Today's Google Doodle is Celebrating Luisa Moreno
In honor of US Hispanic Heritage Month, today’s Doodle celebrates Guatemalan American labor organizer, journalist, and activist Luisa Moreno. The artwork, depicting Moreno linking arms with people from the various communities she tirelessly advocated for, was illustrated by Guatemala City-based guest artist Juliet Menendez.
Moreno was born “Blanca Rosa Lopez Rodrigues” in Guatemala City on August 30, 1947. As a child, her family immigrated to Oakland, California. She moved back to Guatemala as a teenager, but her education was halted as women were not allowed to attend universities at the time. In response, Moreno organized a group to lobby for a woman's right to pursue higher education. Winning this civil rights campaign sparked her lifelong passion for activism.
Moreno pursued her interest in social issues as a journalist in Mexico City for a few years before moving to New York City in 1928. Shortly after her move, a group of Latino protesters were brutalized and killed by police after speaking out against a Warner Brothers film perpetuating anti-Mexican sentiment; She later stated this incident motivated her work to unify Spanish-speaking communities. When the Great Depression struck, she began working as a seamstress at a garment factory to support her family. She immediately saw the need for labor reform as workers were underpaid for long hours and endured dangerous working conditions.
In 1935, Moreno joined the American Federation of Labor as a professional organizer. Within that role, her work with the United Cannery, Agricultural, Packing and Allied Workers of America (UCAPAWA) took her across the country, helping workers such as cigar factory workers in Pennsylvania, sugar cane laborers and pecan shellers in the South, and beet farmers tuna packers in the West. She was eventually elected vice president of the UCAPAWA in 1941.
In addition to her labor rights work, Moreno advocated for racial and ethnic equality. In 1938 she founded the National Congress of Spanish-Speaking Peoples — the first national Latino civil rights assembly. The group advocated for the fair treatment of Latino employees and the desegregation of schools and neighborhoods. Notably, in 1942, she established a defense committee who successfully fought for the dismissal of charges against a group of Mexican American teenagers who were arrested without evidence.
Despite Moreno’s tireless efforts to improve the lives of thousands of US workers, her status as a labor leader made her a target for the Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS). The INS began threatening her with deportation unless she testified against fellow union leaders. Refusing to do so, she was forced to leave the US and returned to Latin America. There, she continued her work by unionizing workers in Mexico, Cuba, and Guatemala.
Thank you for dedicating your life to improving conditions for every community you touched. Here’s to you, Luisa.
