Mexicans in Chicago
[2] After immigration was largely reduced in the 1920s, internal migration from the Southwestern United States became the primary driver of Mexican population growth in Chicago.
René Luis Alvarez, a professor at Northeastern Illinois University, stated that Whites perceived Mexicans to be apolitical and docile and treated the people originating from Mexico "with a kind of benign neglect and largely ignored their social needs or living conditions.
"[3] By the end of the 1930s the Mexican population had declined from 20,000 in the 1920s to 14,000; this was due to repatriations to Mexico in the post-Great Depression; Louise A. N. Kerr of the Illinois Periodicals Online (IPO) of Northern Illinois University Libraries stated that officials "seem to have been" less harsh towards those of Mexican origins compared to officials in areas of the Southwest United States.
As of that year the number of ethnic Mexicans in Cook County is greater than that of each of the metropolitan areas of Acapulco, Cuernavaca, Chihuahua, and Veracruz.
Pilsen was a historic gateway neighborhood for new immigrants first populated mainly by Germans with some Irish and later by Czechs with other predominantly Slavic peoples (Polish Slovaks, Slovenes, Croats) (Serbs) as well as Austrians and Lithuanians before the arrival of Mexicans in the 1950s.
The Mexicans in the Near West Side settled south of Hull House along Halsted and patronized the St. Francis of Assisi church.
The Hull House residents were displaced by the 1960s construction of the University of Illinois Chicago, and they moved to Pilsen and/or to suburban communities.
[2] Mexicans began moving into South Chicago in the post-1920s period, and there they stuck to defined neighborhoods and were a part of the working class.
[10] Additionally, nearly two-thirds of Chicagoland Mexicans now live beyond the city's borders, expanding their presence far into suburbs such as Elgin and Aurora.
Bill in the post-World War II period, and established a project with the Mexican Community Committee of South Chicago to gather potential recipients of scholarships and applicants to universities, and doing so by asking high school teachers working in Chicago neighborhoods with large numbers of Mexican-origin students to provide lists of names.
[16] In the Vietnam War twelve men who were members of the church were killed in action, the highest death toll from any such parish in Chicago.
[17] Alvarez stated that establishment of the Benito Juarez Community Academy in Pilsen, "[i]n many ways", originated from the Chicano movement and its desire for greater recognition of Mexican-American history and identity.
