This is the transcript of the feature by Grace McCarty on Watsonville is in the Heart’s exhibit, Sowing Seeds: Filipino American Stories from the Pajaro Valley
Me: This is Grace McCarty, the UCSC humanities intern with KSQD.
The Pajaro Valley has long been home to farmworkers from around the world, who came to harvest the fruit and vegetables that are grown there. Thousands of Filipino laborers migrated to the region at the beginning of the last century, creating a rich cultural history spanning generations. Filipino American stories in the Pajaro Valley have been overlooked especially by its neighboring universities. But recently, researchers at UCSC have been working to change this. As part of the Watsonville is in the Heart project, the research works to expand the narrative of Filipino-American studies, reexamining the lives of laborers and their descendants.
In April the exhibit “Sowing Seeds: Filipino American Stories from the Pajaro Valley” opened at the Santa Cruz Museum of art and History. Exploring Filipino migration from the 1930s to the present, it highlights archival photographs and heirlooms, contemporary art, and notable oral histories to create a public record that reflects the community it represents.
When I got to sowing seeds, there was a quiet observance throughout the exhibit. Some families walked around the collections talking quietly with each other, others walked alone in complete silence. I asked visitors and students what they took out of Sowing Seeds.
Speakers: Yeah, so growing up in Santa Cruz, I briefly remember in probably one history class for like a day, maybe half a lecture, they briefly mentioned Filipino history in Watsonville, and ever since then I have not heard a single peep about it, and this is really the first time I’ve been able to get a full education on their history and just how deep the roots go in our county.
I think it’s definitely important especially if like Santa Cruz in general they like to paint themselves as people who’s like oh we’re so like it’s like organic and it’s like oh form to fork type things like they’re so heavy on that and they should like acknowledge the people that made that happen
Man: so like as someone who is a Mexican American myself, who comes from a community that are, where there are not a lot of Mexican Americans, I think that it’s important that these niche areas that cover different ethnic groups who come from different immigrant communities is very important because it can speak to the experiences of a lot of different people that we might not be thinking about.
ME: In one segment, a series of photographs are displayed, one that depicts an old picture of a woman outside in a garden. She is surrounded by wide open fields of flowers, and looks straight on to the camera with a quiet strength that seems almost modern for the time. The audio guide describes the context of the image
AUDIO GUIDE: During our interview with Loren Cawaling, he showed us this photograph of his mother, Aladina Cawaling, standing in a field of flowers. The photograph elicited memories of Loren’s mother, including her fondness for gardening and her experiences working in the canneries. Many manang worked in the food processing industry including canneries and frozen food packaging factories, and this interview captures their labor. Watsonville, dubbed the “Frozen Food Capital of the World” during the 1980s, was the hub f or food processing in part because of manang labor. In this interview, Loren recalls the hardships his mother endured while working at Green Giant, one of the major canneries in the area.
LOREN: I mean, you know, I love this picture. […] My mom had a green thumb. […] I mean, everybody used to tell us man, you know, your mom’s yard this and that. She had beautiful flowers in the front yard. I mean, it was always colorful all the time. [
