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FOUR SEASONS BREEZE | APRIL 2026 51 Advances in the struggles of LGBT people sometimes occur because of actions by heterosexual individuals who courageously defend the rights of the LGBT community. In this article, we discuss one such person, César Chávez. We are highlighting him in this issue because his birthday is on March 31, which was declared a federal commemorative holiday by Barack Obama in 2014. The Famous LGBT Americans series will resume in May. Chávez was born in 1927 in Yuma, Arizona. In 1939, his family was forced to sell their farm and became migrant farm laborers in California. He served in the U.S. Navy from 1946 to 1948. He then moved to Delano, California, and became a farm worker. He married Helen Fabela in 1948, and they had eight children. Chávez is known for organizing farmworkers in California as the founder, with Dolores Huerta, of the United Farm Workers (UFW) union. They organized boycotts and strikes and negotiated better wages and working conditions for farm workers. He was guided by his Catholic faith and the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mohandas Gandhi. Chávez was the first national civil rights leader in the United States to support gay and lesbian rights, having done so from the 1970s. In 1987, Chávez spoke at the Second National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights, after walking the entire march route. Speaking with an organizer there from Los Angeles with Gay and Lesbian Latinos Unidos (GLLU), Chávez told her, "You have a right to be seen as gay people and as Latinos." Chávez later sent a letter to GLLU, saying, "we accept you here at the UFW, and you belong (with us)." Subsequently, Dolores Huerta and other members of the UFW participated in the gay pride parade in Los Angeles to publicly demonstrate their support of gay and lesbian people. Chávez died in 1993. He was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Bill Clinton. In 2011, the U.S. Navy named a ship after Chávez. Despite the recent renaming of some naval ships, the federal government last August decided not to rename the USNS Cesar Chavez. For more information and for the sources for this article, please go to the Rainbow Group's Facebook page or request a copy via our email (rainbowgroup@myyahoo.com). The locations and times of Rainbow Group events are available via our Facebook page or email. ~ Dan Hazeltine and Frank Galvan Rainbow Group Spring is upon us and the Steering Committee has been hard at work planning activities for your wine tasting pleasure. Our March "Happy Hour" event was a huge success with members enjoying good company and some great wine! Our next meeting is Thursday, April 16. Doors open at 5:15 pm. As always, bring two glasses, a bottle of wine, and a little something to share with your table. This month we welcome back Heidi Daniels from Michael David Winery. She will have a great line-up of wines for us to taste and purchase. And her wines never disappoint. Also in April, Craig Korotko is scheduled to give a presentation about his career in information technology, and Tom Herron will tell us all about his travels overland from England to India. We are always looking for new ideas or speakers for our meetings so contact us if you have something interesting to share. ~ Tom DePaola, tomdepaola@roadrunner.com, (714) 404-1956 Taste d'Vine

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