Traqueros : Mexican Railroad Workers in the United States, 1870–1930

Perhaps no other industrial technology changed the course of Mexican history in the US and Mexico as much as the arrival of the railroads. Tens of thousands of Mexicans worked for the railroads in the US, especially in the Southwest andMidwest. In this study, Jeffrey Marcos Garcílazo provides the first and only comprehensive history of Mexican railroad workers across the United States.

Perhaps no other industrial technology changed thecourse of Mexican history in the United States andMexico as much as the arrival of the railroads. Tensof thousands of Mexicans worked for the railroadsin the United States, especially in the Southwest andMidwest. Extensive Mexican American settlementsappeared throughout the lower and upper Midwestas the result of the railroad. Jeffrey Marcos Garcílazoprovides the first and only comprehensive history ofMexican railroad workers across the United States.

“Traqueros is the first large-scale investigation ofthe substance and breadth of traqueros’ experiencesat work and in their ‘boxcar’ communities. . . .[Garcilazo’s] years of dedicated research haveyielded an intimate yet comprehensive portraitof Mexican immigrant track men and theircommunities.”—Journal of American History

“Garcilazo has made a powerful contribution tothe historiography of the railroads as well as thehistory of Mexican workers in the United States. .. . [I]t is refreshing at a time when analyses of therise of big business and railroads operate at a levelof abstraction that has left the picks and shovels ofcommon laborers barely discernible. Traqueros arean invisible labor force no longer.”—H-SHGAPE,H-Net Review