League of United Latin American Citizens, Council 60

The Handbook of Texas credits the 1939 revival of a dormant Council 60 to John J. Herrera, a Houston lawyer. Born in 1910 at Cravens, Louisiana, where his father was sheriff, he counted José Francisco Ruiz and Blas Herrera among his forebears and had Lyndon Johnson as his speech teacher at Sam Houston High. He drove a taxi through South Texas Law School, passed the bar in 1943, and in 1947 became Harris County's first Hispanic political candidate. He organized fifty-three LULAC councils, and as national president in 1952-53 drew the league closer to the American G.I. Forum.

What the plaque says

League of United Latin American Citizens, Council 60 On February 17, 1929, representatives from three organizations met in Corpus Christi to merge and form the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC). The new group sought to unify statewide efforts to challenge racism and inequities toward Texas' Hispanic residents, while also promoting patriotism, education and equality. Although needing only ten members to charter a new council, more than 20 Houston men met in 1934 at a filling station and bookstore at 74th and Navigation to form LULAC Council 60, of Magnolia Park. The group immediately set out to eradicate local prejudice and discrimination, and adopted the national organization's primary goals: improving education, employment and civil rights. Many of their early efforts were combined with the Latin American Club of Harris County, with which they merged in 1939 to become simply LULAC Council 60 of Houston. Local work included securing jobs for Mexican Americans in wartime industries; similar efforts later opened the door to Mexican Americans in the city's police and fire departments. The initially all-male Council 60 organized the LULAC Women Council 22 in 1948 and the Junior LULAC Council in 1949. Throughout the 1940s and 1950a, LULAC, at the state level, was involved with the American G.I. Forum in bringing cases before Texas courts, with one, Pete Hernandez v. State of Texas, going before the U.S. Supreme Court. The cases resulted in anti-discriminatory decisions, including school desegregation and jury selection. In 1955, LULAC 60 moved to a two-story stuco clubhouse at 3004 Bagby. From these headquarters, Council 60 began several important programs, including the "Little School of the 400," considered to be a model for Project Head Start, and SER, which became Operation SER/Jobs For Progress. The group continues to provide leadership for the national organization. (2005)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Buffalo Soldiers National Museum — 0.7 mi
  A museum in Houston's 1925 Light Guard Armory that tells the service of Black soldiers from the Revolutionary War onward, built from one veteran's thirty years of collecting.
• Rothko Chapel — 1.1 mi
  An octagonal chapel open to all faiths, built by the de Menils around fourteen dark canvases by Mark Rothko, with Barnett Newman's Broken Obelisk standing in the pool outside.
• Sam Houston Park and the Heritage Society — 1.1 mi
  Ten historic buildings gathered in a downtown park below the skyscrapers, among them the 1870 house of the Reverend Jack Yates, built five years after emancipation.
• The Menil Collection — 1.2 mi
  John and Dominique de Menil's free museum in Montrose: a grey-sided Renzo Piano building among bungalows, holding antiquities, Surrealism and art of Oceania under natural light.

More markers nearby

• Courtlandt Place — steps away
• Fair Grounds Base Ball Park — 0.3 mi
• The Waldo Mansion — 0.4 mi
• Louis Wiltz Kemp — 0.4 mi