PATH OF MEXICAN MIGRATION TRACED
IN SPECIAL DOCUMENTARY "THE TRAIL NORTH"
The history of generations of Mexican migration, represented by one family's journey from Baja California to a new life in San Diego, is the focus of "The Trail North."
Narrated by Martin Sheen and filmed on location in Baja California, the program is based on the work of Sarcramento State Anthropologist Dr. Robert Alvarez, who researched the path to the United States of his own extended family, the Mesa-Smiths.
Alvarez is descended from Thomas Smith, a Yankee sailor who was the first American to settle permanently in Baja California. Accompanied by his 10-year-old son, Luis, Alvarez crosses the border at Tecate and takes viewers on an 800-mile trip to the tiny Mexican town of Las Parras, Baja California. Therre he meets with two elderly aunts and begins the process of retracing his ancestors' steps on their way to the U.S. at the turn of the century.
On the trail north, Alvarez visits Comondu, the town where Thomas Smith settled in 1820 with his wife, Maria Mesa, and further north he stops at the Baja California mining camps founded by American and British companies at the turn of the century. These camps are now little more than ghost towns, but Alvarez stops to talk with some of the old miners and to visit Calmalli, a gold mine which also was home for many of Alvarez's ancestors before they crossed the border.
At every step along the way, Alvarez and his son try to visualize what life was like for their family in the harsh Baja California desert. Says Alvarez, "I didn't want to just go back and see where people came from. I wanted to feel the experience...sense what it was like to be a migrant."
"The Trail North," a production of KPBS San Diego, was made possible by a major grant from the California Council for the Humanities and the California Public Broadcasting Commission with additional funding from the Pacific Mountain Network Program Fund. Producer and writer is Paul Espinosa. Robert Alvarez is executive consultant and co-producer. Thomas Karlo directs.