One more sister to look at

Aaaargh! I made a colossal mistake in an article I recently
wrote for this newspaper. Readers promptly corrected me that Gilroy
has not five but six
”
Sister Cities.
”
Aaaargh! I made a colossal mistake in an article I recently wrote for this newspaper. Readers promptly corrected me that Gilroy has not five but six “Sister Cities.”

Back on Jan. 20, a city council vote gave birth to a brand new sibling for the Garlic City. Located on Portugal’s Azores island chain 900 miles west of mainland Europe, the 15th century city of Angra Do Heroísmo is the hometown of Gilroy Mayor Al Pinheiro. So I definitely made a politically incorrect blunder unintentionally omitting it from my article.

I sincerely apologize for my mistake. “Mea culpa” – “It was my fault.”

To make amends (and get back in good graces with all the nice South Valley folks with Portuguese roots), I will now devote the rest of this column telling you a bit about South Valley’s brand-new sibling. And – as an added bonus – I’ll also explain why the Azores played such a crucial role in our region’s own local history. You see, California might never have been settled by Europeans if it wasn’t for those nine wind-swept islands in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

It all starts with Prince Henry the Navigator of Portugal in the 15th century. Henry began a maritime quest for a sea route to the Asian Spice Islands by sailing south around Africa.

During the search for this route, the Azores were discovered in 1427. By the middle of the 15th century, settlers from Portugal’s mainland began a flourishing Azores island economy producing sugar, wine, wheat and other agricultural bounty.

Construction of Angra Do Heroísmo started about this time. And now in the 21st century world, the city is a remarkably beautiful place to visit – or to be born as in His Honor Al Pinheiro’s case.

The United Nations agrees. In 1983, it designated the central part of Angra as a “World Heritage Site” – a true international honor. Up to the time of the steamship, Angra sustained its prosperity as an obligatory port of call for ships crossing the Atlantic Ocean. Captains stocked up on supplies in town to make the long voyage to the New World.

Visit Angra today, and you’ll definitely want to tour the 400-year-old San Sebastião and San João Baptista military fortifications the Portuguese crown built to protect its precious port.

Situated on an active volcanic archipelago, Angra experiences earthquakes as strong as we sometimes encounter here in California. The city was severely damaged by a big quake in 1980, but is now being restored.

Angra certainly played its role in California history. The Portuguese captain João Rodriques Cabrilho surely made a stock-up pitstop here in the early 1540s before making his exploratory voyage to the New World.

Cabrilho was a top-notch navigator the Spanish hired to head a sea voyage around South America. The Spanish wanted him to find out what lay on the far side of the couple of continents Chris Columbus happened to stumble upon.

Today marks the 462nd anniversary of Cabrilho’s historic landing on a San Diego beach, thus gaining him recognition as the first European to set foot on what’s now the Golden State. On Sept. 28, 1542, Cabrilho became the Columbus of California.

Unfortunately, with their economic success in sustaining the ships, the Azores grew over-populated. Many people born on the islands decided to seek their fortunes in the wide-open spaces of the New World. More than 70 percent of Portuguese in the United States today trace their ancestry to the Azores rather than Portugal’s mainland.

A few Azoreans came during the Spanish mission days and Mexican era to settle in coastal Southern California. But it wasn’t until the mid-19th century that the whaling industry and the Gold Rush brought a flood of Azores-born immigrants here.

In 1848, huge schools of bowhead whales were sited in Alaska’s Arctic waters. A rush was on to hunt the great leviathans for oil and blubber. New England Yankee vessels employed many Azoreans for their excellent skills in sailing and hunting whales.

After a successful hunt, the ships docked in San Francisco or Monterey. With their cargo holds full, crafty ship captains encouraged sailors to “jump ship” so that the vessels could sail back with a mere skeleton crew. The captains thus only needed to pay a few sailors at voyage’s end.

Many of the Portuguese sailors who jumped ship soon brought family over from the Azores to this fertile Promised Land. The new immigrants created Portuguese farming communities in Oakland, Castro Valley, San Leandro, San Jose, and the San Joaquin and Sacramento valleys. They also brought their milk cows from the island, thus establishing California’s huge dairy industry. Today, about 60 percent of the state’s dairy ranches are owned by people of Portuguese ancestry.

The Portuguese immigrants established farms and ranches still in operation in the Gilroy, San Martin and Morgan Hill area as well as throughout San Benito County. Portuguese names such as Sousa, Pacheco and Silva are prominent in the South Valley region. During my growing-up years, I made friends at school in Hollister – as well as at Palma High School in Salinas – with kids with these last names.

Today, the Portuguese in the South Valley nourish their Old World roots with annual cultural traditions such as festivals and ethnic celebrations. Hollister and Gilroy have “Portuguese Halls” originally built in the early 1900s by settlers desiring to uphold their Azorean heritage. These community halls were founded by a religious fraternity called by a name that translates to “the Brotherhood of the Holy Ghost.”

This weekend marks a two-day Portuguese Festival in Gilroy. Whether or not you’re of Portuguese heritage, Tony Leonardo, this year’s president of Gilroy’s Portuguese Festival, cordially invites you to join the local celebration.

I promise you won’t be making a “colossal mistake” to attend the various events. You’ll surely be warmly welcomed by the South Valley’s Portuguese-American community.

Gilroy Portuguese Festival Events

Oct. 2 at 6:30pm: Bilingual mass in Portuguese and Spanish at St. Mary Church in Gilroy. A candlelight procession through the church’s parking lot will immediately follow.

Oct. 2 from 9pm-1am: A dance fiesta will be held at the Portuguese Hall at 250 Old Gilroy St. Around 10pm at the dance, there will be the presentation of Gilroy’s 2004 Festival Queen.

Oct. 3 at 10am: The annual Portuguese Festival parade will begin at the Portuguese Hall and end at St. Mary Church. After an 11am mass, the public is warmly welcome to a free barbeque and “sopas” lunch at the Portuguese Hall. (Donations will be gladly received.)

For more information, call Festival President Tony Leonardo, (408) 842-6947