“Little Mexico”: The Carceral Colonia of Blue Ridge State Farm

This paper examines the incarceration of ethnic Mexicans in the Texas State Prison System in the early 20th century. Among the thousands of human beings forced to toil for the state were some 249 Mexican classified prisoners at Blue Ridge State Farm outside of Houston. Blue Ridge became a Mexican segregated prison in 1923. Like other prisoners incarcerated in Texas, ethnic Mexicans at Blue Ridge faced terrible conditions, brutal work demands, and violence as a part of everyday life. Despite prisoners’ individual differences, shared suffering fostered community and provided Mexican prisoners a means of resilience. Aside from the mutual burdens and the bonds that kept them together, shared faith traditions and cultural practices united prisoners in ways the state did not intend. Mexican prisoners at Blue Ridge spoke Spanish commonly, both out of practice and to deny Anglo guards access to their conversations. While communicating in a language undecipherable to the state itself proved a means of resilience and resistance, the burdens of prison life sometimes led to more drastic action. Subjected to debilitating work regimens, ethnic Mexican prisoners at times refused their overseers demands and resisted openly by organizing ‘mutinies’ that halted cotton cultivation or by escaping altogether. This paper examines how Mexican prisoners at Blue Ridge utilized the benefits of majority status to assert agency and sustain their lives under duress.