Clothing is a way to express oneself and an individual’s unique identity, but it has also historically been used to protest against unfair disadvantages posited against certain minority groups in society. This was one of the many appeals of the zoot suit, which rose in popularity during the 1930s and 40s as a way for African, Mexican, Italian and Filipino Americans, among many other groups, to achieve visibility in public and display a form of resistance to assimilation into American culture. When these minority groups were forced to hide their culture to be accepted in American society, these suits allowed them to express their individuality, however little they may have had at the time.
On Saturday, June 12, hundreds gathered dressed to the nines in their best retro outfits and drove their vintage cars to commemorate the 81st anniversary of the Zoot Suit Riots. These Riots became known as a nearly week-long series of violent attacks in 1943 that targeted primarily young Latino and Mexican American residents in Los Angeles, California.
Known as the Zoot Suit Cruise, over 100 classic cars ranging from the 1920s to the 1970s drive across the Sixth Street Bridge before making their way to 4th and Broadway of Little Tokyo in Downtown LA for dancing, a fashion show, a traditional indigenous ritual, among other events. However, Los Angeles Communities are using this tragedy to educate and ensure that history doesn’t repeat itself.
Beginning as early as the 1930s, the zoot suit was largely popularized by a growing nationwide jazz culture among Black and brown youth and even worn from an early age by Malcolm X, who described the ensemble in his autobiography as “A killer-diller coat with a drape-shape, rear-pleats and shoulders padded like a lunatic’s cell.” Mexican Americans added more accessories and colors to reflect their roots, but their distinct clothing, language and love for jazz led to a counterculture of criminalization by white supremacist groups.
From June 3 to 8 1943, there was a series of anti-Mexican riots in L.A. ignited after some World War II servicemen accused Chicanx youth of attacking them. As the creator of Zoot Suit Cruise, Manny Alcaraz explains, this was likely caused by a history of assault towards young Chicana women by men stationed nearby. In retaliation to this accusation, however, people of color styling these suits were targeted and hunted in an outburst of racialized violence that lasted several days. From then on, zoot suits were seen as unpatriotic for wasting fabric when they could instead contribute to the war effort and were subsequently outlawed for the extent of World War II.
Six years ago, the founder of the Zoot Suit Cruise, “Pachuco” Manny Alcaraz, began the cruise on the 75th Anniversary of the Riots with his friend Art Zamora. According to Chicana artist Autumn Rose, the cruise started as a small community event at a local diner when, “the last Wednesday of the month, all of these old classic cars would gather at this restaurant, and they’d be playing music and just really having a community,” Rose said. “We’d have live music, we had food in the morning, and we just gathered together and had fun.” As community awareness grew, the annual celebration grew into a week-long event that started just last year.
For Rose, this event holds special value to her family’s legacy. From her great great great grandmother who was alive during the Riots, “the stories that she’s told about the horrific violence that happened, everything that happened was so shocking and gut-wrenching to hear about, and how the people were treated back then”, she explains. “So being able to have my car at this event and representing my great great great grandmother in that way, it means the world to me to be able to do that and tell the stories and share the history of it. It’s something that everyone should know about.”
For Pachuco and frequent cruiser Luis Garcia, the event is a way to educate younger generations on their history. As Garcia notes, racism has persisted past the riots, “especially with things with the border and with all the migration,” Garcia said. “So I think it’s important to remember the struggles that our ancestors and our fathers and those that came before us as a struggle that we still have to continue as well.”
However, for the likes of Alcaraz and Garcia, the Riots were a reminder of how men of color were treated in the service. “I’m a Marine Corps veteran, I personally did two tours out to Afghanistan,” Garcia said. “So coming back, and then learning the history about what happened, especially what the service members did to people that look like me, even though we also did serve in the military kind of hit a soft spot. And ever since it’s also been a form of protest in my own way against what’s going on.”
Similarly, for Alcaraz, a Navy veteran who fought in Vietnam, he was constantly aware of how people who looked like him were treated by their colleagues. “It was kind of hard for the Mexican guys in the service. I was in the Navy, and if I came on leave, and I want to put a Zoot Suit on because it was for entertainment, dancing, swing, I would get beat up. I would say, ‘No, I’m in the Navy,’ you know?” Alcaraz said. “They would beat me up because I was wearing my Zoot Suit.”
The zoot suit not only reflected a history of racial discrimination, but it was also an example of the formation of important aspects of Black and Chicanx cultures that shaped their racial identities even today. Each suit was made of different eye-popping fabric and decorated or accessorized in ways that were unique to the wearer. For Mexicans who had newly immigrated to the U.S., zoot suits helped them break free of the suffocating expectations they had to follow to assimilate into American culture. Along with low riding, zoot suits are an extension of each wearer’s sense of self. “‘Brown and Proud’ represents many different colors, which is also why you see the different colors [of zoot suits] because it comes in many different varieties,” Garcia said. “So I think it’s important to showcase that we are all different, and there are many different shades of brown.”