Emilio Ernest Delgado[1] (May 8, 1940 – March 10, 2022) was an American actor best known for his role as Luis, the Fix-it Shop owner, on the children's television series Sesame Street.

Delgado was "adamantly and morally opposed" to the Vietnam War, but enlisted in the California Army National Guard for six years, serving domestically.

[6] A supply corporal, Delgado was deployed to the Watts riots in Los Angeles, in 1965, where he was "astonished to see weekend warriors being issued live ammunition to use against other Americans.

"[7] That year, he received his first Equity job in a summer stock play starring Martha Raye,[6] and later he was cast in the first Mexican-American soap opera, Cancion de la Raza.

[9] Delgado told the Los Angeles Times: "We are 100% positive in our approach, and we are uncompromising in our belief that our kids will come away thinking of themselves as artists.

"[10] Delgado had a guest role in an October 1970 episode Storefront Lawyers before being cast as a series regular in Angie's Garage in November 1970.

[citation needed] The enormous popularity of Sesame Street created a barrage of groups providing input on the curriculum in its second season.

[14] Seven new cast members were added at the start of the season, including Delgado, Panchito Gómez, Raul Julia, and Sonia Manzano.

[6] The character has been described as the "antithesis" of the Mexican and Latino stereotypes that proliferated television at the time, as he was "an honest, upstanding, hard-working, affable person.

[16] Delgado was named the coordinator of the Children's Television Workshop's Bilingual Task Force, and he was sent across the country to meet with groups.

[6] During Sesame Street's 19th season, first aired in 1988, Luis fell in love with Maria, performed by Sonia Manzano, and married her.

According to Delgado, "to this day, there are fans out there who want to believe that the Luis and Maria wedding episode in 1988 was real, but the fact of the matter is, it was just terrific acting.

Notably, he had a recurring role as national news editor Rubin Castillo on the television series Lou Grant.

[21][6] Delgado starred in Quixote Nuevo that premiered in 2018 at CalShakes Theater in Berkeley, California, then went on tour in 2019 to Hartford Stage in Connecticut, Boston's Huntington Theatre and Houston's Alley Theatre production (2020) of Octavio Solis, a modern Chicano adaptation of Don Quixote.