Carter Hutchinson  00:00

Okay. We are recording here on, I think it is the fifth of March. Excuse me, the sixth of March. 2025, this is Carter Hutchinson, graduate student at VCU, and I'm interviewing Nancy Rodriguez. And we are in her house in Surry County, Virginia. So Nancy first. Thank you so much for you know, sharing your time with me, and I know that we had to reschedule this a couple of times due to the weather and some other things. So I'm so grateful. Thank you.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  00:40

Well, I'm grateful to you and VCU for preserving the history and the culture that I love and would like to see more acknowledged.

 

Carter Hutchinson  00:56

So, as I mentioned or explained earlier, we're going to walk through what we call in the oral history 'biz an interview guide. It is a suggestion of the topics, it is not a hard and fast rule, but our professors have given us this guidance and so, at times, I may try to pull us back to a question, but that's probably only to really sort of double-check that you said what you wanted to say about that topic. Okay? So, we will get started. First off, Nancy, could you share a little bit about where your family is from and your childhood? You can take that in whatever order you'd like to.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  01:52

Sounds great. I'm delighted to say I had a great childhood, a unique childhood, because -- both my parents were immigrants. Mom came from Brazil, and they actually -- her journey to America was kind of interesting. She was an infant, and my grandparents took her on a boat and while they were coming up to America, they were stopped by a German U-boat. And they took all the women and children off the boat, my mother and grandmother being there, and they were going to sink the boat because it was on its way to America. Fortunately, the boat was under a different nationality -- it wasn't a U.S. boat -- so my grandfather was rescued. They returned to the boat and made it all the way to Ellis Island.

 

My father -- however -- was probably one of the most interesting people I'll ever meet in my life. He fled Portugal at the age of fifteen. He stole somebody's passport to get to Brazil. He came from a very rural community. His father was very abusive. And so, he made his way to Brazil on this fake passport. Then, he stowed away on a boat to come to the United States. And he was discovered. So, they put him to work feeding bananas to the monkeys that were on the way to the Bronx Zoo.

 

[Laughter]. So, when he reached the dock in New York, they ran into -- then, they were called N.I.S. agents -- and they asked my dad how much money he had in his pocket. And my father said twenty dollars. That -- I mean we're talking back in 1920, I mean that was a lot of money. So, they said, 'give us half. And that buys you thirty seconds.' My father outran them. So, as far as I'm concerned, my dad won the Olympic Gold.

 

And he, you know, came and was essentially homeless, and started working. He would go for job interviews, and he -- they would say, 'have you ever done' such-and-such, and my father spoke no English, so he would say 'Yes.' And then just watch what was happening and continued to do that. So, fortunately, my father made his way to Newark, New Jersey. And while he was in Newark, he heard that there was a Portuguese family, because my grandparents were actually Portuguese, but they moved to Brazil, and at the time, immigrants would go out of their way to find other immigrants to find other immigrants who spoke their language. So, he went up to Bronx, New York, and my mother opened the door. And that's how they met. But the childhood of the two of them together -- were an amazing couple. There is actually, when the New Jersey Art Center opened up in Newark -- JPAC, as it's called -- they opened it up with a documentary. And I was the first person who spoke during the documentary, because I talked about the fact that growing up, we would get a knock on the door. And there was a stranger with a little white piece of paper in their hand saying 'Ninety-One McWhorter Street, Newark, New Jersey. Daniel Rodrigues.' And, you know, I would say 'are you hungry? do you need to use the bathroom?' Again, all in Portuguese. And my father and mother became, like, the magnet in the community -- to the point where the Portuguese community in New Jersey was considered the 'up and growing' community that was started by five individuals. And my parents were two out of the five.

 

 And my mother was the person who would take the kids and enroll them in school and get that started. My father would help them find a job, and he would do that. But, coming from that community, I also learned the fear. And that was, as immigration in the United States started developing, and we were no longer welcoming immigrants -- people seem to think that's today, but it's been going on for a long time -- I would know, we would have people in the house who were being looked for. And so, I know what the fear of a knock on the door is, not knowing who those people are. My dad owned a fuel oil business with my mother, and they owned something like sixty- to seventy apartments -- understand, this is a man who came homeless, and my mother with a high school education, I mean, they just worked and worked and worked and socked everything away. And so, he -- because the fuel oil business makes money in the winter, but not so much in the summer, so he would do an import-export business. Well, our back yard had these big garages where they would work on it, and, Carter, the most amazing thing was this guy all of a sudden jumps from the roof down to -- probably twelve, fifteen feet -- and, you know, broke his leg, but tells my father very quickly that immigration is after him. So, my father was building a box to send to -- actually Spain at that point -- my father says, 'quick, get in the box,' and then hammers the guy in the box when the immigration guys start looking around and inspecting.

 

I mean, that's the kind of environment. And my father -- my sister -- is older than I am. So, he called her over and he said, 'tell them I can't speak English,' which was true. 'But just tell them what I tell you. That's it. Don't add anything,' what-have-you. And they ultimately went away, my dad put the box in a truck, took it down the shore, paid in cash to fix the guy's leg, and the guy turned out to be part of a Puerto Rican gang. And my sister and I, from that day forward, had gang members walking us to school and back. [Laughter]

 

So, I mean, that's my childhood -- is really a case of all those memories in the family.

 

If you would walk down what would be the comparable street to Broad Street -- okay -- it's called Ferry Street, in Newark. And it's near Penn Station, and it goes up, and it's a merchant thing. All the signs are in Portuguese. All the signs -- to now -- they're in Portuguese and Spanish. But you would go to a store and, depending on if it was the Kidden lady who owns it, you would say 'leche' or you would say 'leite', if it was a Portuguese owner. I mean, it was just that kind of community.

 

Growing up, too, our grammar school was like a United Nations.

 

So, whoever -- whoever was the newest kid, we would adapt to their language. And my mother even recalled telling me, one time, I was speaking Chinese. I mean, you just learn.

 

But I bring this up for a reason -- which shows the unique experiences that you have in -- a community that is well-integrated with folks. We were in class, I think I was like -- well, it was during the Cuban Missile Crisis, so that will set the stage. And the young lady who came in had just come from Cuba, and she was there for maybe a few weeks, not anything more. And then, at that time -- welcome to my generation -- we used to have air raids where you would have the sirens go off, and you would go in hunker down on the floor. You would think -- you know, we loved it. Because that meant you got out of time -- come on.

 

Fire drills, same thing that we have today, and everybody does it. Carter, the air raid sirens went off and this young lady started screaming -- screaming. 'Where's my father?' you know, 'oh!' For her, bombs were coming.

 

She had experienced that drama, that drama in her life, and so they had to usher her out. They had to She had experienced that drama in her life. And so, they had to usher her out, they had to bring her parents so it would calm her down. As a result of that, none of us -- none of us -- liked air raid drills from that point on. Because all of a sudden she made it real. It was no longer. It wasn't a joke, exactly, and so in that respect, and to be honest with you too, being the daughter of two out of the five gangs. You know, it was both a blessing and a curse, because if I was seen talking to a boy at the bottom of the steps, my mother was getting a phone call inside the house. So there was a lot of pressure, you know, to be the example.

 

Carter Hutchinson  14:43

A lot of expectations.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  14:46

Very much so. But the expectation from my father was always to be happy. Both expectations were to be educated. There was no doubt about it. When you think about the fact that my mother graduated high school, my dad got to the fourth grade in Portugal but did not have enough money for shoes. And there was a requirement that you could not go to school barefoot. So, he stopped going to school as a result of that. And, when you think those two individuals -- my sister got her PhD., and she was dean at a university, head of the Foreign Language Department at the New School for Social Research, and then dean at Hudson County Community College, and I didn't do too badly.

 

But, maybe at this point I should explain that one of the reasons I went into political -- political science was the fact that, from an early age, a child's age, I saw the importance of the law. I saw the importance of standing up for people who could not stand for themselves. I just learned, in my mother's words, a Bible verse that says, 'to he is given much, much is expected.' So that is why I went into politics, and worked my first campaign at age nine for J.F.K. And my mother was the first woman elected to a national convention from Newark, New Jersey -- period. And she was a delegate to the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago. So, and then I later returned as a national delegate to Chicago in 1986 for Clinton.

 

So, it was just that belief that one had to speak up for those who couldn't be heard. I hope I've answered your question.

 

Carter Hutchinson  17:45

I think you -- certainly. What can you remember -- what stands out to you in your memory -- about your educational experience? You know, in your youth? You know, you just touched on it a little bit, but maybe you could talk a little bit more about that.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  18:02

Again, the time and the era -- Newark was the eighth un-safest city in the nation. The Newark public school system was being embezzled. The mayor, actually all the mayors that I grew up with were sent to jail. [Laughter] From Addonizio to Ken Gibson to you-name-it, they did that. So, by the time I graduated Lafayette Street School, at -- which, by the way, I'm still in touch with my best friend, Denise Taylor, who's there -- who was there. She -- I digress, but -- what I learned from that experience was, I was behind. I had the measles and missed two weeks of school and was never taught phonics. So, my parents saw, when my sister graduated -- she graduated three years ahead of me -- that she just did not want us -- they did not want us to go to the local public high school, and sent us to an all-girls private Catholic high school. That really helped improve my reading skills, my -- you know, determination. Since it was an all-girls school, I wound up being the editor of the school newspaper, you know, on student government, you know, just -- wound up being Marylawn Girl of the Year when I graduated. [Laughter]

 

Just because I've learned I was able to do it, but I -- I would have like three, four hours of homework a night. Part of that was catching up, but my parents created little offices for us, and really told us that was our job. Our job was to become educated. And one quick story about that, I was at Rutgers University when I went on to graduate with honors, and I said to my mother, 'I want to get a college ring.' And you know how expensive they were -- they were expensive back then too. And, she said, 'well, why do you want it?' And I said, 'I want everybody to know I graduated college.' And she said, 'Nancy, if when you open your mouth, they don't know you're a college graduate, a ring's not going to do it for you.'

 

I mean, my -- my parents were tough.

 

Carter Hutchinson  21:13

It's an experience, thing to know as well. It's not something that you just you know?

 

Nancy Rodrigues  21:18

And also, too, that immigration, that when -- my parents wound up starting a scholarship program because some of my sister's friends, because she went before me and my parents saw it happening with her friends, that as soon as the girls were graduating high school -- or, as soon as, actually that's not true, I take that back. As soon as they turned sixteen, I think it was, or whatever -- sixteen or eighteen, memory -- their parents put them to work in factories.

 

You know, they -- that was the thing. So, our parents started a scholarship to enable anyone to go to college. And that organization, or scholarship, lasted -- oh -- forty years, and then it was sucked into Rutgers University in an endowment. So, you know, I knew from an early age that there was no way I was going to get out of graduating and going to college.

 

Carter Hutchinson  22:52

I wonder if you might explore a little bit more -- any sort of connections that you see between your parents' experience and the value that they placed in education?

 

Nancy Rodrigues  23:12

[Sighs]. My father was denied an education. So, he never got over that. He never, never got over that. My mother graduated cum laude, or actually valedictorian, and my grandfather would not send her -- allow her -- to go to college. I think part of it was the denial, but at the same point, education is the greatest social leveler. I know Hobbes says death, but I think it's education. Because how else do you explain a kid from Newark, New Jersey, who -- English wasn't her first language -- and went to a very -- a grammar school that was being pilfered -- wind up serving three governors and being an 'honorable'?

 

You know, that's the only way it happened, Carter. You know, our family, though -- in a way, I left Virginia for multiple reasons, but one of the reasons that I love Virginia and made it my home as a result of it was -- I was not Elvira and Daniel Rodrigues' daughter, I was not Linda Rodrigues' sister. Not that I'm not proud and honored to do it, but here I had oxygen to be myself. And I felt -- could I build the house of my dreams? Could I literally achieve -- help people? What can I do that would pale in comparison to what my parents were able to achieve?

 

I should add, the street where I grew up is now known as the Elvira and Daniel Rodrigues Plaza in Newark, New Jersey. You can -- what is it -- GPS it, and it'll come up, it'll tell you exactly how to get there.

 

It was amazing. It was. And I really was blessed with all of that. But I also learned that -- we -- I see it every day where people take certain things for granted. And, I guess, having the experience of seeing the guy in immigration, and then also seeing where bad things to happen to good people.

There were -- in my graduating class -- if memory serves me correctly, about six girls who were pregnant. So, I mean -- it was just a total -- grammar school, mind you. And grammar school in New Jersey was up to eighth grade, you know, there. So, I think I answered your question.

 

Carter Hutchinson  26:59

Absolutely. Yeah, I, I can't, of course, when I try to imagine, it seems to me that something comes to mind that you just mentioned, which is that it, it must have been apparent, you know, too horribly, too apparent for folks coming to this country to sort of see, and education might be one of those especially important examples of people in this country not appreciating what they had, and that might be, you know, 1000 times more stark for somebody coming from your parents perspective to see, you know, these kids that aren't necessarily taking advantage of what they have, and so that maybe…

 

Nancy Rodrigues  27:57

Well, but to part -- that's why my parents started a scholarship foundation. Because people were coming here and -- put the kids to work, put the kids to work. And, my parents were at the forefront of saying, 'No.' I have to be honest, too, Newark, New Jersey, was one of the last cities -- major cities -- to do any English as a second language, and it was because of my mother who had been on the school board.

 

She was tough stuff. And she, her belief was doing English-as-a-second language was condemning those children to a second-class existence. My parents would never allow me to use 'ain't.' I had to speak clearly, as a matter of fact, people are very often surprised when I say I'm from Newark, New Jersey or -- New 'Yawk -- no! It was always clarity, and one day my mother heard me use a curse word -- so, from that day forward, if I ever said a curse word -- and you've known me a long time, have you ever heard me curse? Okay, and I'll tell you why: My mother made me, any time that I used to curse, go to the dictionary, look up ten words -- find ten words that described what I was feeling -- and substitute and come back to her with one new word out of those ten. And if she didn't like it, she'd say, 'well, what was one of the other words?' [Laughter] Just to see – Yeah, they were --

 

Carter Hutchinson  30:07

Wow. That's such a good that's such a great idea for any place and age. That’s --

 

Nancy Rodrigues  30:13

I know, it just -- if -- the quote I gave you earlier -- about Benjamin Franklin?

 

My father knew very -- very little English. 'Very happy to meet you', 'That's very nice', 'You better do better on your next report card or else' -- was Benjamin Franklin. And he said -- he said, 'If you don't believe me', you know, in Portuguese, 'read Benjamin Franklin.' 'He says right here', you know. 'A man who pours money into his head shall never be robbed'. So, you need to do that. So

 

Nancy Rodrigues  31:04

So that's why when you asked me if I would do this, it's education. For both of us.

 

Carter Hutchinson  31:14

Absolutely. One of the things that our professors are interested in -- and you talked about growing up in Newark, the interactions, experiences that you had with your community there, and -- with the Brazilian, Portuguese, Latino community more broadly -- what do you remember about family members that were not in America? At that time through your childhood, or -- were there letters, communication, visits occasionally, or anything like that?

 

Nancy Rodrigues  31:58

Remember, I was the person -- first of all, I thought everybody in Portugal, or Brazil, was related to us. -- because they'd knock on the door and they'd say 'hey', you know. You know, it was a big thing to -- um -- phone calls.

 

I mean, it was -- there would be like twenty people in a room with one thing and it was like outrageously expensive to call abroad, or to Brazil, but, you know, you'd pass the phone around. That was -- you know, there would be a date and a time, and everybody would be standing around waiting for that -- that moment. It was always a big deal, yeah. We always had people visiting and enjoying -- we also made sure that they brought things from the old country to us. And it's -- the other thing, though, Carter, I don't know how to explain this, I just also have a weird definition of 'family'. Because there's a dear fr -- I guess, I always thought of Jack as a brother growing up, but Jack and his family came to America and had a one-room place. They went out their first night in America to go eat something and while they were gone their house burned down, or their apartment burned down. So here they were in a strange country, not knowing the language, and no place to live. And what little money they had went up in flames. They were given -- Jack and his father came to Ninety-One McWhorter Street, knocked on the door and said, told, this situation. And, you know, my father had apartment things, but he didn't have any vacancy, but he said, 'but we have a basement.' So, Jack, Celeste, his sister, Lucille, they lived with us for about a year. And the first thing my mother did was sign Jack up for school at Lafayette, and got people jobs, and my dad did that, but it was like that all the time. I consider them family. You know, I really do.

 

So, you had the family from Portugal, and Brazil, because I have an uncle who lived in Brazil, and my first cousin still lives in Brazil, from my dad's side -- and my mom has also relatives there. I just feel like my family is also the immigration family, the ones that I've come to love and to feel that they are there. At one time, we had -- with rel-, relatives were coming over to America -- so we would have as many as sixteen people sleeping in our house -- and it wasn't as big as this house as I have -- and seventeen people eating. So, family would also come over, because by then, you learn the system. So, you got them jobs -- as a baker, as this, or that -- work visas were much more easy to get. And so that's how my father was able to bring over the rest of his family.

 

My mother's side of the family -- my parents, give you an idea, my dad was fifty when I was born. So, they were much older, so they came into a certain extent when the immigration wasn't as it is today, where you have to know somebody, or pay thousands, tens of thousands of dollars, all you needed was, you know, Mr. Bita from the bakery saying, 'yeah, I could use another baker', and called over João, who was my cousin, João is 'John' in Portuguese. So...

 

Carter Hutchinson  37:21

Um -- I am sorry, but I have to say one thing, which I am sure I shouldn’t be as the interviewer, here. But, since we know each other, I think it's interesting, only just now -- and it should have clicked three, or four, or five minutes ago -- um -- I can see -- uh -- where some of -- I'm thinking about when we first met each other. It was a period of time when -- and maybe you could talk about this a little bit, what this makes you think of -- when there were very important people that -- a man who was just elected governor, for example, who needed a thousand things to happen at one time, in a period of thirty days -- maybe ten, at first, even -- and nobody really knows what to do. And I'm remembering how much you really -- um -- there wasn't a thing, you didn't limit yourself in any way. You wanted to help, and whatever needed to get done, you made sure that it got done during the McAuliffe transition. And I can see a real difference in how a little people approach situations versus that. And I can see how maybe that came from your experience growing up.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  39:00

Absolutely. I think you're very perceptive on picking that up. Absolutely. I have got a creative mind, I just -- you know, if something needs to be done, you do it. You don't -- since you were in that environment, you were -- many people will go, 'just do this, this and this.' And that's not what people were asking you for, they were saying 'I need help.' You know? You don't need somebody to tell you what to do, what you're trying to do. You know, Paul and I used to joke about that. Paul, who was head of transition and later -- I thought for the recording, I should identify him. Paul Reagan, who then later became chief of staff. We used to joke about that. He would go like this [hand gesture]. 'You know what to do.' Hand me a piece of paper. Because he knew it'd get done. You know, it wouldn't be like, 'Oh, what do you want me to say?', or whatever. I figured if that's not what he wanted to say, he would change it. But, you know, it's -- at that high a speed, you had to get the ball moving.

 

Carter Hutchinson  40:21

Well, and -- I mean, I'm sure that you wouldn't, maybe, lead with this, but I will say that -- um -- most people that -- um -- reach positions of high authority, especially in political environments, don't you think that, often, their answer is to find somebody to do the thing that they want done? And that must have been one of those things that really set you –

 

Nancy Rodrigues  40:57

Apart? I -- I have been told by more than... one person -- and people I respect -- that, even made me feel more humble -- was that they felt that I was the most humble secretary that they have ever met in their life, who really genuinely cared about what was important and not the demagogue, not the points.

One thing I do want to add, because we talked a lot about New Jersey -- but this is one of the reasons I love Michel Zajur as much as I do -- I had just finished a about a decade being an executive director of a nonprofit and it was an incredible experience. It was DRIVE SMART Virginia. And -- a lot of accolades, you know, Federal Highway Administration, NHTSA gave me an award, I mean, the awards were ridiculous. But it just got to my soul with all this -- comforting parents whose kids didn't wear seatbelts, and -- you know, I passed as many laws as I could with the help of really terrific people -- Bill Mims among them, Bill Mims among them -- that I just needed a break from that, and I went to volunteer at the Virginia Hispanic Chamber because one of the things I was missing in my life was not having what I grew up with, and so I think that's why Michel and I have a bond. Because I really believe that -- I -- what they did, the free legal -- the free legal advance there -- Laura Sanchez was a saint, she started the foundation, the chamber foundation. But I would see immigrants come in every day, and the stories they would tell are horrifying. I mean, people don't understand that part of this immigration -- equivalent -- especially... You know, my dad left a military dictatorship -- Salazar -- but what's happening even now [Part I., 43:53] in some countries, and my daughter-in-law is from Colombia, these drug gangs are just unbelievable.

 

I sometimes, in having political discussions with friends who believe that I might be more of an anti-immigration, I have no idea -- maybe they don't realize my last name's Rodrigues -- but I look at them and I say, 'Okay, if your daughter stood a very good chance of being raped any time she left the house, or your son, or your wife -- your daughter, or your wife, or your son -- could be kidnapped, or forced to join a gang, what would you do? What would you do? Would you just say, "oh well," you know, "I'll just go vote 'em out."?' You know? It's mind-boggling to see.

 

What I -- one of the things that you happened to tap on -- is I have a very strong work ethic. And I think that's part of the immigrant experience. You know? To achieve the dream. I mean, I am the face of the American dream, if you will. You know? From a homeless guy from coming here, as I mentioned earlier, to being 'the honorable.' And Linda being 'the Doctor'? And we're talking one generation. And my father was fifty when I started. [Laughter] You know?

 

Carter Hutchinson  46:04

Um -- could you -- uh -- share a little bit of your memories about when you -- any memories that come to you that you want to share -- about when you first decided to live in Virginia, and what -- sort of -- getting to know Virginia -- was like for you?

 

Nancy Rodrigues  46:25

It was somewhat of a difficult -- I went to William & Mary graduate school, and I think I was the only person with brown eyes. I was certainly the only person driving a Toyota, not a Mercedes or whatever yeah, so that was kind of a culture shock, if you will. I was doing a favor, bringing -- I belonged to an exercise group, it was called 'The Body Shop' -- and a friend of mine was running out of time and she said to me -- 'Tommy Norment was marrying Carl Humelsine -- who was the president of CW-- 's daughter -- '

 

'-- and I need to get a gift over' -- she was just telling us, and I said 'Well, I'm going that way. Do you want me to just drop it off?'

 

'-- to you?' -- you know -- 'for you? You know, I can do that. It's just dropping off a gift.' [Laughter] So, I took a gift to the house and whoever answered the door said, 'Servants go to the side.' And I went 'Whoa, whoa, whoa' -- I said -- 'I'm doing a favor for so-and-so, dropping off this gift, if you don't accept it from me, I'll be happy to tell her that you rejected' -- you know -- 'rejected the gift.' [Whispers] She was pissed.

 

So, I mean -- that was a real -- the other thing was to see the treatment of Blacks. That was -- now, I actually lived up living in Braxton Court, which is an African American neighborhood, all professionals. I rented the house from Doctor Blaton. Fred Crawford, who lived across the street, was the chef of Williamsburg Inn, and Braxton was the architect, so I really -- I felt more at home there than in other places. I still do. When I moved to Surry, it was eighty percent African American. It is now fifty-two, fifty-three percent Caucasian. I'm getting out. [Laughter] No.

 

Carter Hutchinson  48:59

That's interesting too.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  49:00

Yeah, it was a different -- different kind of culture, but for me, because I've sat at the 'big boys' table,' if you will, there's -- I've also risen to where I am because I don't tell tails out of school -- but I do see a lot of ... two-facing, you know, where I just -- I just -- [gestures] -- I literally sometimes get nauseous.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  49:50

I do believe, though

 

Nancy Rodrigues  49:54

Or just walk away. I do believe, though -- also through the Virginia Hispanic Chamber -- I was glad because I was able to help, you know, some folks with immigration.

 

But the guy who -- I know this kind of gets off the topic -- but the... Rob Redmond, Bob Redmond, Bob Redmond, was actually the lawyer who started that free clinic. And so, he's kind of an interesting person as well. And there are some really terrific friends who are doing it -- not to garner political support or to do business -- but because it's the right thing to do. And there's a lot of people -- there's a lot of people in the Latino community who want to profit from each other. I know that for twelve years, just about, I was the highest-ranking Latino in state government. And there are some, because I don't speak Spanish, who would say 'Well, she's not really Latina.' And I look at them and I said, 'Well, let me ask you a question: do you know what it's like to hear a knock on the door? Do you know what it's like to have, you know, eighteen people -- seventeen people -- sleeping in your house, eighteen people, you know, feeding them? Do you know what it's like to have to take kids, have to go up with people...'

 

I -- so, some of my childhood memories is public service -- which is Dominion Energy -- and turning on lights, being the translator. One of the things -- and kind of moving this conversation a little forward -- is, I know we were talking about COVID –

 

Okay -- this is going to relate to COVID and what I was saying about being that little kid who had to go with a couple, or a mother, or something, to register the kids at school, the public service, you name it, even if it was to go make change because they didn't understand the dollars. Well, COVID happens and our governor at the time, who I love dearly, put out a call for the Virginia Medical Reserve. So I sign up because I know there's a lot of resilience, and I know that I could help translate. So that's what I did. I was -- I would go to the vaccine things and translate.

 

Well, I went to one and the women come in with their little kids, right? And the kids are there to translate. So, I said, 'I know what that feels like.'

 

Well, you know, 'it's the Commonwealth of Virginia, you know, we don't want to take the word of a kid when we have somebody who is an adult that we could arrest if they do something wrong' -- you know? [Laughter] So, the nurse poo-pooed the kids and said, 'Well, no, she'll take care of it.' I turned to them, and I said, 'You know what? I was you. I know exactly -- and you know what -- I bet you speak Portuguese better than I do. So come here. I need your help. What I need to do is: she's going to ask a question and I'm going to translate, and you tell me if I did it right.' And, you know, we did this. And then I would go, 'Oh, I can't remember the word for "b"' -- bibietta, I know what -- 'oh, yeah, bibietta! Oh, okay.' -- and so the kids really got into it.

 

And so the nurse later came up to me and said, 'I'm sorry' -- to the little kids -- 'I didn't realize that you really knew how to speak it well.' And they said, 'Oh, not a problem. Not a problem. She did a good job!' [Laughter] You know? Which I thought -- but it was that -- or, also I'm a notary. And so at different events, like Farianata Trumadad, which is another -- that happens to be something that the chamber does -- I will notarize affidavits for them. And the affidavit is, 'my spouse, my whatever, is in jail.' And -- 'so I can't get him, or her, to attest -- so I can take my child, who was born in America, back to --' wherever. 'I just want to go home but I can't do that without having it.' So, I mean, I probably would do like forty or fifty of these in a day. But if the kids came, and they were there, I would say, 'Okay' -- because at the time, you remember, you had that -- Latinos love, you know, the embossment -- everything you go, there's a seal on it.

 

I would have the kids put the seal on it.

 

Let them be part of the process, because that's how -- that's how they don't feel so helpless -- when they know they can be part of it. So, I tried to give back to that immigration community, even now, even now, because -- or as recently as COVID, you know. I'll tell you, that was Mardi Gras. [Laughter] You know how we had -- you know that, you were in the thick of it -- remember people didn't want vaccines and they were saying 'blah, blah, blah' -- the Brazilians, I mean, it was Mardi Gras, they would come with cakes and candies [laughter], you know, and they say, 'Oh, I wish could', you know, 'give this to my mother.' Just a totally different attitude, totally. It was good to be with my peeps.

 

Carter Hutchinson  57:07

So we are coming up on an hour, and I want to be respectful of our time.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  57.09

 

I appreciate that.

 

Carter Hutchinson  57:13

 

So, there's one thing that I want to ask you -- before I ask you whether there's anything else you'd like to say -- and I hope it's not too proscriptive on my part as an interviewer, but Michel mentioned something that you also just reminded me of him saying, which is -- um -- when he was remembering the Virginia that he ori -- met -- for the first time, and I think this is roughly in the, maybe, the sixties, maybe, give or take, maybe a little later, that he's recalling in this memory, but he spoke about -- one of the less obvious motivations for a lot of the community building that he family did, and is still involved in, of course, but how it started organically was -- in some ways -- a response to this sort of impression that we really only have two races in Virginia. And, at least in, maybe, anywhere but Northern Virginia, maybe. Or this -- he -- I think, maybe try to rephrase that a little better. But that, what in some ways the community-building for the Latino community in Central Virginia was doing -- in terms of educating everyone else outside the community -- was in some ways pushing in two directions, you know, trying to create a space for the community that, um, just our social history in Virginia, our public history, if you will, doesn't really recognize -- and in some ways that's one of the points, I think, of this project -- but, almost that our history books, really, sort of set up Virginia, where, 'if you're not Black and you're not white, then what are you?' I wonder if -- you know, you spoke a little bit about it standing out to you the way that Blacks were treated when you met Virginia, and I wonder if maybe you could share a little bit about that?

 

Nancy Rodrigues  59:59

Um -- I always felt that -- part of my background is, I very often was the only woman sitting around the table. Okay. With all other guys. Or I will be in a situation where I hear a disparaging comment made about Latinos, and [laughter] -- you know, I am one. So, it has always fascinated me, I can see -- the other thing about the Latino community is that you could be Black. You know? That's what makes Latinos so hard to put -- my, my daughter-in-law has the darker skin. My little granddaughter, who goes to Stuart School, I don't know if you're familiar with Stuart School, and she said 'Grandma, they're -- they make fun of my skin.' It's going on today. And, of course, my reaction was, 'Oh, Celeste, do they go to the beach and lay in the sun to get a sun tan? See, God gave you one. So, you don't even have to do that. And they're trying to copy you?' So -- 'Oh, well, Grandma, they're just mean.' I say, 'Yeah, they are. You're going to run across mean people in the world.' You know, it's as simple as that. I can see where Michel would say that -- the, I guess my experience, compared to Michel's, coming from Newark, New Jersey -- what about Chinese? You know?

 

 [End of Part I; Beginning of Part II]

 

Nancy Rodrigues  00:00

[Laughter] What about Indian? I just, I've had that conglomeration. [Pt. II, 00:10] Obviously, the biggest thing, coming here from up North to down South, and that was in the seventies, so that was ten years after, by then, I just -- I didn't see that. I saw the Black-White issue, but I certainly felt that people -- it's, again, Black hair, [laughter] I did have black hair, I can show you pictures, black hair and brown eyes, and the last name Rodrigues, they kind of accepted me for who I was. And I do think Latinos are considered more white than they are considered Black.

Except when I was dropping off a present for Tommy Norment's wife. I told Tommy that story -- he was mortified.

 

Carter Hutchinson  01:11

I bet.

 

Well, I didn't mean for my word choice there to overshoot, I think, my point of where I was thinking, which is that -- and you make this point beautifully -- which is that, in so many ways, we have an impression of what somebody should look like based on what, sort of, pop culture and history books tell us. And, in -- most of the time, it's not the case. You know? I mean, even these forms, you know, that we were looking at -- which are constructed to be inclusive -- are doing so in a way that sort of demonstrates you can't put people into boxes.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  02:09

And again, I'm using the definition by the federal government about Latinos and Brazil counting. You know? That's the only reason I say that. And, I think I mentioned this earlier, there's more people that speak Portuguese in the world than speak Spanish, so -- you know, I do find, however, there is -- I mean, bigotry exists, certainly in Virginia, certainly in the White House -- sorry -- that may be a political statement here but I don't care -- they, there are people who will not qualify me as an American. They won't. Because of upbringing. Certainly, I see more and more, around here I had -- there was a farmer here in Surry County, he's since died, but he used to refer to me as 'the Mexican lady who runs around town.' And someone said, 'Oh, I hope he didn't offend you.' And I said, 'No, he didn't -- because, you know, he offended himself.' Because he has chosen not to know me. You know? And so, there -- what's the song, 'you've got to be taught, carefully taught, to hate all the relatives your parents hate, you've got to be carefully taught' -- um, when I came to Virginia, maybe because I looked so European, I wasn't fixed with that. And I don't, I do see it though when I am out and about, now that you point it out, when people see individuals talking in Spanish, I can see them say 'Why don't they learn English?' So, if I have a chance to talk to them, I say, 'Have you ever been abroad?' 'Oh, yeah.' 'Where'd you go?' 'Oh, we went to France.' 'Did you learn how to speak French?' You know? It -- it's just, Carter, I don't think there's a way to -- the only way I know to stop bigotry is not to condone it, which is why I try to speak up all the time when that happens. But it's hard to look at somebody, and people, too, are very interested when they don't know me, and I don't speak with that accent -- that was my mom, you know? So, I think I probably belated it.

 

Carter Hutchinson  05:44

No, not at all. Not at all. I mean, it's interesting how education really -- real education -- means so much, and included in that, of course, is language. You know, I'm thinking about this classroom we were just in yesterday for our class. These are volunteer-led classes teaching immigrants in Richmond, at cost -- seven dollars a month, or whatever -- and they're learning, sometimes, their second or third language, which is an educational experience. And it's just -- it's really a stark example of that, you know, where, you know, there's folks within earshot of you wherever you go who, you know, maybe, didn't even encourage their kids to learn their first language well and those are the same people that you just speak of, who sort of say things without thinking.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  07:08

And -- exactly. Education is the only -- that's the great equalizer. I just told you, my granddaughter is going to Stuart School. I often believe that the American system is like backwards. We save for college. You're not going to do well in college without a strong foundation and Lafayette Street School didn't give me a good foundation, but Marylawn of the Oranges took what foundation was there and built it up. So, having had that experience, I know how important it is -- I think we should reverse it. I think we should be pouring money, not tons of money into colleges to that extent, but into elementary school and grammar school, to really learn the basics of how to do it.

 

Carter Hutchinson  08:20

Well, because then you can -- then you're not under the gun as much when you get older, you have a little more in your belt and you can decide.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  08:30

One quick story about my dad, which kind of does this. You didn't ask me why my dad didn't learn English.

 

Carter Hutchinson  08:40

Why didn't your dad learn English?

 

Nancy Rodrigues  08:41

He went to English school, and they laughed at him, and he never went back. And also, anybody will tell you, it is very difficult to learn a new language as an adult. For me, put me in Italy, and in three days I'm speaking Italian. Put me in France, because I studied French, for two days, and I'll be speaking French -- not probably as good for Parisians, but out in the countryside I'm fine. [Laughter] I think that it's -- your brain is just wired. [Laughter] My granddaughter, Celeste, she's so funny, one day -- she was growing up, she didn’t' speak for like two years because when you're learning two languages simultaneously, you know, your brain doesn't know how to do it. So she came over and she was -- and I'll talk to her in Portuguese, you know, at times, and she'll talk to her dad in English, talk o my husband in English, talk to her mom in Spanish, and then she'll go 'Grandma, which one?' [Laughter] You know? [Laughter] 'Do you want to speak Spanish, do you want to speak', you know, 'English, what do you want to speak?' You know, but that's the -- but, Michael, God bless him, he has tried to learn Spanish and, the point of it, he can say 'cerveza'. [Laughter] It's a different -- different culture. But now, Carter, you understand why I feel so lucky. I feel incredibly lucky to, if given the chance of being raised in an American family or the immigration family, I was so lucky. And, for the record, I am -- Linda is a very popular name even in Portugal -- but all my relatives, and when this is finished with, I'll share with you something I just sent to Lou Kadiri from Warner's offie, and all my cousins are named Maria. So, it's their middle name -- so it's like... Maria the Sal, Maria the Fatima, Maria Campusdesantos, Maria de Crosaria, you know, rosary, whatever, and we'd say, 'Hey, Rosary, and hey Fatimah, or hey Sal, because of heaven', and my sister was named Linda Maria. When I was born, it was Nancy Rodrigues. No middle name, no nothing. I was the American in the family. I was the one who was going to have the American name and do it that way. And I think that makes me someone, and I talked to the little kids back at that COVID, and I said, 'It's hard sometimes, isn't it? You've got one foo tin one culture and another foot in another culture.' And they said, 'Yeah. It is hard.' I said, 'I know it's hard, it's really hard now, but I'm telling you, one day, you're really going to be thankful for it.' Because I will tell you, there's a real sense of family, again family could just be the other immigrants that you surround yourself with, but there's a real thing and I don't really feel that in the American culture. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't see it.

 

Carter Hutchinson  12:50

Mm-hmm. Well, I -- I think that there is ... I think that's absolutely true. I think that the experience really sort of has an impression on who you are and how you think about the world.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  13:16

But remember earlier, I said one of the great things about my husband and I, he's from Nebraska, you know, frontier, cowboy, it's the same deal. When we talk about growing up, he has the same experiences that I did in a lot of ways.

 

Carter Hutchinson  13:42

I often -- um -- I'll say this and then I'll ask you if you want to say anything else before we wrap up, but what you just said is especially poignant for me. I think that, particularly Central Virginia, the Mid Atlantic, anything east of 95, especially, or right down the center, there's a sense -- especially around Richmond, you know, and I'm sure Williamsburg in some cases and down that way -- that we almost, you know, that this is sort of a crumbling museum, you know? The state's, sort of, identity of itself is really, really, an old identity, you know. And I remember community the strongest where I grew up, which was west of Staunton about twenty miles. I went to a little elementary school in a small not-even-town of Churchville, and I think that's how I would have to answer what you said which is I think those places where the exceptions for –

 

Nancy Rodrigues  15:18

Oh yeah, and there are exceptions, yes. That's true.

 

Carter Hutchinson  15:21

But I think they're -- I think those places are fewer and farer between than they were when I was growing up. And I think it's that community -- of relying on each other.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  15:33

And why did you think I chose to live in a farming community? You know, for that very reason as well.

The other thing I want to say -- first of all, this has been very enjoyable. Thank you. It's fun. I had forgotten some of the stories until you, you know, I hope I didn't bore you --

 

Carter Hutchinson  15:53

Not at all for a second.

 

 

 

Nancy Rodrigues  15:57

 

It makes me think what a character my dad was. But I really want to comment on the tremendous undertaking that this is. And I'm just -- keep getting more impressed with V.C.U. because they really are ahead of their time. I was, by the way, the first speaker for the graduation service, the first time that V.C.U. recognized their Hispanic students that were graduating, you know, and they asked me -- because I was secretary then -- to speak, and I basically said that 'You know, I am the face of the American dream and that they needed to take out a mirror and look at themselves, because that's what they are now.' And it was V.C.U. that did that, and V.C.U. continues to amaze me in what they are doing. They are -- at a time which is so anti-immigration, here they are trying to preserve it. So, kudos to your professors for doing that. And I look forward to reading the stories of others -- to do that. So, thank you. Thank you, Carter.

 

Carter Hutchinson  17:43

Thank you, Nancy. This has been great.

 

Nancy Rodrigues  17:47

My pleasure.