, has died at the age of 99.

Mrs. Chavez died of kidney failure at her San Jose home on Saturday, said Mark Grossman, a family representative.

Cesar Chavez, founder of the United Farm Workers of America and organizer of the 1960s grape boycott, credited his mother, who was illiterate, with teaching him nonviolence long before he read Gandhi.

“She said don’t be violent, but don’t be afraid to fight--by standing up for your rights,” Chavez said of his mother in a statement after her death.

Though she moved to Arizona from Mexico when she was just 6 months old, Mrs. Chavez never learned English. She married the late Librado Chavez and lived on a farm until the family lost the land in 1938. It was then that they began their life as migrant farm workers in California.

“On the road, no matter how badly off we were, she would never let us pass a guy or family in trouble,” her son, 64, recalled. “That’s why we suffered so much. But my mother would tell us, ‘you always have to help the needy, and God will help you.”