[1] They settled into a home in the predominantly Mexican Segundo Barrio neighborhood where their four children Aurora, Humberto, Orlando, and Horacio were born.
In El Paso, his father worked in the logging and rock cutting industries, while simultaneously continuing clandestine revolutionary activities.
According to Corona, "We believed the assassins were agents of President Obregón, who feared that the villistas were planning to reorganize and overthrow the government.
"[2] After his father's death, the Corona family returned to El Paso, where young Humberto grew up surrounded by tales of the Revolution and the Protestant social networks of his mother and grandmother.
He remained in the Texas public system until the fourth grade, when his mother, disgusted with the mistreatment of Mexican-American and Mexican immigrant students, sent him to Harwood Boys School in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
As a young student, he was particularly struck by the impact of the Great Depression on the Mexican repatriados and Dust Bowl migrants, many of whom were treated by his grandmother.
As the CIO unionized workers in the various industries throughout the city, Corona and other organizers secured employment for the disenfranchised youth in those same fields, solidifying the bond between the two groups.
[5]The Congreso worked closely with the CIO on the issues of labor rights, police brutality, inequality in schools, and access to public facilities.
Corona also became involved in the struggle against racial discrimination in the criminal justice system when he joined the defense committee of Fetus Coleman, an African American man wrongfully accused of rape.
When, during World War II, their neighbors supported the Japanese American internment, the Coronas moved to an apartment in the Mid-Wilshire district.
They again found trouble when their new landlord complained about their inviting African American union members for visits, accusing them of attempting to integrate the neighborhood.
While the representative was unable to attend, his wife, Martha Fall Rogers, who had been a classmate of Corona's at El Paso High School, did.
Several months after the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, Corona volunteered in the Army Air Corps and resigned from his position with the union.
Following his dismissal from the Air Corps, Corona was sent to Torney Army General Hospital in Palm Springs, California, where he was assigned mailroom duty.
While in Palm Springs, he helped to organize soldiers' fora, which were held every Friday night at the home of the movie producer Joseph Schenck.
The Rainbow Division, however, did not enjoy a good reputation at the time, and Corona transferred to Fort Benning for paratrooper training.
However, while in Neoshe, he ran into Jaime Del Amo, who had served Francoist Spain as Spanish consul in Los Angeles.
"[9] Following his discharge from the Army, Corona and his wife settled in East Los Angeles, taking up residence in the Ramona Gardens housing project.
With Reverend Kendrick Watson and Bill Taylor, he formed Mexican-American Committee for Justice in Housing tp open up the projects to Mexican Americans.
Corona first met César Chávez in the late 1940s or early 1950s, after having heard positive things about him from members of the Catholic and Quaker churches.
Chávez spoke at a conference sponsored by Bay Area chapters of CSO, and impressed Corona with his directness, honesty, and "down-to-earth approach."
While Corona worked with CSO, he was more active with the Asociación Nacional México-Americana, which he viewed as the "real inheritor of El Congreso's more militant and left tradition.
José Revueltas organized a picket of the U.S. embassy in Mexico City to protest his sister's imprisonment that was attended by thousands of college students, which succeeded in pressuring the United States to release her.
At the time, Rivera was working on a mural on the history of theatre at the Teatro de los Insurgentes, and his home was being watched by the FBI, especially for American visitors.
In April 1960, Corona was one of the founders of the Mexican American Political Association, which was organized as a result of the view that the Democratic Party had failed to genuinely address concerns of Mexican-Americans.
Corona was also closely associated with Hermandad Mexicana Nacional, which emphasized organizing unions and defending and providing social services to undocumented workers.
[14] CASA began to work for the rights of immigrant workers, and also provided them social services, including legal help and education.
In 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. invited Corona, along with Corky Gonzales, Reies Tijerina to Atlanta to plan for the March on Poverty.
[15] One of the Corona's significant contributions was to educate the majority population that immigrant workers were a substantive part of the U.S. labor force, not a temporary phenomenon.
As a founder and leader of Hermandad Mexicana Nacional he played an important role in the efforts to gain an amnesty program for undocumented workers in the Immigration Reform and Control act 1986.