For Pacoima Elementary, the Name of the Game Is Pride

The classroom is crowded; faces once familiar to me anxiously await the start of the meeting. Near the front, atop a table, sits the younger crowd, none of whom I recognize. Many of them teach at this school and are here to voice their thoughts.

Mostly it’s an old crowd. Old fogies. Mexican Americans (as we were once called) who in the 1920s, ‘30s and ‘40s attended Pacoima Elementary School and are here to protest the proposed name change of this institution to Cesar Chavez School.

Those who promote the change feel that it will give the school--located in a working-class, gang-infested neighborhood--a better image. Was not Chavez a great man? This is an emotional issue, painful to those of us who admire Chavez yet are against the change.

Most folks here are angry, hurt. Their voices--a blend of Spanish and English--fill the room. I can sense their frustration and that of the teacher, an idealistic young Chicano who has taught at this school for 12 years and whose idea it was to change the name. Pobrecito. He stands in front of the room waiting to speak. His pale face and shaking hands indicate he’s taken on a major fight, one he never anticipated.

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But hey! It never was his school. It was mine! The place where I, and those around me, learned--in halting English--our ABCs and that George Washington and not Benito Juarez was the father of our country. Where we played ball in the wide field that bordered Norris Street and, on holidays, stood tall to salute the American flag.

A few here remember when in 1914 the school first opened. In a trembling voice, a World War II veteran recalls fond memories of kindergarten and of our principal, Prudence L. Harding, an excellent and kind educator who hired only teachers who she felt would accept (and not criticize) our faulty English, poor hygiene and foreign culture.

An elderly woman to my left shares memories of the “old days” when she and her siblings walked the rock-laden streets to school. She, too, is against the proposed name change.

I’m surprised by the eloquent--and emotional--speech from a man in front of me. A Vietnam veteran, he recalls how in the 1950s, due to urban renewal, many homes from the old barrio--a predominantly Mexican neighborhood that extended from San Fernando Road to Herrick Avenue and Pierce Street to Filmore Street--were torn down to make way for the San Fernando Gardens housing complex (a misnomer, as it is in Pacoima!). “They took our homes and now they want to take our school name,” he shouts. This is America! I fought for my country and I will fight to keep my school’s name. There are no dumb Mexicans here!

In a clear, firm voice, a young woman tells of her pride at being an alumna of this school. She then introduces her mother, an energetic woman who worked two jobs to educate her five children, two of whom are teachers. All of whom resent the name change.

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In the end, nothing is resolved. The principal thanks us for attending. He vows to respect our feelings when he presents the proposal to his superiors. But will he? Or will our protest be lost in the bureaucratic shuffle?

As I exit the room I look back at those who linger to talk, to touch. Old fogies determined to keep alive their memories of a time when life was simple and happiness and knowledge awaited them at Pacoima Elementary School.