“Mostly of Spanish Extraction”: Second-Class Citizenship and Racial Formation in Puerto Rican Chicago, 1946–1965

Extract

Introduction: “Incident Not Racial”

In the summer of 1954, on the Near West Side of Chicago, an unexceptional bit of teenage brawling escalated over the course of a few evenings to arson and gunshots. The trouble began, in the words of one report, when “two Puerto Rican youth beat up [an] Italian youngster.” Then, on the night of July 28, “a wild street fight” erupted, pitting Italians against Puerto Ricans. According to Chicago's Catholic Interracial Council (CIC), a liberal advocacy group, “crowds were estimated to be around the figure of 2,000 at the peak of the incident,” and only the extended efforts of two hundred police officers “restored order.” Although significant numbers of African Americans and Mexican immigrants also lived in the immediate vicinity, there is no record of either group being involved in the near riot.¹

At a small emergency gathering held in the aftermath of the street fight, local clergy and non–Puerto Rican community leaders emphasized that the “incident [was] not racial.”