We have fed you all for a thousand years-
For that was our doom, you know,
From the days when you chained us in your fields
To the strike a week ago.
You have taken our lives, and our babies and wives,
And we're told it's your legal share,
But if blood be the price of your lawful wealth,
Good God! We have bought it fair!
Written by "An Unknown Proletarian", 1908Like California’s agriculture—diverse and large—its agricultural workers have come from a diversity of groups, and the list is long. Indeed, groups known to be involved in agriculture in the Pajaro Valley region alone include: African Americans, Basques, Canadians, Cambodians, Chinese, Croations, Danes, English, Filipinos, French, Germans, Greeks, Hawaiians, Indians Irish, Italians, Jamaicans, Japanese, Latinos, Manxmen (Isle of Man), Mexicans, Mormons, Okies/Arkies/Texies, Portuguese (Azores), Scots, Spanish, Swedes, Swiss, Vietnamese, and Yankees (nineteenth-century New England Protestants).
Excerpt from the book: The California Agricultural Workers’ History Center by Geoffrey Dunn and Sandy Lydon
