Guadalupe "Lupe" Rodriguez

Michelangelo said: “If we have been pleased with life, we should not be displeased with death, since it comes from the hand of the same master.” If Michelangelo was correct, then, indeed, our MaMa, whom some of you called “ Grandma Lupe, Ganga, or Pipi, is certain to be continuing to spread love and joy in her new heavenly home, as was her custom throughout her earthly journey.

Born in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico, on August 6, 1912, Guadalupe Pastora Rodriguez y Lopez was the fourth-born of five children to parents Ramona Lopez and Juan Rodriguez. She often shared stories of her childhood, which she described as very happy because her parents were so loving and gentle. Her mother, Ramona, was a Grammar Teacher who home-schooled her four daughters, Juanita, Mery, Lupita, & Rita, and son, Jacinto. MaMa described her Mom as being soft-spoken, never angry or loud, who used quotes, anecdotes, and proverbs to correct her children’s behavior, never resorting to yelling, or using foul language, or spanking.

Growing up, we never heard our mother curse, and she did use our Grandmother’s technique of verses and proverbs to correct our behavior. However, unlike Ramona, she was quick to remove her slipper or shoe, or use whatever she happened to have in her hand, if we dared to be disrespectful! She demanded respect, and she got it!

According to MaMa’s birth certificate, her father, Juan, was a “Talabartero”. Translated it means someone who works with leather, i.e. a belt-maker or saddler. MaMa recalls that he owned coaches drawn by horses, which were a common form of transportation in those days. She also recalls that both parents played musical instruments and loved music. Ramona played the accordion. Juan played several instruments, including the guitar, which he taught his children to play. Their musical influence explains MaMa’s life-long love for singing and entertaining, As teenagers, Lupe and her younger sister, Rita, sang duets and played their guitars at local movie houses and cafes.

Juan was born in Puerto Rico, and Ramona in Mexico. MaMa believed Ramona’s roots may have been Mayan, because she taught them words in the Mayan language. MaMa also told me that Juan’s parents may have been from the Canary Islands, because she recalls hearing their conversations about having relatives there.

Juan left Puerto Rico and settled in Mexico in the early 1900’s, after the United States annexed Puerto Rico during the Spanish-American War. He was a man of principle and resented that the U.S., defeated Puerto Rico in a war that he felt was decided before it was fought, because Puerto Rico was grossly outnumbered. And so it was, that Juan and Ramona, at some point, met, married, and had a family in Mexico.

For years, the Rodriguez family lived happily in Merida. MaMa recounted that her father would, bravely, go hunting in the jungles of the Yucatan, where there were wild animals. Then, she would laugh remembering that Juan would succumb to a headache as if he were suffering from a serious illness. She couldn’t understand why such a brave man could not handle a headache!

MaMa learned to sew at a very young age by taking her doll’s clothes apart and using them as patterns to sew new ones for her dolls on her toy sewing machine. In time, she was making her own clothes, and so her parents bought her a proper sewing machine. By age 12, she became so skilled, that not only did she make her own clothes, she also sewed clothes for her entire family.

Some years later, the U.S. government deployed a ship called “The Sumner” to the Yucatan peninsula to return all ‘Americans’ back to the U.S. and to Puerto Rico. The U.S. was on a manhunt for Pancho Villa, who had taken refuge in the area. The Sumner’s manifest shows the Rodriguez family returning to Guanica, Puerto Rico in the year 1917.

Within a couple of years, Juan resettled his family in the Dominican Republic, refusing to live in American territory. Note: Kudos to Juan from his Granddaughter, Vasthy, and the Peralta Family, for without his having settled in the Dominican Republic, Vasthy and her late husband, Jose Rafael Peralta would have never met, married, and produced two sons, Alfonso and Jose, who in turn, married Lisa and Victoria and produced three daughters, Liana, Ana Victoria, Sophia, and son, Rafael. Great, great, great granddaughter, Liana married Francis Rodriguez and they have baby Miriana, becoming MaMa’s fifth generation of descendents.

At the tender age of 16, Lupe met and fell in love with Journalist, Writer, & Poet, Victor Coradin. They produced two daughters, Vasthy and Helimana, and son, Praxiteles, later known as Victor. Coradin was an activist against the Dominican dictator, Raphael Molina Trujillo, and as an enemy of the Trujillo regime, he wrote newspaper articles denouncing the dictator, and drew crowds in public places, to listen to his speeches. Ultimately, he was warned that Trujillo had ordered his arrest, so Coradin fled to the neighboring country, Haiti.

Lupe’s first-born, Vasthy, was born in Haiti. Mama described that period as the darkest time in her life. After being impoverished for a couple of years, Coradin was forced to return to the Dominican Republic, where he had family in the countryside that could take him in and not be found by the Trujillo Regime. They settled in the town of La Vega, where Lupe gave birth to her second daughter, Helimana, and to her only son, Victor.

Within a few years, seeking a better life for herself and her children, Lupe left Coradin and went to stay with her brother, Jacinto, in Santo Domingo. Several years later, she met Manuel Cubilette, a well-to-do merchant, who fathered her daughters, Myrna and myself, Moraima.

In 1948, Cubilette immigrated to New York City with Lupe and her five children to escape the tyranny of the Trujillo regime. However, shortly after arriving in New York, Manuel felt that he had to return to Santo Domingo because he did not like the American way of life, where women worked for a living, and had equal rights, almost, as much as men had. He returned to Santo Domingo, alone. Mama had found her freedom and would not return with him to a way of life where women were oppressed and subservient.

MaMa sought help from her Dominican friends in New York, and they helped her become established in her new home. With their help she found employment in N.Y.’s garment district where she became a member of the Ladies International Garment Workers Union (LIGWU), and for the next 35 years, earned her living as a seamstress. Mama’s story would be incomplete without mentioning the Garcia Family, who became our family, with Ana Luisa “Abi”, MaMa’s best friend, who became our second mom, helping to raise us, along with my oldest sister, Vasthy, who missed out on being a teenager and finishing high school, because she went to work alongside MaMa in the factory and helped support the family too. A deed on Vasthy’s part that my siblings and I have always recognized and appreciated.

Abi played such a major role in MaMa’s life and our lives for many reasons, but most importantly because they both had a love of music. Abi’s father had an orchestra in the Dominican Republic and he and Abi’s mom had 8 children, most of who were musicians. Ana played piano and guitar, and her sister Ligia played violin and guitar. I mention this because music was their bond. The three ladies always entertained our families. They attracted a very large circle of friends, including the friends from church. They sang in the church choir, and entertain the crowd at the Spanish American Community Club in Co-Op City, where we lived. Throughout the years, we were entertained by their beautiful voices and music. MaMa loved to sing. She also loved to tell funny jokes and recite poetry. Our memories of the years of our youth are full of the happy times we spent enjoying their music. We were blessed to have spent those years together as part of the Garcia family.

I’ve told you MaMa’s story in detail because MaMa rarely mentioned her past. Maybe she preferred to put it all behind her because it caused her pain. Whatever her reason, we knew very little about our mother’s family and her youth. In 2007, we moved MaMa to San Diego from The Bronx, because she was 94 yrs old and we were concerned for her after Abi’s passing in 2005. It was only after she came to live with me that I had these fascinating conversations with her and learned about her family’s history and her own past. I feel that it’s appropriate that you, her descendants, know her story and have an understanding of who Mama was, and how her past influenced her to become the positive force that she became in our lives. She felt that God had blessed her with so many wonderful things, especially her family, and she gave thanks every day for them and asked God to bless and protect them.

She embraced change, not fearing what came next, because her strong faith in God and prayers could get her through life’s challenges. She was not judgmental and she accepted everyone as an individual regardless of their weaknesses and shortcomings. She brought out the best in those who knew her. She gave her love abundantly because as God’s children, we are supposed to love one another. She made friends easily and was loved by everyone she knew.

Her older grandchildren may remember the birthdays and holidays celebrated in her tiny apartment in the South Bronx, where we were crowded, probably stepping on each other’s toes, but where love was so abundant that we didn’t care. Later, in her Co-Op City apartment, much more spacious, and where the great grandkids enjoyed Grandma Lupe’s Christmas tacos, and Abi’s dulce de coco, and their songs and guitar playing, was the family tradition that they had created for us. That was MaMa’s focus: to love each and every one of her children and the generations that followed. She was so proud to have a family. Being a role model was important to her, and she was – always hardworking, cheerful, and independent. We could always count on her and Ana to come to visit and render any help we needed no matter how far away we moved

Note: Kudos from all the Davila Family because by MaMa settling in the great borough of The Bronx, N.Y., daughter, Helimana (dec. 1997), met Frank Davila and produced son, Frank, Jr. “Rennie” father of Victor and Muriel, and grandfather of Lauren, Alyssa, Damien, and Olivia. Daughter, Nancy, mother of David, IV, Noelani, Elijah, Elimana. Noelani, mother of Nevaeh, and Cassius. MaMa’s Daughter, Myrna, mother of Luana, who is mother of Nya, Cassie, and Susana. Moraiita “Mo”, mother of Janie, and Janie, mother of Isabella and Castalia. Finally, me, Moraima “Mory”, mother of Troy, Miranda (dec. 2021), and Nathaniel. Troy and wife Sheree parents of Lukas and Tao, and Nathaniel and Katie parents of Sophia.

We shall forever be grateful and indebted to you, our dear MaMa Lupita, for being the core of our existence. We will keep your wonderful memory and legacy in our hearts, and remember the wonderful MaMa that you, and all the love, smiles, hugs, kindness, blessings, and prayers, you so generously gave to family, friends and all who ever knew you. May you Rest in Eternal Peace, MaMa, in the company of your blessed family, Mary, Joseph, Jesus, our Lord God, and all the Angels, and Archangels in your new Heavenly Home.