Ruth Fernández

According to the "Comisiones Nacionales para la Celebración del Quinto Centenario" (National Commission for the Celebration of the Fifth Centennial), she is said to be one of three artists whose contributions have helped unite Latin America.

She became a professional singer at the age of 14 when she would go to the local radio stations, WPRP and WPAB, and sing for 50 cents a day, in 1935.

[7] Fernández was the very first successful Afro-Puerto Rican female singer, and as such, she broke color barriers and stereotypes.

The Mingo band was contracted to perform at a benefit for the American Red Cross in the Condado Vanderbilt Hotel on August 4, 1945.

The director of the orchestra told her that according to the hotel's rules, she had to enter through the kitchen door like all other black musicians (a de facto integration rule, illegal at the time in Puerto Rico, but still in place at the time out of concern for American patrons of the hotel).

[7] She had a long-standing musical partnership with Lito Peña; she recorded two albums with his Orquesta Panamericana, and he wrote and arranged many of her most famous songs.

[6][7] Fernandez has also appeared in two Spanish-language films, and has a role in the Afro-Puerto Rican documentary "Raíces", produced by the Banco Popular de Puerto Rico.

With some reluctance, but agreeing to it as to show she was a good sport, she accepted neighbor Sunshine Logroño's request to sing the song as the theme for his satirical movie, "Chona, La Puerca Asesina" (Chona, The Killer Pig), as a way to emphasize the deeds of Cambucha, the film's hero (played by Puerto Rican actress and singer Nena Rivera) of saving Puerto Rico from the giant piglet after which the film is named.

[7] In 2000, she was paid a tribute in the Antonio Paoli Hall of the Luis A. Ferré Center for the Performing Arts in Puerto Rico.

[6] In June 2012, the Senate of Puerto Rico approved Resolución Conjunta del Senado 957 (Joint Senate Resolution 957) to rename the Museo de la Música Puertorriqueña in Ponce as Museo de la Música Puertorriqueña Ruth Fernández in honor of the singer from Ponce.

[14] She was elected into the Senate of Puerto Rico, representing the district of Ponce as a member of the Popular Democratic Party.

She also looked after the needs of Puerto Ricans living in the United States; a tenement in The Bronx, New York, is named after her, Ruth Fernández Apartments.

Her controversial tenure, spanning over a decade, resulted in the granting of $500,000 to the organization with which it purchased Teatro Coribantes, a theater near San Juan's Hato Rey financial district.

She acknowledged suffering from Alzheimer's disease, but 2010 newspaper interviews depicted her as having occasional moments of (very candid) lucidity.