My Family's Ethnic and Religious Identity

This is an article written by my nephew

Joel Apodaca

 

The ethnic group I will be focusing on will be the Spanish people that came to America from Mexico.  The reason is that, after speaking to my parents, I found out that both sides of my family have ties back to Spain.  Another person I went to about my family’s background was my aunt Rose Apodaca on my dad’s side.  She has been really the only one all of pretty much all of my family to delve into the research of the Apodaca line and where we come from, so I will be talking more specifically about my dad’s side of the family.  She will be mentioned later as I go into detail about my family background.  With all the information I have gathered, I will discuss my ethnic history how religion has affected my immediate family.

By introducing my family history, this will allow me to explain my ethnic background and heritage.  My family and I were born in the state of California, and so were my paternal grandparents.  But as for my paternal great-grandfather's and his parents they were born in New Mexico.  What I found interesting is that my great-grandfather wasn’t actually an Apodaca, his last name was Lucero and his mother’s name was Leonarda Apodaca, my second great-grandmother. So her kids got her maiden name Apodaca instead of Lucero. New Mexico is really the focal point of where my paternal family line starts in America and the Lucero line is what ties me to the Spanish group that came to America.  Many generations back, my paternal ancestors who were of Spanish descent made their way from Chihuahua, Mexico and migrated north into New Mexico. Interestingly enough I even have some Pueblo Indian in me because of the intermarriage that went on.  This is all according to my aunt’s research.

 My aunt Rose Apodaca let me borrow a book about the Lucero line, it is called New mexico’s Crypto-Jews by Ori Z. Soltes what this book reveals is that these Luceros were here in New Mexico ever sine the 1600’s.  The part of the book that mentions Lucero in this passage.  “On May 4, 1662, Francisco Gomez Robledo was arrested is Santa Fe…after his arrest, his brother law Pedro Lucero de Godoy was designated to assist the attachment of his property” (pg.140).  Francisco was charge on accounts of Judaizing, which was a serious charge in that time due to the Spanish Inquisition that was going on.  This would be an example of issues and struggles that my ancestors as an ethnic group were facing. And to be honest, my parents and grandparents didn’t really have any issues of racial discrimination thing like that.  Even though my dad and his family were one of the very few Hispanic families living in Downey, California in the sixties at the time, my dad never experienced bullying from the larger white community.  They were poorer than most of the white community, but that would be really the only issue they had to face.  But I disgress, Francisco was acquitted because they found, out these accusations were just based on hear-say and not actual evidence.  The book, Kiva, Cross and Crown by John L. Kessel, actually records the same incident but goes more in depth about his trial and what happened after he was acquitted.  This passage from that book talks about his trial: “Gomez Robledo fared better before the inquisitors than any others…bodlily examination by physcians showed that Don Francisco had no ‘little tail’ as one of his brother was alleged to have, nor could the scars on his penis be positively indentified as an attempt at circumcision” (pg. 191).

My families relationship to religion doesn’t just start at home, it started all the way back 400 years ago when the Lucero’s first came to America.  The first example I gave you was when Francisco Robledo was tried under the Inquisition in defense pleaded loyalty to Our Lady of Rosary and reverence of La Conquistadora (a statue of the Virgin Mary brought to New Mexico by Francisco’s father). This leads to my next example from the book New Crypto-Jews.  During the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 , the Indians burned the church where La Conquistadora was at, “but that didn’t stop Josepha Grivjalva Sambrano, niece of Francisco Gomez-Robledo, from entering the church and saving La Conquistadora” (pg.141).  My aunt say Josepha is my tenth or so great grandmother.  There was made an engraving on the front door of the St. Francis Catherdral in Santa Fe, New Mexico that depicts this scene of Josepha.  My ancestor’s religion of that time was Catholicism.  It was fought pretty hard for in that time and they were able to hold on to their religion for hundred of years. My grandmother Dolores Baldenegro Apodaca was a Catholic who loved the Lord, with that you can say that the religion survived and made its way all the way down to our generations.  I believe religion gave these Spanish New Mexican’s a solid communal identity to hold onto, one that they knew their children, and their children’s children will fight to hold on to.  I believe it meant more to them than their homeland of Mexico or their race.  Because future generations will have different places of dwelling, but the one thing that every generation would have in common was religion. Josepha went to great lengths to preserve that identity and even her uncle Francisco Robledo pleaded such loyalty to La Conquistadora.

 
As for my relationship to religion, it started in my own home.  I was born and raised a Protestant.  My parents always told me this is what we believe in and there was a God and His son Jesus Christ came to earth to die for our sins.  And I believed what they were saying and everything, but it wasn’t until I was seventeen that a sudden realization came that hit me like a ton of bricks.  No one had to tell me but I realized I didn’t know God.  Yes I said I believed in Him and spoke about him but He never was personal to me.  So I sought God in prayer and asked that I may have a living relationship with Him, and at seventeen that’s when I truly “met God” as I like to say, and now I live this Christian life because that is the path I choose myself to walk.  My father had a similar experience as I did when he was sixteen.  Though my grandparents believed in God and were Catholics, they never really taught their kids in the ways of Catholicism as my dad and mom did Protestantism in their family.  In my opinion after thinking about how my ancestors viewed their religion and how my family and I view religion and God, I believed it changed.  My ancestors viewed it as an identity of communal culture, and were devoted to traditions and La Conquistadora, whereas now my family and I view it as a relationship with God Himself where we walk with Him day to day and our devotion isn’t to traditions but to a person, Jesus Christ.

It is very interesting to have been able to look into my ethnic history, how religion affected my Spanish ancestors when they came from Mexico into America, and to have talked about how my ancestor’s religion compares now to my own relationship to religion and how things have changed.  Many of these historical records and documents are easily lost in translations as they are passed down through time and it makes me very grateful to my aunt Rose for having done this research and finding all these things.  One thing that really surprised me out of this whole thing was that out of hundreds of years that my family line has been around, my Apodaca name goes back to my third great grandparents.  And that I should really have the last name Lucero if it wasn’t for my great-great grandmother refusing to take it for her son Benjamin Apodaca.  Another thing I thought was surprising was that I have Native American blood as Spanish blood in me, which is very cool.

Wedding Photos

My Grandparents

Benjamin Apodaca and Francisca Lopez on

their wedding day.

  

 

My Paternal Grandparents

 

                                                              Mr. and Mrs. Felix Lopez

Request the honour of your presence

at the marriage of their daughter

Francisca

to

Mr. Benjamin Apodaca

son of

Hesiqio Lucero and Leonarda Apodca

on the twenty second of June

Nineteen hundred and twenty-four

at

Santa Rita Catholic Church

Santa Rita, New Mexico

 Witnesses: Aldofo Pena

and

Nazaria Salinas

 

 Felix Contreras and Rita Sanchez

Married on:  7 Jul 1937

Gila, Arizona

Felix is my grandfather's brother. My grandfather is Benjamin Apodaca,

Their mother was Leornarda Apodaca

 

 Severo Apodaca Contreras 

and

Bernarda Sanchez

Married on August 2, 1935

Miama, Arizona

    (Brother of Benjamin Apodaca)

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unas Floricitas

Unas Floricitas

By Ben Apodaca

You can take the boy out of New Mexico, but you can't take New Mexico out of the boy. There is that

special "something" that keeps us wanting to go back.  This yearning can last a lifetime, as it did with my father, Ben Apodaca. He regaled the family with stories and incidents, much to the disomfort of hismom, that he had heard when he was a young boy and during early adulthood. This his story - one he wrote a few months before his sudden death two years ago - Rose Apodaca Martinez, daughter, Whittier, California. 

Ben Apodaca  Picture Taken May 1999

Two months before he passed away.

He wrote this article in 1997

     While searching for ancestors in Dona Ana County, New Mexico, I began my journey in the Garfield, Hatch and Salem area, recalling an old settlement called Santa Barbara that at one time located along the Rio Grande.  My grandmother Leonarda Torres Apodaca, was born in Salem in 1887 and was baptized at the San Ysidro Catholic Church.  I often thought of those places and tried to imagine how my ancestors lived in those days.  I continued on to La Mesilla, still looking for clues.  This is where my grandmother made her First Holy Communion in 1887, at San Albino"s Church.  When I was a young lad, my father had shared a story with me about his family, saying that he had half brothers and sisters whose name was Lucero, but never mention their place or origin.

      Later that day, I was walking through the the cemetery and found a grave marker with the name of Alcario Lucero on it.  I also noticed there were unas florecitas on the grave, and I thought, "Aha! There's someone here that I need to find." That was the lead I needed to continue my research.
     I headed home to Southern California, remembering that as a young man, I had traveled through many of those places in New Mexico, never realizing how deep my my family history was imbedded in the Land of Enchantment.  In my heart I carried all those memories of places in the past. Immediately upon my return I called the Rio Grnade Gazette in Anthony, N.M., and placed an ad in their newspaper to see if I could find living descendants of Alcario Lucero.  Within a week I received a call from Esther Lucero, granddaughter of Alcario Lucero, informing me that her sister, Margaret, from Alabama, was also doing genealogical research.  Through this contact and unas florectias on a grave, I found my family.  The flowers gave a completeness to my heart and soul, brought me tears and sadness, but also brought happiness into my life.

     As I continued my research, I concentrated on looking for Mariana Lucero, who had lived in Anthony, recall that she and her husband, David Madrid, were owners of a large farm in the area.  I had met my Aunt Mariana in 1942 but had lost contact with her. 

     So now I was really on a roll!  In 1994, I made several calls to St. Patrick's Church in Canutillo with no results, then I researched Chamberino and hit pay dirt when I contacted Father Vega from the San Luis Rey Church.  He put me in touch with Pablo Lara, who was the cemetery caretaker, and Pablo in turn told me that he knew a man named Pasqual Madrid.  When I tracked down Pasqual, he told me he had a cousin named Eustolia, who was the granddaughter of my Aunt Mariana.  I was hot on the trail.  I contacted Eustolia and told her that my father, Benjamin, and her grandmother were brother and sister.  She was so excited with the information, and invited my nephew Aaron Magdeleno, and me to visit her in Anthony.  To my surprise when I arrived at her house, I realized that it was the house of my Aunt Mariana.  Eustolia then proceeded to tell me that her grandmother, Mariana, had said she had a brother, Benjamin Apodaca, who lived in Silver City and that they did not visit often due to the long distance.  During our visit, Eustolia showed us a picture that belonged to her grandmother.  The picture was of myself, my sister Felicitas and my two brothers, Dan and Sam.  I now have a copy in my possession and will always cherish it.  On the back of the picture it says, "Para mi Hermana Mariana de parte de tu hermano Benjamin Apodaca y familia, ano 1935." 

I have mixed feelings about all that has transpired.  I sometimes feel sad because I never had an opportunity to know my Lucero family, and on the other hand, I feel happy that I finally got to enjoy their company for just a little while-all because of unas florecitas placed on a grave.

Published in La Herencia / Fall 2001