Photos: California Digital Library

During World War II, the Mexican and US governments instituted a migrant worker policy to ease labor shortages in the agricultural industry. The Bracero Program began on August 4, 1942. Thousands of Mexicans entered the US legally to harvest cotton, beets, strawberries, avocados, cucumbers, tomatoes and oranges.

These photos, taken from 1942-1954, show how the US government “controlled” the border through armed enforcement and health screenings. A desperately poor population, south of the border, was eager to come north to work, for low wages. Just like today.

With the arrival of mechanized farm equipment, such as the cotton harvester, the need for manual labor declined. The program was ended in 1964. But in West Texas and Southeast New Mexico you can still find braceros, many of whom are here illegally. They are among the most exploited workers in America.

Here in Los Angeles, where agriculture is extinct, the presence of illegal Mexicans seems to exist in a historical vacuum. But it has a long history……as yet unresolved.