Jul 27, 2017
(Rigoberto)
Over the last 25 years, according to some who have researched the topic, likely well over 1,000 people have made their way from the state of Veracruz to the city of Northfield. The majority came from the mountain valley city of Maltrata or its surrounding villages. From a few workers taking jobs at Ryt Way Packaging to hundreds of families forming a transnational community, since 2000, Northfield has watched its Latino population explode.
It’s mostly thanks to one city about 1,800 miles away in the mountains of southern Mexico.
The city of Maltrata lies within a mountain valley, surrounded by the peaks of Maltrata. It is situated on the western edge of the state of Veracruz in the south central portion of the country.
The city is about 5,000 feet above sea level, and the mountains reach up to 9,000 feet. The population is about 12,000, but adding in the many surrounding villages and smaller towns, the number climbs closer to 20,000.
Former Northfield Middle School Principal and current Kenyon-Wanamingo Superintendent Jeff Pesta has visited Maltrata each of the last six summers. He collected and recorded a bevy of historical and cultural knowledge on the city.
According to Pesta and other researchers, the city was originally an indigenous Mexican settlement, which was destroyed by Aztecs around 1184. The settlement was then populated by new Aztec citizens. It was later influenced by passing Spaniards and by the Franciscan evangelization from 1530 to 1550, which brought in Catholicism. Today, the community is estimated to be 95 percent Catholic.
The modern economy of the city had long been built on agriculture — beans and corn — in addition to the manufacturing of brick blocks. The latter economic force was severely disrupted in the 1990s. According to Pesta’s research, the exhaustion of clay resources and the passage of the North American Free Trade Act depressed the economy in the 1990s.
At that time, young men, without jobs or suitable wages, ventured toward the United States border, in search of employment.
Rigoberto Lazaro, 50, now a 22-year resident of Northfield, was born in Maltrata, coming of age there in the 1970s and early 80s. He said his childhood was simple but happy. He played baseball and soccer, and he did what everyone in the community did: gathered.
“People were friendly. Everybody,” he said. “We all knew each other. In my culture, you have everybody around — cousins, all the family.”
Lazaro was the oldest of seven siblings. By the age of 13, he was working for one of the brick manufacturers. He’d head home after school, change into his uniform and go to work.
He quit at age 17, tired of the rigorous schedule. His mother helped him get a job in a different town at a pharmacy, but then he was traveling an hour away and wasn’t returning home until past 11 p.m.
“And I’d still have homework to do,” he said. “I was not doing well in school.”
Lazaro managed to graduate high school, but by then, in 1985, work in Maltrata was already sparse. His attention was drawn elsewhere.
“It was not decent work (in Maltrata). They paid low,” he said. “I wanted to help my parents. In those days, it was a big dream to come to the United States. I thought, ‘I want to try this.’”
So he did. He was among the first of his generation of Maltratans to make the trek to America, entering first in California. Soon, he’d land in Northfield.
Northfield
At the turn of the millennium, as noted by Pesta, Northfield was promoting itself as the home of colleges, cows and contentment. The community was driven by an agriculturally influenced microeconomy with some regional industry and the benefit of two prestigious liberal arts colleges.
The colleges helped attract a diverse and often educated populous to the city. That, in turn, made the community more welcoming to influxes of unique culture. The community, though, lacked some of the workers necessary to man local industry.
Around 1991, a couple of the young Maltrata men working in California were invited to take jobs, which paid them more than 10 times the amount they made back home, in Northfield. It represented an opportunity to sustain themselves in the United States and send money back to their families.
Years after the first few Maltrata natives made their way to Northfield, Lazaro headed there. He had a friend from home who told him work was available, and it was. He found a job in Lakeville making cabinets within two weeks of moving to Northfield. He quickly became comfortable in the community.
It was a bit like being home.
“After work, people seem like they know you,” he said. “They’re very friendly. I had a job and I worked the hours I wanted to. I was making good money and sending some back to my family.”
Lazaro eventually moved on to Cardinal Glass, where he has now worked 15 years. He and his wife, Reyna, have raised two children, David, 25, and Nayeli, 23.
The family is joined by hundreds of other Northfield families with roots to Maltrata. Pesta estimates the numbers increased from about 50 in 2000 to 1,500 by 2010.
Transnational community
Pesta defines a transnational community as a distinct migration paradigm that doesn’t follow a classic assimilation cycle.
“You think of a different immigration model — people come from somewhere and within a generation they’ve transitioned to the common culture of the community,” he said. “Transnational communities don’t assimilate at the same rate. Part of being in a transnational community is that you have kids operating in a family split between two countries.”
Maltratan immigrants living in Northfield, are intrinsically linked to one another and to people back home. Their connection to home is strengthened by advancements in communication technology and by a simple geographic fact: Northfield and Maltrata reside in the same timezone.
Cecilia Cornejo, a Chilean immigrant, who has lived in Northfield since 2010, teaching cinema and media studies at Carleton College, is working on a documentary exploring the connection between Maltrata and Northfield. She is spending a few weeks this summer living in Maltrata.
Vega Diaz lives in Maltrata but her four eldest children all live in the United States — three in Northfield. She said half the town seems to live in Northfield. She visited Northfield for the first time this summer, meeting her grandchildren and seeing her children after many years. Though she misses them, she is glad they have found success in the United States.
“I am fine with whatever they want to pursue as long as they are happy,” she told Valdecantos.
Home
Cornejo and Pesta both found in their research that the Maltrata-Northfield migration pattern is not unique. It has taken place in many other places, though little research has been done on similar rural-to-rural migrations, according to Pesta.
“It seems like the way these develop is one person goes and they are able to figure out a little bit of how the system works, and then, soon after, others join,” Cornejo said. “Of course, this is all impacted by politics and policy.”
At 50, Lazaro represents one of the oldest permanent residents of Northfield who originated in Maltrata. When the migration started in the early 90s, it was young men making the trip, eventually joined by immediate family.
So now, about 25 years after the first Maltrata natives made their way to Northfield, the community is only a couple generations deep, the first to be born in Northfield are reaching adulthood. Their experiences are unique from anyone around them.
“The kids born in America that are part of that transnational community will see their world expanded,” Pesta said. “They know how to act at a basketball game at Northfield High School; they know how to act at a quinceañera for relatives; they know how to act when they go down to Mexico.”
Lazaro is happy in the Northfield community. His children received strong educations, both graduating from college after high school. He remains connected to Maltrata. He calls his parents and siblings there every day.
But he visits less. It’s a long trip. The city feels less like home than it once did. He recalls his childhood there, when home was defined by the people around him.
Today, he finds that in Northfield — his home away from home.