Seattle had a growing Latino population in the late 1960s, and activists had been pressing the city for a building in which to establish a Chicano community center. Tired of having their requests ignored, in October 1972 they took over the abandoned Beacon Hill School on 16th Avenue South and renamed it El Centro de la Raza. After a 75-day occupation and ongoing negotiations - including a sit-in at the Mayor's office - the city finally acquiesced in June 1973, subleasing the Seattle School District building to the group for $1 a year. As of 2019, El Centro de la Raza community center continues to operate in the same building, providing services and advocacy for the Latino community and other residents of the Beacon Hill area.
Almost three months into the occupation, on December 26, 1972, the Seattle City Council voted to commit over $131,000 for the renovation of the Beacon Hill School and staffing for the first year. This photo shows members of the occupying group celebrating the Council's approval at La Hacienda Cafe at 2532 Beacon Avenue South. They are, left to right, Larry Gossett, supervisor of the Office of Minority Affairs at the University of Washington (UW) at the time; Estela "Chata" Maestas, wife of Roberto; Roberto Maestas, holding Vitta Mendoza; Juan Hernandez (partly obscured); and an unidentified man.
Roberto Felipe Maestas (1938-2010) was a Mexican American activist in Seattle. Maestas became involved in UW civil-rights and antiwar demonstrations in the late 1960s-early 1970s and was a fierce advocate for Chicano and other minority concerns. He led the occupation of the Beacon Hill School and founded El Centro de la Raza. Along with Bernie Whitebear, Bob Santos, and Larry Gossett, Maestas was one of Seattle's "Gang of Four" (also known as "The Four Amigos"), who founded Seattle's Minority Executive Directors Coalition (MEDC) in 1982. All four were associated with radical minority rights activism in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and all went on to leadership roles.
Caption information source: Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project at University of Washington, page at http://depts.washington.edu/civilr/slides_Chicano.htm Caption information source: "Chicano Center OK'd," Seattle Times, December 27, 1972, p. 20. Caption information source: "Maestas, Roberto Felipe (1938-2010)" by Frank Chesney, HistoryLink.org Essay 9186 Caption information also derived from captions written by Post-Intelligencer staff and attached to the back of the photograph.
