The Texas Rangers arrived on horseback, with orders to stop the presses (literally) and shut the newspaper down for good.
They expected to show up, close it down, and go about their business. What they didn’t expect was to be met by a young woman, barely five feet two, who refused to let them do it.
The Rangers were there that day in 1914 because the United States government was offended by an editorial in El Progreso, a newspaper published by and for the Mexican American in Laredo, Texas. The column criticized then-president Woodrow Wilson’s decision to send federal troops to the Mexican border during the height of the Mexican Revolution.
Jovita Idár, a journalist at the newspaper, was having none of it. She stood in the doorway of the offices of El Progreso, defending its right not only to publish, but to exist at all.
It wasn’t the first time Jovita stood up for her Mexican American community. Born in Laredo in 1885, she was one of eight children in an upper-class family whose status gave them access to a level of education and economic opportunities that most Hispanic families in Texas didn’t have.
Her father was a newspaper editor and civil rights advocate dedicated to helping the Mexican American community. His children, including Jovita, grew up very aware of their privileged status, and he and Jovita’s mother insisted that their children use their privilege to ensure the same opportunities existed for everyone.
Jovita attended a Methodist school and graduated with a teaching certificate in 1903. She accepted a position at a school 40 miles from Laredo, but the reality of teaching at a poor, segregated school (which most schools for Mexican children at the time were) frustrated her. There weren’t enough textbooks, let alone paper and pencils; many students skipped school, but even on days when the classroom was full there weren’t enough desks and chairs. Jovita realized she wasn’t able to make large-scale change as a teacher, so she left the classroom and began working as a journalist.
She returned to Laredo and joined La Crónica (The Chronicle), her father’s newspaper. At the time, the paper was considered the voice of the Mexican American community, advocating for civil rights and social justice for Mexican American citizens and immigrants. Its content ran the gamut, from hard news to history, biography to poetry, but its most important feature was commentary, with journalists taking on topics like poor living conditions, the loss of Mexican culture, and racism.
Jovita joined two of her brothers on staff, writing under a pseudonym to expose the squalid conditions of Hispanic schools. In 1911 she and her family organized the First Mexican Congress, which sought to unite Mexicans in the United States and Mexico to fight injustice in Mexican communities. Later that year, Jovita founded La Liga Feminil Mexicaista (the League of Mexican Women) to provide free education to Mexican children in Laredo. The two organizations, whose members came from the same wealthy, educated class as Jovita, expanded their influence to support other social causes, including alleviating poverty and feeding the poor.
This all took place against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution (which lasted from 1910 to 1920), and its influence on Jovita’s activism grew.
In March of 1913, Jovita joined several Laredo women to cross the Rio Grande River into Mexico and help the wounded after an attack on Nuevo Laredo. She joined La Cruz Blanca (the White Cross, an organization founded by a Laredo woman similar to the Red Cross) and stayed in Mexico, volunteering as a nurse at the border.
She returned to Laredo in 1914 and began writing for El Progreso, which is where she held off the Texas Rangers.
When her father died in late 1914, Jovita returned to La Crónica, which she ran until 1917, when she married. She also founded a weekly newspaper, Evolucíon, which she published until 1920, when she and her husband moved to San Antonio.
She continued her work there, and within a year started a free kindergarten for Mexican children. She joined the Democratic Party and wrote editorials supporting equal rights for women. She volunteered as an interpreter at local hospitals, and in 1940 became co-editor of El Heraldo Cristiano, a Methodist Church publication. She died on June 14, 1946.
“When you educate a woman, you educate a family,” Jovita wrote. It was the guiding principle of her activism.
Editor’s note: The Texas Rangers did return to the offices of El Progreso in 1914, but decided to wait for a day when Jovita wasn’t there. They destroyed the printing presses, accomplishing their mission to stop the newspaper from publishing.