Estella Quintanilla grew up in Brentwood, a small agricultural town in Contra Costa County, about 45 miles from Berkeley. Her parents emigrated from Mexico and brought up their family in Brentwood. Quintanilla was the first of her siblings to attend college. She enrolled at UC Berkeley at the age of 18 and left home in 1968.
Quintanilla was initially introduced to political activism through her father who was active in organizing and picketing with farmworkers as part of the United Farm Workers Movement. As a new freshman at Berkeley, Quintanilla says she sought out “La Raza”. She moved in with another Chicana Beatrice Lara, whom she described as “fiery and militant” making it easy for her to get involved with politics on campus. Naturally, they were both drawn to the Mexican American Student Confederation who regularly worked with and was in support of the Farm Workers Movement.
“Upon arriving in Berkeley, I was very surprised to learn that there were less than 100 Mexican and Latino students in attendance at UC Berkeley. That was one reason that motivated me to join the TWLF strike in my second quarter. After the TWLF strike, I took my first course on Chicano history and it was the first time I had ever had a Mexican or Chicano instructor.”
Quintanilla’s father, however, was concerned about his daughter’s safety and talked to the MASC members about placing her in the student group’s office away from their more “heavy-duty activism”. Regardless of his concerns for her physical safety, he wanted Quintanilla involved on campus and said to her, “No one’s going to take it away from you. No one gave you anything and no one’s going to take your education because no one gave it to you, so do it.” Quintanilla’s office duties included sitting at the desk and taking messages as they came in. She recalls the male leadership occasionally coming into the office space and being able to hear “loud discussions” among them. Despite any internal conflict that may have arisen, MASC members understood the importance of unity and managed disagreements privately away from the public eye and even from the rest of the group.
According to Quintanilla, the male leaders in MASC were older by about 8-10 years. Despite the age and gender difference, she acknowledges they were respectful and cognizant of the women in the student group as their partners in the struggle. Quintanilla describes them as having been more worldly, urban, and experienced in activism and other movements whereas some of the younger members of the group came from rural backgrounds without as much experience. The general environment Quintanilla detailed appears to be the very energy that fostered the care and community that the TWLF has been infamous for. Unity among the groups necessitated unity within each cohort to function well as a whole. TWLF members knew that their struggle was a shared one between themselves, the other ethnic groups, and their communities and gender was not a dividing factor.
When asked how the community around the TWLF was formed, Quintanilla recalls there being around 60-100 Chicano students on campus. “You had to do something. It’s not just ‘why are we the privileged ones, why are we here and not ‘why are we here alone?’ So that was one way. I mean, we were on the lookout for each other.” Quintanilla recalls there were a few places where Chicano students would gather to discuss the happenings of the strike or any potential meetings that were going to happen. The financial aid office or the EOP office are examples of places where they would have to pick up their monthly checks and could convene. “After the TWLF strike, I took my first course on Chicano history and it was the first time I had ever had a Mexican or Chicano instructor.” Quintanilla describes the urgency felt at the lack of Chicano students on campus. “That alone is going to make us move or do something, you know? To organize or to get together.” In regards to those that did not join them, she states, “It was intense when we ran into a person of color who wasn’t supporting the strike.”
Quintanilla woke up extra early to join AAPA for their 8 A.M serpentine marches around
campus to accommodate her yearning to participate in direct action. She recalls one day in particular when students picketed at Sather Gate, “blue meanies” were called in to use aggressive reinforcement. The officers indiscriminately targeted people and white students that were crossing the picket line ended up getting attacked along with the TWLF picketers. The following day, Quintanilla recalls even more people joining their picket lines.
Quintanilla graduated with a BA from UC Berkeley in 1972 and completed an MA in Education and a teaching credential by 1976. For 32 years, she worked as an educator and school site/district administrator focusing on providing educational equity to the underprivileged.