This is the first part of a two-part article.
Look to next week’s issue on November 12 for part two.
Many historic people and memorable moments have come out of Jackson County, with others who come later in life to tell stories about those people and moments. Whether they be singers, artists, writers, photographers, or other types of creatives, there is one thing in common: everyone is a storyteller at heart, and everyone has a story to tell.
Alicia Gallegos, maybe known to some as Alice, was born in Vanderbilt and attended Industrial High School in the 1950s and 60s.
Currently, and for 25 years, she’s hosted Hilos de Historias, translated to Story Threads, a radio show on Majic 104.9 in Corpus Christi, nearly every Saturday at 11 a.m. On her radio show, she interviews people in Texas who keep the past alive by telling stories.
Majic 104.9 has stations in Victoria, Houston and San Antonio.
It’s about time someone tells her story, one that rings true about everything she’s accomplished in her life thus far.
Gallegos thought about the professors who influenced her post-high school life and gave her advice that directed her into a field of work, speech language pathology, which she thoroughly enjoyed for 50 years.
“I never stopped going to school, so I enrolled at Louisiana State University while my husband, Eladio Gómez, was in the Air Force. Initially, I wanted to be a bank president, so I was majoring in business.”
She was assigned to be the assistant to the dean of the business department, but couldn’t help overhear lots of laughter down the hall while she worked. She noticed students going over to hang out with the professor, and the atmosphere was nothing like the dean of business’ office. So Gallegos visited the office when it was empty of students.
“I’ll never forget her name, Dr. Harrington, she was the head of the speech pathology department. We discussed what my major and goals were, and she said frankly, ‘you’ll never be a bank president, one, because you’re a woman, and two, you’re a Mexican woman.’ She said, ‘if you get a degree in banking you’ll be the most intelligent bank teller they’ll have,’” Gallegos said.
So she learned about speech therapy and looked into it. At that time her husband was transferred to Guam, because it was the end of the Vietnam war. Due to not wanting to stay on base with him, she transferred to North Texas State University because it was one of the best speech therapy departments there.
Gallegos was the first Mexican-American to be in the school of communications, along with the first black woman, whose family were members of the NAACP. Being a minority at that time, they found themselves with troubles others may not have to contend with.
“We found ourselves with assignments which could be seen as a little bit difficult,” Gallegos explained. “Part of an SLP degree is clinical practice, and most of the students were assigned to people in the clinic, which meant you could walk across the street during a working day. Well, we were assigned to people in the veteran’s hospital in Dallas, which meant we had to drive all the way over there and do it in the evenings after school, which took up more time.”
Turns out being sent to the VA hospital was the best thing for them. Nothing happened in the evenings at the hospital, so they were able to finish their clinical practice in six weeks, which is unusually fast.
Back then, most therapists had to get a teaching certificate to work in schools, so if one graduated in August, then one could teach in the spring, and take classes in the summer.
“But when the list came out, my black colleague and I weren’t on the list. I shrugged it off, but she did not. She told her parents, and her dad called my dad and asked permission to take me with them to talk to the dean of students,” Gallegos said with a shaky voice. “My father, a hand from God, drove overnight from Vanderbilt to Denton. We went in and the dean was a black man, can you believe it, in 1972, and his name was Dr. King. After a bit of talking the dean called the dean of communications. Some words were exchanged and then he hung up the phone and said, ‘ok, girls you’ve been approved.’” Once she earned her degree she looked for a job, and she talked about the superintendent who changed the course of her career, and without his help, she may not have had a career in SLP at all.
She applied at a particular school district, but the assistant superintendent said he would not be able to offer her a position. As she was leaving she ran into the superintendent, who happened to be a former Vanderbilt superintendent. He took Gallegos back to the office and asked his assistant super why she wasn’t hired. He pulled out a letter of reference given to her by one of her professors, the super read it, tore it in half and threw it in the garbage. He said they were going to hire her, because he knew her since she was a little girl and lived down the street from him.
“He said it was written with an obvious bias against me, that the professor didn’t want me to do well, and back then those things followed you for life,” she said. “It was a stroke of luck.”
Being an SLP for a while led her to being the first Mexican-American to open a speech therapy practice in Corpus Christi. She opened the business in order to be around for her son, Alan, after her husband passed.
“I wanted to raise my child and be able to engage in his activities,” she said. “As my practice grew I was able to hire people, and that allowed me to be involved in community activities, and that’s how my community activism emerged.”
Robert Garcia, a retired Corpus Christi ISD special education director for 18 years, worked with Gallegos for a long time and recalled what type of worker and person she was.
“She was on contract with us and was a fine lady, very efficient and thorough. Alicia always made sure the job was done, and I always had good reports on her,” he said. “Her personality is very outgoing and she really takes time to establish relationships and find out what’s going on with the students and get to know them. She’s a very special person.”
Gallegos worked for Congressman Bill Patman while he was in office, and a lot of her work consisted of public relations in the community, which opened many doors for her SLP practice. She would be sent to Washington for different things, so she learned a lot about the government at the federal level and how it trickled down to the local level.
Look to next week’s article to read more about Alicia Gallegos’s time on the CC library board, her work with the non-profit group, Foundation of Hope, opening the Rincon Point apartments in Taft, being on the CC Caller Times advisory board, and being recognized for receiving the Jefferson Award.
