Antonio Orendain

Antonio Orendain (May 28, 1930 – April 12, 2016) was a Mexican immigrant to the United States where he worked as an agricultural worker and Union activist. He is known for his work as a part of the Community Service Organization (CSO) from 1953 to 1962, as well as his work alongside Cesar Chavez as a part of the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA). Orendain later went on to found the Texas Farm Workers Union (TFWU) to specifically organize agricultural workers in Texas. His father was a guard, commonly known as a watcher, in the agricultural fields of his community and was killed when Orendain was 3 years old. Orendain then lived with his grandparents and worked alongside his grandfather who was also a watcher. He came to the United States without documentation through California in 1950 when he was 20 years old to work as a farm laborer. He met his wife, Raquel, while working for the Community Service Organization (CSO) and they married in 1952. He was naturalized in 1959. Antonio Orendain was a part of the Community Service Organization (CSO) from 1953 to 1962 where he met and worked with Cesar Chavez. Orendain joined the Community Service Organization (CSO) as a part of the anti-bracero movement. The Bracero Program was implemented by the U.S. government after WWII in order to have cheap labor in southwestern agriculture. Orendain and Chavez argued that the agricultural businesses were hiring the cheap labor of Mexican Braceros which aggravated poverty among laborers and pressured growers to hire local workers. After realizing that the Community Service Organization (CSO) could not help farm workers, Chavez and Orendain resigned in 1962, and Chavez founded the National Farm Workers Association which was later known as the United Farm Workers. In 1965 the NFWA began striking. They helped organize and bring nonviolence tactics to the Delano grape strike along with the Agricultural Workers Organization Committee (AWOC). The major reason for Orendain to split from the National Farm Workers Association and devote his time fully to Texas agricultural workers was a confrontation between El Texan Ranch and union workers where the supervisor fired strikers as well as their supporters on May 26, 1975. The Texas Farm Workers Union was created to be more specifically located for the Rio Grande Valley instead of relying on help from the National Farm Workers Union which was based in California.

In 1977, Orendain led the Union in the March for Human Rights which marched from Austin to Washington D.C. where they formed picket lines to earn bargaining rights for Texas farm workers. Their numbers started at 40 and expanded to 10,000 by the time they reached the capital. The Texas Farm Workers Union struggled for years with inconsistent funding and by 1982, it collapsed due to a lack of funds. Some people, however, put the end year at 1986. He is remembered for bringing awareness to the poor conditions of agricultural workers including the low wages and absent health coverage. He is also known for starting the Texas Farm Workers Union (TFWU) and marching to Washington D.C. to bring awareness to the suffering of agricultural workers in Texas. Orendain was known for his encouragement of education as his children remember his encouragement to get a good education so that they could later get good jobs. Because of Orendain, agricultural workers in Texas were able to gain access to sanitary provisions including outhouses and clean water. The United Farm Workers and the Texas Farm Workers Association were both unsuccessful in mass organizing in Texas, but through small scale strikes and protests, the unions were able to bring about better resources for agricultural workers and create farm worker contracts.