Henry Vásquez, oral interview with Rossana Cheng He, Grand Terrace, California, March 21, 2015. Digital Recording

Henry Vásquez is a retired teacher of the bilingual program at Burbank Elementary School in Southern California. He was born and raised in Colton, California. He has two brothers and a sister. When they were young, the family would go to their grandma’s house every Sunday. It was a large family gathering. Mr. Vásquez described it as “you know, very clannish.”

His mother was a stay-at-home mom for most of her life. During World War II, sometime in the 1940s, the government asked the general population to help out while the men were fighting overseas. And so she worked at the local Air Force base at San Bernardino called Norton. “I don’t think it was a very long job. But you know, she helped out. I’m not sure about exactly what she did. It was an interesting part of her life. She got to know people who were doing similar things that way.”

There weren’t exact expectations for the Vasquez siblings in the family when they were growing up. Mr. Vásquez’s older brother Robert enlisted into the Air Force straight out of high school. Robert didn’t serve in Vietnam. His time serving in the military allowed him to mature and get ready for the next chapter of his life. He came back home and enrolled in college. As for Mr. Vásquez, he had to figure out what he was going to do after high school.

“… like what was I gonna do. There were no one’s footsteps to follow. So I sort of did it on my own. But you know, I had uncles that had already gone to college so I wasn’t exactly trailblazing or anything…”

Coming of age during the Vietnam War, Mr. Vásquez’s knowledge about the war increased and his views on the war evolved over the years. He first found out about the Vietnam War when his high school teacher talked about it in class.

 

However, he didn’t give much thought about the war at the time. When he turned eighteen, he had to register for the draft. He filled out the paperwork for the student deferment and it was approved. Mr. Vásquez continued his student life at San Bernardino Valley College and later transferred to University of California Riverside. The war wasn’t really on his mind as he was busy with classes in college.

In 1970, the draft lottery system took effect. Receiving a draft number assignment below 100 indicated a high chance for being drafted. Mr. Vásquez’s number was 71. Within two months, he got the draft papers in the mail. He was shocked, “Like what? I’m deferred. How could this be? It was a very tough time deciding what to do.”

 

After making the decision to apply for conscientious objector status, Mr. Vásquez went and talked to various priests. Collecting letters of support was not easy. The application process “was kind of like challeng[ing] you to the core, like what you really believe. You are raised as a Catholic, but if you study history, you see that at times the Catholic Church has been quite involved in wars. So how were you able to justify that you don’t believe in war?” He talked to many people and got letters from priests, teachers, professors, and classmates to support his position.

Shortly after submitting his application, he was scheduled for an interview with the draft board. The interview itself was yet another rough experience:

“They ask you horrible questions. They ask you stuff like if your mother was sitting right there and you had a gun in your hand, and there was a robber or a thief that had a gun in his hand and was gonna kill her. What would you do? I told them that I don’t think that I would kill anybody even under that circumstance. I know I would be pretty hard to forgive, but I couldn’t take somebody else’s life.”

Unfortunately, Mr. Vásquez’s application was denied by the draft board. He was given the option to petition for an appeal, which he did. Then he was notified that the interview scheduled for his petition had to be canceled and that it will be rescheduled. Months and years passed and he never received a notice from the draft board. He was left in limbo and never found out whether his petition to appeal was approved or denied until this day.

During his time at University of California Riverside, he was involved in antiwar activities. He participated in peaceful demonstrations, talked to people in nearby neighborhoods, made flyers about the war in Spanish and distributed them to Latinos/as in the community. Coming of age during the Vietnam War, being drafted, and applying for conscientious objector status allowed Mr. Vásquez to reflect upon and come to terms with his religious and political beliefs.

Mr. Vásquez graduated from college and went on to be a teacher for the bilingual program in elementary school until he retired a few years ago. Since then, he has been involved in the Inland Empire Future Leaders Program for Latino youths as well as Native American projects in his community.