MY FRIEND, RAY

Dr. Ray Gonzales, in Franco's Spain, before he got kicked out and told never to come back.

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It was a late summer evening in 2014 when I first caught up with Dr. Ray Gonzales. We were at a get together of a mutual friend in Bakersfield. I always knew Ray but never had the chance to chat with him about anything of substance. It was at this get together I finally was able to talk to him, and watch him in action.

To be sure, I knew Ray was once a U.S. Marine. I knew he received a Ph.D. and that he was one of the founding faculty members at CSU Bakersfield's Department of Political Science (where I am currently chair of the department). I knew he was the first Latino from the San Joaquin Valley elected to the state assembly in 1972. I also knew that he served in the first Jerry Brown administration in the mid-1970s.

What I didn't know was that he wanted to be a priest, but gave that up. He was also the director of Peace Corps in Western America. I also didn't know that he served in U.S. embassies in Central America and Europe as part of their diplomatic corps during the Reagan administration. If that wasn't enough for one lifetime, Ray would return from Europe and become a founding faculty member of California State University Monterey Bay (where my kids now attend).

Ray eventually retired from CSU Monterey Bay and moved back to Bakersfield, where he grew up, to be with his sister.

That 2014 summer evening I watched as Ray held court to an audience of about 15 friends, telling stories about his life experiences. He had been kicked out of Franco's Spain for participating in a demonstration against Franco's regime. He had his life threatened by death squads while serving in Central America (which is why he carried a gun while serving in the region). Ronald Reagan signed legislation Ray authored which granted health care to state workers. The significance there is that the legislation could (should?) serve as a template for health care for all in America. Ray lived life.

As Ray went on telling stories, nobody left. I watched and listened, and said to myself, "This guy's got a Ph.D. and he's still got it." That evening I invited him to teach a class in our department.

Ray balked, and gave what was obviously a well rehearsed speech about age, being tired, dialysis, etc. I said, "OK, why don't we try this. You sign up to teach a small class. If you don't like it, or can't do it, after the first, second, third week ... I'll take it over, with no hard feelings. I just want you to bring what you have to our students." Ray thought for a moment and said, "Let me get back to you."

It worked out, and Ray ended up teaching over the next 2 1/2 years with us, saying all the while that it gave him "grandkid spending money." While teaching at CSU Bakersfield (the second time) he called me "boss," no matter how much I resisted. Imagine that.

In any event, our students loved him, especially how he brought a lifetime of stories to the classroom. Whether it was American and California politics, or foreign policy during the cold war, Ray had the stories. From Jerry Brown to Ronald Reagan, to health care for the disabled, Dr. Ray Gonzales lived a life of action.

My friend Ray passed away yesterday. He was 80. I went to see him in Oceanside about two weeks ago, when it was clear the end was near. He was relaxed about everything, and said, "I've visited everywhere I wanted to go, and read the books I've wanted to read ... I'm ready to go. I'm just tired."

When I left, I kissed Ray goodbye and told him how much I admired and loved him. As I walked out the front door, I lost it. I was leaving a great man.

Below is a beautiful piece that my friend Leonel Martinez wrote for the Bakersfield Californian. It appeared last week.

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Dolores Huerta, my son Sebastian, and Dr. Ray Gonzales at my son's H.S. graduation, 2017

As a kid growing up in Lamont in the 1970s, almost all the adult Latinos I knew were farm workers. I assumed that’s all we could do.

But one day, I spotted a campaign sign for a young Mexican-American running for the State Assembly, and the world changed. I realized Hispanics could also hold powerful positions in society.

Maybe I could too.

That name on the sign was “Ray Gonzales,” and he had launched a campaign that would make him the first Latino to be elected to state office from the San Joaquin Valley. With only two Hispanics in the state Legislature, none from conservative Kern County, victory seemed impossible.

Gonzales shocked the state and won. And in doing so, he cleared the path for other Kern County Latinos to win election in the decades to come. Now 80 years old, and in failing health, Gonzales remains a political warrior with a heart for justice.

“I studied for the priesthood and I studied with the Holy Ghost fathers,” said Gonzales in a telephone interview from his home in Oceanside, where he has moved to be closer to his children. “I had already committed to help the downtrodden. It was kind of easy to transfer my goals and desires to civilian life, where I kind of felt like, ‘I’m still doing God’s work.’”

I didn’t meet Gonzales until 1990s, when I was a reporter for The Californian covering his third and last political campaign against incumbent Mary K. Shell for 2nd District Kern County Supervisor. He lost that race and left town to work for the foreign service and Peace Corps and finally teach at Cal State Monterey Bay. I didn’t see him for years.

After he retired from teaching in 1997 and I left reporting, we bumped into each other again and formed a fast friendship. We had lunch probably two dozen times over a two or three year span and during that time Gonzales virtually taught me a college course on Kern County politics and history.

One of my favorite stories was about when Gonzales had the gumption to turn down iconic labor leader Cesar Chavez in 1971.

The problem was that United Farm Workers’ President Chavez - who has since been embraced with a state holiday and a national monument in his honor - was a much-maligned figure some labeled a communist. One politician claimed Chavez and Gonzales trained guerillas in the hills near the UFW headquarters in Keene, preparing for a revolution. Accepting Chavez’s endorsement, he realized, might scare away conservative voters.

“He said, ‘What can I for you?’” Gonzales recalled. “I said, ‘I need your troops, I need your support … but an endorsement wouldn’t be helpful.'”

In that first political race, against GOP incumbent Assemblyman Kent Stacey in the 28th Assembly District, Gonzales faced steep odds. But his strategy was to run as a college professor, not a Hispanic activist. To do otherwise, he was certain, would be political suicide.

Only 8 percent of his constituents were registered Latino voters. So he stitched together a coalition of Hispanics, African Americans and educators, knowing that was his only chance.

His office had a payphone installed because they didn't have the $800 deposit for a private line, and the whole campaign cost only $20,000. Although Gonzales won, he lost reelection and calls the initial win “a fluke.” Yet, there were other victories.

Dr. Ray Gonzales made enough history to have a calendar made with his likeness.

Born and raised in Bakersfield, Gonzales became the first Latino faculty member at Bakersfield College in 1965. Later that decade, he became president of a group that successfully battled for more minority television reporters. He also staged a picket of the Bakersfield City School District board to force the hiring of the district’s first Hispanic principal. It succeeded.

But I always felt his most important victory came when he formed the Kern County Latino Redistrict Coalition to successfully carve out political districts with a majorities of Hispanic voters. That effort resulted in several Kern Latinos for the first time being elected to office at the state and county levels. The trend has continued.

“That had an impact,” Gonzales said. “It’s ongoing. It took the lid off something.”

Gonzales took a last teaching job at Cal State Bakersfield, where he always requested approval for classroom changes even though he had decades of experience, according to Mark Martinez, head of the Political Science Department.

“When did he get his Ph.D.? Probably when I was 9,” said Martinez. "I’d say, ‘Ray, you know what you’re doing.’ He’d say, ‘No no, you’re the boss.’”

I was with Gonzales at a reception welcoming him as an appointed trustee for the Bakersfield City School District in 2015. He posed for snapshots, grinning and joking, back in elected office for only the second time and 43 years after his first election.

Soon after winning reelection unopposed, Gonzales began experiencing problems related to diabetes and hemodialysis, and he resigned.

Since then, Gonzales’ health has worsened. He depends on others to get around. The political warrior is weary.

“Now, I can’t even sit up in my own bed,” he said. “I run out of gas. I’m tired.”

After almost half a century doing battle to improve the lives of others, Gonzales now reflects often on his own death. When his battles are over, how would he like to be remembered?

Gonzales paused for a few seconds before responding.

“He was a local boy who liked to do good and accomplish some things when he believed something needed to change.”

Leonel Martinez, a Bakersfield College and Cal State Bakersfield graduate, is a technical writer for the Kern County Superintendent of Schools office and a former reporter and columnist for The Californian. Contact him at columnista1@gmail.com.

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- Mark