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STAFF
E(Htor ................FELIX GUTIERREZ Managing Editor ..........COSME PENA* Art Editor __.............TUAN ACEVEDO* Sports Edit^-_____________MANUEL CE.IA* Feature Editor __............ANGELO CANO
Lfnotypist ...........ANDREW ACEVEDO*
Feature Writers
PAUL CORONEL RUDOLPH MORALES* WILLIAM HORNELAS* ROGER ANTON Business Manager.........STEVEN REYES $G4 S. Raymond Ave., Pasadena, Calif.
Offidfll Organ of the Mcxtcan American Movement
An inspirational, educational magazine devoted to the betterment of our American people of Mexican descent.
•Indicates now serving in the armed forces.
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Dedicated To:
This issue is dedicated to three of our Mexican Voice colleagues who are now serving their country. We do this because of their unselfish service and of the void their absence has created.
The three are: Artist Juan Acevedo, who is responsible for the improvement of our magazine. It was he who designed the covers and supervised the printing. Acevedo is a graduate of U.C.L.A., a well-known professional artist, and a distance runner of note. Cosme J. Pena, who joined our staff in 1939 has contributed to every issue of our magazine. Journalist Pena has served as managing editor, feature writer-and layout editor. A graduate of Los Angeles City College, “Ceejay” served in various school publications. Majoring in Journalism, Jolly Javier also performed on the wrestling team. Industrious Manuel Ceja, Chapman college graduate and prominent youth leader, was the first to join the staff of our magazine. In the five years of his service his sports columns were one of the highlights of each issue. Ceja, besides having been the youngest high school coach in Southern California (he coached
the Spanish American Institute var	______________________________________________________________
sity teams at 22 years of age), also was a well-known quarter-miler.
To these three we say, “Thank you . . . and after this is all over, let’s do our very best to put out a bigger and better Voice!”
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ESSAY WINNER
Bill Rivera of San Fernando won the U. S. Treasury Department’s Farm Boy Essay contest. Rivera, a student of Canoga Park high school, wrote on .Why farmers Should Buy Bonds.”
A Challenge___________ . .
“Zoot Suiters Attack Sailors”
“Twenty and Thirty Zoot Suiters
Attack Lone Sailors”
“Zoot Suiters Seek Revenge, Threaten to Maim All Servicemen”
“Pachucos Invade Dance Hall, Kill One”
“Zoot Gangster Incites Riot”
These headlines, soldier, sailor and marine of Mexican descent, are read over and over again daily in our Southern California newspapers. These words sicken your pathetic parents, relatives, children of Mexican descent. These strike fear into your own people who go about their business of earning a living. These bannerlines anger, disgust others not of your national descent, making it easier for them to blame your group, to segregate it, hate it, to feel superior to it. For it is said of them, “They are nothing but a bunch of hoodlums. How could anything good come from them?”
These things are going on, servicemen, while you wallow in the jungles of the South Pacific, freeze in Attu, bake in India, while you are fighting for the way of life that you know and have been accustomed to, while you fight for the four freedoms.
Who is to blame?
That is not important.
Even if people do know that poor environment, broken homes, cultural clashes, low economic standards, large families, segregation, prejudices and war frenzy are the causes of all this, they do not stop to analyze or to think. No! It is easier to segregate, to incriminate a whole group, to hate. For now they say,
OUR HEROES
Two outstanding heroes of national prominence in this war have been Lieutenant Leonard Macia of Tombstone, Arizona, and Captain Armand Monteverde of Anaheim, California.
Lieutenant Macia was one of the flyers cited by the army for his flight with General Doolittle when that group of flyers bombed I okio. Lieutenant Macia is a bombardier
“Who is to know which is a good pachuco or which is a bad one?” How easy it would be to say, “Who is to know which is a good Mexican or a bad one. All are bad.”
Fighter for freedom, when you return, you will return another person and you will return to a different world. You will say, ‘‘Ah, I am glad we got that job over there done.” Yes, that job! But we have another job. One that will take a different sort of courage; not the courage of facing death, but the courage to face the future and to fight for your group, to fight for a better America, at home.
You are the leader. You are the one that is boldly going to provide the leadership our group needs. You are the one that must have the courage to identify yourself as Mexican-American. You are the one that must improve your home, your community, encourage education, inject pep here and there. You must train our group to think of themselves as Americans. You must encourage, organize our group to contribute to this, our nation.
At home, regardless of who is to blame, these teensters of your descent are giving our group a bad name. No, it is not up to us to damn or to pity them. It is up to us to unify ourselves, work together, to live and breathe life into our community, to insure that never again will these headlines appear, that never again will “Zoot Suiters Kill Three.”
It is a challenge, sailor, soldiery and marine of Mexican descent. It is a challenge and a problem that we must face together. It is our group, our problem, our business. Have we the courage to solve it?
and, his exploits were reported in Life magazine.
Captain Armand Monteverde received the personal commendation from the President of our nation for his part in saving his bomber crew after they had crashed into an iceberg. Captain Monteverde led his crew on top of the iceberg for 149 days in spite of repeated attempts at rescue. His personal courage and duty to his men is an inspiration to our youth.