San Diego Chicano Park

San Diego has a historic park named Chicano park, it is located beneath the well know Coronado bridge in Barrio Logan, south of San Diego. Barrio Logan was one of the location were Mexicans had arrived and started settling around the area in the early 1890’s. San Diego was already such a historic place to Chicanos living there. So when the government tried taking the land that was rich in history and their culture, the people fought and created what is now called Chicano park. The park is know for its outdoor murals dedicated to the Mexican American culture it is said to have the largest amount of outdoor murals in the United States.

After World War II, the Barrio Logan community became and industry mess from junkyards to metals and other toxic businesses that were affecting the community by creating air pollution. There was constant construction around the area causing loud noises. The city became careless for the location and the community was getting tired of it and refused tolerate it anymore. During the 1960s the black civil movement had inspired many Chicanos. The Cesar Chavez movement started during the 1960’s as well and that sparked the Chicanos to start organizations like MECHA and The Chicano Youth movement, as well. The community had been demanding a park for a while and now they were going to but their foot down. In 1969 the city council finally promised for a park for the inconvenience of the homes loss when the bridge and freeway were build, but no action were taken to build the park. In April 22,1970 the final straw had arise, Mario Solis a Chicano student had found out that the city was planning to build a highway patrol station. He decided that was the end of it, he went door to door handing out flyers to spread the word. By the next day 250 people had gather to at the spot to but an end to it, the occupation of the Chicano park lasted twelve days and the city officials finally agreed.

To start the park the people in the community invited painters all over the world to help them paint murals to describe their culture and their past. The murals in the Chicano Park are beautiful they are painted with a heated passion of a revolution. There are many of them spread out throughout the park area. They represent Mexican American heritage and many of them symbol their community’s struggle. The struggle from the Chicanos was not over looked; they struggle to have a voice and made it all happen. The community made something beautiful from concrete and paint. As for the park itself, there are basketball courts, murals; there are many benches everywhere painted in red, green, and white, which are the colors of the Mexican flag, there are children playgrounds. There is a statue of Emiliano Zapata, one of the Mexican Revolution leaders during the 1910s and there are many more things that represent the Mexican culture. They are many beautiful murals that have caught my attention. The first one that caught my attention was the “Chicano Park Takeover” mural I found it beautiful and significant because this is the mural that describes the making of the park. Painted by Casteneda, Roger Lucero, 1978 and Renovated in 1991.The mural illustrates how the community came together to fight to get a Community Park, all their effort are shown in their mural. The horizontal mural uses brushstrokes with paint, it has the use vibrantly colors and the use of thin lines. In the bottom of the mural it starts of with a Tarahumara carrying a torch referring to the ancient race. On top of that there is the Coronado Bridge and the Coronado bay. Then it goes to the day where the fight for the park all started it shows a man in overalls with a shovel and a bulldozer ready to build the California Highway Patrol Station. On the top left the description of The Murals of the Chicano park “A child has climbed a lamp pole from which he hangs the flag of Aztlan with the three-faced image of the