The Latino Big Bang in California: The Diary of Justo Veytia, a Mexican Forty-Niner [Hardcover]

The Latino Big Bang in Californiapresents a Spanish transcription and English translation of a diary written by Forty-Niner Justo Veytia, a Mexican immigrant seeking riches during California's Gold Rush. Veytia's diary offers insights into the dilemmas and choices of an adventurous and ambitious young mexicano and provides a detailed glimpse into the life of Latinos who participated in this tumultuous moment in California history. In doing so, Veytia's diary demonstrates that the US-Mexico War together with the Gold Rush constituted a Latino big bang in California that attracted large swaths of fortune seekers from across the Spanish-speaking world throughout the latter half of the nineteenth century. Combining archival research with quantitative methods to extrapolate demographic information about the persistent presence of Latino communities in California from the mid-nineteenth century to today,The Latino Big Bang in Californiashows how Latino migration and labor forever changed the course of California history.David E. Hayes-Bautistais a Distinguished Professor of Medicine and the director of the Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He is also the author ofEl Cinco de Mayo: An American Tradition.

Cynthia L. Chamberlinis the historian, editor, and translator at the Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. She is also the coauthor of a number of CESLAC’s publications on the history of Latinos in California.

Paul Bryan Grayis a California lawyer and historian and the author ofA Clamor for Equality: Emergence and Exile of Californio Activist Francisco P. Ramírez.This gem of a book offers a poignant glimpse into the life and times of Justo Veytia, a twenty-eight-year-old Guadalajara native whose quest for California gold took him on a two-year odyssey that left him penniless, yelã-