Hispanic culture

The promise of jobs and the hope for prosperity brought them at the turn of the 20th century. They were Hispanics worn out by economic hardship in New Mexico and political upheaval in Mexico.

“Work in Colorado,” recruiters for Northern Colorado farmers and companies shouted from bullhorns as they traveled by train through towns in New Mexico and Mexico.

Between 1910 and 1930, more than a million Mexicans arrived in the United States; 45,000 heeded the call to Colorado. The work they found was difficult, most of it in the sugar-beet fields, where “stoop laborers” bent over the crops as they hoed and weeded the crop by hand.

Germans from Russia were the first to work in the beet fields, in the late 1800s. As they made enough money to buy their own land in Northern Colorado, farmers looked south to recruit new beet-field workers. Mexicans were expected to migrate north each spring and return home each winter.

But many wound up making Northern Colorado their home; Weld County counted 20,000 Mexican farm workers in residence by 1927, many housed in adobe “colonias” on land provided by the sugar companies.

Eventually these workers started businesses, raising families, becoming active in faith communities and serving in government leadership positions. Their stories have become as much a part of Northern Colorado’s fabric as the Anglo settlers who gave names to cities such as Greeley, Loveland and Fort Collins.

Mexican immigration to Northern Colorado has continued to the present day. Some continue to work in farm fields, but more are finding higher-paying jobs in the region’s booming oil and gas industry.

The Hispanic influence is especially strong in Greeley, where U.S. Census figures show Hispanics make up about a third of the population and has increased 118 percent between 1990 and 2003. In Greeley-Evans School District 6, more than half of the student population is Hispanic. The city’s few hundred Hispanic-owned businesses include restaurants, insurance agencies, dental and medical practices, clothing stores, tortilla manufacturers and mechanics, among others.

Hispanic newcomers to Northern Colorado come today not only from Mexico but also from Central and South America, also lured by the promise of jobs and the familiarity of family members.

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