On June 13, 1971, rioting broke out at Roosevelt Park after police attempted to arrest a young man standing in a crowd of several hundred rowdy youth. A small scuffle escalated into a brawl leading officers to fire upon the crowd, wounding at least nine people. Outraged, nearly 500 youth moved into the downtown area where they overturned cars, shattered windows, looted and severely damaged and destroyed buildings. Police attacked rock- and bottle-throwing protesters with tear gas but were overwhelmed. The New Mexico National Guardsmen came into the city to assist officers. After two days of rioting, the city tallied over $3 million in damages. Shocked by the level of carnage, one journalist of the Albuquerque Journal wrote, “It was something you’d think couldn’t happen in Albuquerque, but it did.”
Unlike the riots in Watts in 1965 or Detroit in 1967, Albuquerque lacks the evocative label of 1960s urban uprising. The actors were primarily Mexican-American, and the riot occurred in the summer of 1971. Despite these anomalous characteristics, the rebellion was one of at least 14 Latino urban riots that occurred that year.
This year marks the 45th and 50th anniversaries of at least 17 Latino urban riots. These incidents have happened at least 57 times since 1964, but they are remembered in isolation. Preserving this history is crucial because the issues that sparked them, such as municipal neglect, discrimination and poverty, still exist in many communities around the country. Sadly American political culture portrays Latinos as recent arrivals, which makes it appear that these issues are temporary. Failure to address persistent issues in the community might increase the likelihood of another urban uprising in the near future — a plausible claim considering the incident of social unrest in Anaheim, California in 2012.
Most Americans are unaware of Latino urban riots because they fall outside of the black-white binary. Despite numerous books and documentaries about the 1960s and ’70s, these riots are rarely, if ever, mentioned. Sociologist Gregg Lee Carter published the only comprehensive piece of scholarship about the topic where he listed 43 riots in Mexican-American and Puerto Rican communities between 1964 and 1971. Nevertheless, there are some shortcomings in the list: some of the riots were melees, he missed several incidents, and they continued well beyond 1971.
I have provided an updated version of Carter’s list with hopes that people will become more interested in recovering this history and learn from it. By looking at several online newspaper databases and the works of other scholars, I included 25 additional riots. I disregarded racial violence, school and prison settings, as well as eliminated several of the incidents in Carter’s list. To determine what constituted a riot, I factored in that the event had to have at least 100 participants, result in significant property damage (destroying and/or severely damaging vehicles and buildings), and trigger a police response. With the exception of Los Angeles in 1992, Latinos were the primary actors in these riots; however, there were several incidents were whites and Blacks participated in almost equal numbers. There were numerous other incidents of civil unrest, but because property damage was minimal I did not include them. This list is incomplete because not all newspapers are digitized. Additionally, there was a discrepancy in reporting when Blacks and Latinos both rioted because some journalists reported only on Black rioters.
A glance at this list reveals some unique characteristics. Unlike Black riots of the 1960s, Latino riots occurred mostly in the 1970s, and they continued well into the early 1990s. Over two-thirds of them were in Puerto Rican communities. They occurred in major cities and in communities as small as Coachella, California, which had about 9,000 residents in 1970. Rioting broke out mostly in the Northeast. New Jersey had the most with 17 incidents.
Here is the updated list:
|
Latino Rioting in the United States |
||
| Location | Date | Group |
| New York, NY |
8/29/64 |
Puerto Rican |
| Chicago, IL |
6/12/66 |
Puerto Rican |
| Jersey City, NJ |
6/19/66 |
Puerto Rican |
| Perth Amboy, NJ |
7/30/66 |
Puerto Rican |
| New York, NY |
7/23/67 |
Puerto Rican |
| New Haven, CT |
8/19/67 |
Puerto Rican |
| Paterson, NJ |
7/1/68 |
Puerto Rican |
| New York, NY |
7/10/68 |
Puerto Rican |
| New York, NY |
6/1/69 |
Puerto Rican |
| Trenton, NJ |
6/12/69 |
Puerto Rican |
| Waterbury, CT |
6/30/69 |
Puerto Rican |
| Passaic, NJ |
8/3/69 |
Puerto Rican |
| Hartford, CT |
9/1/69 |
Puerto Rican |
| New York, NY |
12/7/69 |
Puerto Rican |
| Coachella, CA |
4/5/70 |
Mexican-American |
| Jersey City, NJ |
6/11/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| New York, NY |
6/14/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| Hoboken, NJ |
6/24/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| Los Angeles, CA |
7/2/70 |
Mexican-American |
| New York, NY |
7/15/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| New Brunswick, NJ |
7/23/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| West Chester, PA |
7/25/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| New Bedford, MA |
7/29/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| Hartford, CT |
7/31/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| Hoboken, NJ |
8/28/70 |
Puerto Rican |
| Los Angeles, CA |
8/29/70 |
Mexican-American |
| Los Angeles, CA |
1/9/71 |
Mexican-American |
| Los Angeles, CA |
1/30/71 |
Mexican-American |
| Pharr, TX |
2/6/71 |
Mexican-American |
| Bridgeport, CT |
5/20/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| New York, NY |
6/9/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| Albuquerque, NM |
6/13/71 |
Mexican-American |
| New York, NY |
6/13/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| Oxnard, CA |
7/19/71 |
Mexican-American |
| New York, NY |
7/27/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| Lakewood, NJ |
8/18/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| Camden, NJ |
8/19/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| Hoboken, NJ |
9/4/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| Los Angeles, CA |
9/16/71 |
Mexican-American |
| Paterson, NJ |
10/11/71 |
Puerto Rican |
| Boston, MA |
7/16/72 |
Puerto Rican |
| Dallas, TX |
7/28/73 |
Mexican-American |
| Long Branch, NJ |
8/22/73 |
Puerto Rican |
| Newark, NJ |
9/1/74 |
Puerto Rican |
| Springfield, MA |
8/28/75 |
Puerto Rican |
| Wilmington, DE |
10/20/75 |
Puerto Rican |
| Chicago, IL |
6/5/77 |
Puerto Rican |
| Houston, TX |
5/7/78 |
Mexican-American |
| Anaheim, CA |
7/24/78 |
Mexican-American |
| Worcester, MA |
6/21/79 |
Puerto Rican |
| Lawrence, MA |
8/9/84 |
Hispanic |
| Perth Amboy, NJ |
6/11/88 |
Hispanic |
| Vineland, NJ |
8/29/89 |
Hispanic |
| Miami, FL |
12/3/90 |
Puerto Rican |
| Washington, DC |
5/5/91 |
Salvadorian |
| Los Angeles, CA |
4/29/92 |
Hispanic |
| New York, NY |
7/6/92 |
Dominican |
Wow!!! Who knew,, Free Press?
That wasn’t a “Latino” riot. Ask anyone who was there.
I had heard that a disproportionate number of Latino ( largely Boricuas) riots occurred in New Jersey -16-18! The Anaheim CA riots involving Chicanos/Mexicanos after members of a predominately Anglo police force killed two Mexicans is not well known in our country. Rioting in Disneyland ? That was definitely covered up
I was there with Guy Bralley and his brother Mark when all this happened. I was Tribune, Guy was Journal, Mark was shooting for a small paper I don’t recall. Got tear gassed by Henry’s hamburgers, again at Roosevelt Park, kind of exciting when you’re in the middle of it all and only 18 or 19!
Good luck on trying getting people to care about these events. I’ve seen Hispanics argue for their history to be incldued into the history of hip hop, but remain quiet when this subject comes up.
This is ridiculous; the riots were not about latinos or any race. It was a hot summer and we were looking for a fight with APD because of there treatment of long hairs and ‘hippies’ at Yale Park. Don’t believe all this other bull because I was there and I was right in the middle of the action. This was not and never was about chicano power and I have no idea how they concluded it was an latino urban riot – that is a joke. I have no idea who the author is or how he came to his conclusions but he is unequivocally wrong.
Not a day I’ll forget. That is my name under the picture you led with on the article. Not my finest day. Three names down this list is Richard Robles. Thanks Richard for getting me into, and I think out of the hospital before that day was over. My brother Mark still lives in ABQ, and he worked for the Albuq weekly paper owned by EJ Lewis (all gone, now; so is the Tribune). I can largely agree with Jody below on it not being a “Latino” riot, but we kind of termed it an equal opportunity riot: lots of players who just kind of jumped aboard as this event rolled along.
Calling this a Latino riot is absolutely absurd. I was there, and A.P.D. instigated the whole event. By trying to arrest a couple of individuals for drinking. There were probably around 500 of us their, and half of the park was drinking and smoking. So going after two individuals, ended up being not very smart
This was not a Latino or Mexican-American riot. I was not present when it started, but learned that the police started the riot by how they treated a couple of hippies among a crowd of about 500 people at Roosevelt Park on
a hot Sunday afternoon on or about June 13, 1971. The attendees were peaceably enjoying a rock and roll concert, drinking cold beer, smoking marijuana, and minding their own business. This was typical conduct at that point in time in our nation’s history. The police started the riot. Only one police car was torched.
I was there at Roosevelt park on June 13, 1971. It all happened on the East side of the park. There were about 500 people drinking, smoking marijuana and who knows what. There was a police car on fire and a couple of fights . The National Guard were acoss the street on the East side waiting for their orders. At that point I left
My boyfriend now my husband stayed. And was arrested and taken to Montessa Park until he and others posted bail. People mostly hippies were thrown out of Yale park
For smoking weed and drinking. They ended up at Roosevelt Park where police wanted to throw them out of there. Thats what started the rioting. Not a chicano or chicana thing.