[6] The loss of jobs in the Great Depression drove many Mexicans back to Mexico, but approximately 900 stayed in Omaha.
[7] In February 1915, Omaha Police Department Detective Tom Ring was killed while investigating a report of boxcar thieves at a rooming house at 15th and Chicago.
[8] In the early decades of the 1900s, Mexican families established themselves in colonias[9] next to the Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad depot south of Little Italy and Little Bohemia.
[10] Near South 72nd and Q Streets there was another barrio where Mexican families lived in railroad cars next to the Union Pacific-Santa Fe station.
A strong Mexican-American presence thrives there, with numerous public murals and exhibitions of Mexican culture throughout the community.
[18] Shortly after the beginning of World War I, the packing houses and Union Stockyards hired Mexicans as strikebreakers during a labor shortage.
[19] According to the Nebraska State Historical Society, there are a few remaining Mexican elders who came to Omaha through Kansas City as railroad workers for the Union Pacific and the BNSF Railway.
"[20] In Omaha in 1924 the average packinghouse paid $3.36 a day,[21] and in 1928 ten railroad companies employed between 800 and 1000 Mexicans in the winter, and less than 250 in the summer.
[26] During the 1960s both Catholic and Protestant congregations encouraged Mexican Americans in Omaha "to move forward with a more proactive role in claiming their identity and place in the community.
[30] A 1978 study found that Mexican Americans in Omaha felt particular satisfaction with their lifestyle and the services that they received from the U.S. government.
[33] Nebraska's Latino population nearly doubled from 1990 to 2005, largely due to increases in towns with meatpacking operations located within a two hundred mile radius of Omaha.
[35] According to another report, "Mexicans [in Omaha] celebrate Holy Week, one of the most important events in the Catholic liturgy, in remarkable public spectacles.
Dedicated to Latino arts, the museum includes local, regional, national, and international exhibits.
In addition to providing school tours and sponsoring a performing dance group, the museum features exhibits, family activities, art and cultural classes, and special events.
[40] The lack of participation of Mexican-Americans in Omaha in the administration and reform of health care has also been noted as further evidence of the absence of desire to assimilate.