Panel: "The Birth of a New Symbol - The Founding of the Brown Beret Organization"

In the late 1960s a group of young Chicano militants came together to form an organization that utilized innovative tactics to fight a legacy of injustice in their communities. At the forefront of struggles against institutional violence the Brown Berets' message profoundly resonated with Barrio youth throughout the United States. The CSRC Library celebrates this important history and the recent archival donation by Brown Beret prime minister David Sanchez with a panel discussion on the founding of the Brown Beret organization. Brown Beret founding member Ralph Ramirez will join Sanchez on the panel along with Rona Fields, whose 1970 dissertation was an ethnographic study of the organization. Professor Milo Alvarez, whose research on the Brown Berets examines both the local and national membership of the group, will moderate the discussion.

This event is FREE.

Image: Four Brown Berets leaders--Fred Lopez, David Sanchez, Carlos Montes, and Ralph Ramirez--in Los Angeles, Calif., 1968.

Watch the video of this event here.