Ruben Salazar

Ruben Salazar. March 3, 1928 - August 29, 1970. , Ruben Salazar was a prominent and award-winning journalist. He was born in Juarez, Mexico and later moved across the river to El Paso, Texas. After attending high school in Texas, he went on to attend the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), served in the US Army for two years and then returned to UTEP to earn his journalism degree in 1954. After graduation, he worked as a reporter with the El Paso Herald Post. In the late 1950s, he moved to California to report for the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat and San Francisco News. He joined the Los Angeles Times in 1959 for an 11-year career that included work as a reporter, Vietnam correspondent, Mexico City Bureau Chief and Chicano issues columnist. While at the Times in the early and late 1960s, Mr. Salazar reported extensively on equal rights activism and advocacy for Mexican Americans in Los Angeles and beyond. In 1970, he was named News Director of Spanish-language KMEX-TV, Channel 34, and became a columnist for the Times. , On August 29, 1970 Mr. Salazar was covering the National Chicano Moratorium against the war in Vietnam and the disproportionate number of Chicanos and ethnic minorities being killed there. The march drew 30,000 people to Laguna Park (now named Ruben Salazar Park). The demonstration ended in a riot after Los Angeles County Deputy Sheriffs charged the crowd with batons and tear gas. While covering the story, Mr. Salazar and his crew rested inside the Silver Dollar Cafe at 4945 E. Whittier Blvd. After being struck in the head from a tear gas projectile fired by a deputy sheriff, Mr. Salazar was killed instantly. This park is named in his honor, as are other memorials across the country. His legacy lives on not only in East Los Angeles, but throughout the nation and beyond.