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Bustamante, Albert Garza,. Oral history interview with Albert Garza Bustamante, 2004 [videorecording].

Title: Oral history interview with Albert Garza Bustamante, 2004 [videorecording].

Albert Garza Bustamante begins with his personal and family background and elaborates on his family's home life and work around Dimmit County, Texas, and as migrant agricultural laborers in Oregon. He expresses his budding interest in politics through the American G.I. Forum. He touches on the race discrimination he encountered in Texas in Nueces and San Patricio Counties during his military service and provides details of his military experience as a U.S. Army paratrooper. He explains how he worked his way through San Antonio College and struggled through Sul Ross State College despite the aid of G. I. Bill veterans' benefits because he had married in 1958. He discusses his successful efforts as a teacher and coach at James Fenimore Cooper Junior High School in San Antonio and recalls how he met Henry B. Gonzalez through Lalo Solis and worked as Gonzalez' aide at the Hemisphere [sic, HemisFair]. He assails Gonzalez' political maneuvering and discusses Gonzalez' career in Washington, D.C. He addresses his decision to run against Albert Peña for Bexar County Commissioner and talks about his confrontation with George Velasquez. He reveals the reason behind the breakup of the friendship between Peña and Gonzalez and for hiring Peña's campaign manager, Peter Penfield. Bustamante describes his unique campaign strategy when he ran for and won election as Bexar County Commissioner in 1972, including the creation of a comic book and his television debate, and discusses his campaign funds. He notes working with the Committee Organized for Public Service (COPS) while he served as a Bexar County Commissioner and cites his efforts to provide facilities at Mission County Park. He comments on fellow commissioner Blair Reeves and commissioners court Judge Plau [sic?] and applauds his efforts as Bexar County Judge to collect deliquent business taxes to fund county hospital programs. He jumps into his election to the U.S. House of Representatives and points to his election as president of the Democratic freshman class in Washington, D.C., entitling him to dine with Ronald Reagan. He tells of his role on the House banking subcommittee during the savings and loan bailout crisis involving the Resolution Trust Corporation, discusses the wheeling and dealing for military appropriations in Washington, D.C., and argues about nuclear disarmament and the handling of nuclear waste. He expounds on his congressional junket into Honduras and Nicaragua to investigate contras (counterrevolutionaries), the Central Intelligence Agency, and illegal gun sales surrounding Oliver North and mentions the dealings in Central and South America involving Manuel Noriega, Omar Torrijos and Pete O'Shea and their rumored drug connections to La Mena [sic, Mena], Arkansas. He talks about his campaign fundraising and his election defeat by Henry Bonilla in 1992 following congressional redistricting and speaks of the investigation on bribery and racketeering charges into contracts and financial dealings affecting his wife, attorney Rebecca Bustamante, contractors Oliver Heard and Evaristo 'Eddie' García, and Falcon Food Services and Management, Inc. He briefly discusses his financial and real estate woes to cover his trial expenses and he laments his choice of attorney, Tony Canales over Bill Clinton's impeachement attorney, Abbey [sic, Abbe D.] Lowell. He discusses his appeal and request for a presidential pardon, mentions Bill Clinton's pardon of Henry Cisneros, and provides details of his imprisonment at the El Paso Prison Camp. He contrasts the relative unity of the African American community through Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition to the disunity of the Mexican American community, and comments on fellow congressmen such as John McCain, Tip O'Neill, and Jim Wright.

ArchivalResource: 3 videocassette(s) (VHS) : col. ; 1/2 in.Transcript : 190 p. ; 28 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/434047972 View

Berriozábal, María Antonietta, 1941-. Oral history interview with Marʹia Antonietta Berriozʹabal, 1996 [videorecording].

Title: Oral history interview with Marʹia Antonietta Berriozʹabal, 1996 [videorecording].

Ms. Berriozʹabal talks about her family history and genealogy (the Arredondos and the Rodrʹiguezes). She gives details about her political activities while employed as a legal secretary to Judge Blair Reeves who supported her involvement with the Chicano movement in South Texas, and her active role in Raza Unida Party politics. Ms. Berriozʹabal tells about her first professional position as Manager of the 1980 Census office in San Antonio. She gives details about the politics involved with census work and census data applications. She elaborates upon the details of her work as a politician including how she organized, managed, and raised funds for her elections. Ms. Berriozʹabal talks candidly about problems she encountered in San Antonio city politics during her term as council member and her unsuccessful bid for mayor. She tells about threats against her life and members of her family for her assertive stance opposing big business led programs such as the Whitewater Project. She laments that some Mexican American politicians used questionable campaign tactics to oppose her during her election bids for mayor. She gives her opinion of former San Antonio mayor, Henry Cisneros, and compares the differences in political styles between the two of them. Ms. Berriozʹabal concludes the interview by stating that she hopes her legacy will be her work with mentoring young Mexican American women in leadership roles.

ArchivalResource: 2 videocassettes (VHS) (3 hr., 29 min.) : col. ; 1/2 in.Transcript : 124 p. ; 28 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/50420290 View