Although preservation efforts have saved structures like the Blackwell School in Marfa, many Mexican schools have since been demolished. Therefore, to access this history, visitors to other Mexican school sites must rely on other ways of knowing the past.

Remembering can be a strategy of resistance to the erasure of Hispanic history in Texas, and visitors to these non-extant sites can still experience the history of Mexican schools through the powerful act of sharing and telling their stories.

Beginning in the 1920s, Bastrop's school district provided segregated education to young Hispanic students. In 1939, the school district purchased two and a half acres for a property that would become the site of Mina Ward.

Since students were banned from attending the nearby Anglo school, they were forced to make the journey across town to Mina Ward. The distance to the school was especially difficult due to the students' lack of access to motor vehicles. In interviews, former students recalled having to walk as much as seven miles just to catch the school bus.

Former Mina Ward student Minerva Delgado was the primary plaintiff in the 1948 landmark case Delgado v. Bastrop Independent School District, which ruled that Hispanic students had the constitutional right to attend Anglo schools.

Prior to this case, schools built exclusively for Hispanic children weren't viewed as segregated institutions, because Hispanics were considered Caucasian. Even after the 1948 ruling, most Mexican schools weren't fully integrated until 1965.

Still, the fight for equal education for Hispanic students continued into the 1970s as disparities between Anglo students and Mexican students who were enrolled in bilingual and dual-language programs continued to be exposed.

All that remains of the former Mina Ward school is a single concrete slab that was once the entry hall of the school. Today, this slab is located on private property, but visitors can learn about the history of the site thanks to a Texas historical marker placed nearby.

During their trip to Bastrop, the authors were able to chat with the current property owner, who mentioned that in their backyard still stands a water fountain once located in the Mina Ward schoolyard.

In 2017, a public park was erected in honor of Mina Ward student Minerva Delgado close to the former site of the school. At the park's opening ceremony, Delgado delivered a keynote speech to community members and former students who had gathered to commemorate the legacy of the school.

Pick up some lunch from nearby Southside Market & Barbecue and picnic under the canopy in Minerva Delgado Park. As you take in the Texas sunshine, imagine what the conditions would've been like for students at Mina Ward. Remember, air conditioning wasn't common in buildings until the 1970s, so Mina Ward classrooms would have been very hot.

As you share a meal, ask yourself what lunchtime would have been like for these students whose friendly banter was restricted to English, to the exclusion of non-fluent speakers. Over food, listen to the testimonios of your loved ones as they reflect on their upbringing.

Under the shade of a mesquite tree on the far left corner of the lot, I laid down my childhood blanket on the yellowing grass. Lauren and I ate brisket sandwiches from Southside Market and bathed in the summer heat as we discussed our experiences in school while growing up.

We were slightly surprised at the similarities and differences we shared. Our schools both provided free lunches. Every student at my school received them, it was an open fact. Lauren's classmates, however, took great measures to hide their utilization of the program as most of the study body purchased their food. I never even knew students paid for school lunches until college.

We both struggled with the college application process and found it difficult to get accurate information from our guidance counselors. We didn't know what questions we were supposed to ask. While I grew up closely connected to my Latinx heritage, living on the Texas-Mexico border, Lauren felt slightly alienated from it.

-Algae

My paternal grandparents were migrant workers, so my father attended school in various states whereas my mother lived and attended school in Mexico, in a city across the river from my hometown of Roma. I shared with Lauren my parents' similar classroom experiences to those of Mexican schools, even if neither of them actually attended. My mother was never punished for speaking Spanish, as that was the dominate language in her classroom, but my father has said that was a threat he experienced in American schools.

My aunt has told stories of physical punishments students received if caught speaking Spanish on school grounds, which was a shocking distinction from the Spanglish environment in my high school.

And although my father and his siblings attended school in the Rio Grande Valley in the late 1970s, a region with a dense Mexican and Mexican American population, their teachers were mostly White. Hispanic teachers became common in The Valley only after universities became integrated and marginalized communities graduated and held degrees.

Lauren’s maternal grandmother immigrated from Mexico to the U.S. in the 1950s. When sharing her experience going to elementary school in the United States, her grandmother shared how her older siblings were put in public Anglo schools. However, the teachers did not know how to teach Spanish-speaking children, and they were often made to sit in the corner, coloring while other children learned. After this experience, my great-grandparents began sending all their children to private Catholic schools where they were given a better education.

When my mother attended school in the 1970s, teachers requested that her parents avoid speaking Spanish in the household so that she would stop speaking Spanish and adopt English instead. As a result, my mother’s Spanish stagnated, and my uncle never learned the language.

I've never been comfortable with the term "Latina" as I look White, didn't grow up participating in Mexican traditions or even speaking Spanish. I've since begun practicing and teaching myself Spanish in order to reclaim my heritage.

Algae and I chatted until a red wasp appeared and ushered us to leave, but not before enjoying the playground for a few moments, including a few slips down the slide. We left Bastrop having learned a little more about one another and about ourselves, sharing not only our personal histories, but those of our families.

Neither of us had a direct connection to Mina Ward, and yet, in sharing our educational testimonios with one another, we were able to reflect on our experiences, our similarities, our differences, and how our histories are tied to those of the former students of Mina Ward.

-Lauren