Crispin Sanchez
Encyclopedia
Crispin Eliseo Sanchez was a South Texas
trailblazer in the fields of Mexican-American education
and sport
s.
, the seat of Gonzales County
in southeast Texas. In the era of segregation
, he attended a one-room school for Hispanic
children. A halfback
, running back
, kicker
, and punter, Sanchez was the first Mexican American to play football
at Gonzales High School. His excellence at first base in baseball
led to his drafting by the St. Louis Cardinals
, but he declined the offer and instead followed his mother's advice and entered college. For a time he played with the former Gonzales Apaches. ("Apaches" is now the name of the Gonzales High School teams.)
During World War II
, Sanchez joined the United States Army Air Corps
, the forerunner of the Air Force
. He was part of the Hell's Angels with the 303rd Bomb Group and was a tail gunner
in a B-17 Flying Fortress bomber. He flew 35 air combat missions. During the pivotal Battle of the Bulge
in December 1944, he provided air relief to Allied ground troops in Belgium
with two .50-caliber
machine gun
s.
On returning from the war, Sanchez entered Texas State University in San Marcos
, then known as Southwest Texas State Normal School. In college, Sanchez met his future wife, Dora A. Garcia (1929-2003). He received his Bachelor of Arts
degree, and the couple moved to her hometown of Laredo
, the seat of Webb County
in South Texas, where Sanchez began his long career in education.
gubernatorial nomination. Sanchez recalled Tony Sanchez as "the only redheaded [boy] in my class . . . freckle-faced, and reminded me a lot of Tom Sawyer
."
Sanchez also procured his master of education
from TSU. In 1964, when the doors of J. W. Nixon High School
opened in Laredo, Sanchez became the assistant principal. In the summer of 1969, he traveled to Evanston, Illinois
, to study toward a doctorate degree in educational administration through Northwestern University
. When Sanchez returned with his Ph.D.
in hand, he accepted an offer from Domingo Arechiga (1926–1987) then the president of Laredo Community College
(Laredo Junior College at the time) to become the dean of student services.
(since disbanded) and baseball teams. One year LCC basketball was ranked No. 1 in the United States and the players were featured in Sports Illustrated
magazine, recalled Sal Otero, former sports editor of the Laredo Morning Times
.
Alberto Patricio Cardenas, Sr., who worked with Sanchez at both Nixon High School and in the counseling department at LCC, recalled that Sanchez was "always advocating for the rights of the students." Jose Roberto "Beto" Juarez of Laredo, the LCC academic dean at the time, credited Sanchez for strengthening the college's counseling and athletic departments. "We worked together many years, and he was very cooperative in terms of handling any student problems," according to Juarez.
Cemetery in Laredo.
Robert Ochoa, the current LCC dean of student affairs, who worked under Sanchez for more than two decades, said that Sanchez helped many students to gain acceptance into four-year schools, medical schools, and dental programs.
Laredo Community College honors Sanchez through the naming of the Crispin "Doc" Sanchez Baseball Field.
South Texas
South Texas is a region of the U.S. state of Texas that lies roughly south of and including San Antonio. The southern and western boundary is the Rio Grande River, and to the east it is the Gulf of Mexico. The population of this region is about 3.7 million. The southern portion of this region is...
trailblazer in the fields of Mexican-American education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
and sport
Sport
A Sport is all forms of physical activity which, through casual or organised participation, aim to use, maintain or improve physical fitness and provide entertainment to participants. Sport may be competitive, where a winner or winners can be identified by objective means, and may require a degree...
s.
Early years, sports, education, military
Sanchez (first name pronounced CHRIS PEEN) was born to Pedro R. Sanchez (1893–1984) and Guadalupe V. Sanchez (1896–1977) in GonzalesGonzales, Texas
Gonzales is a city in Gonzales County, Texas, United States. The population was 7,202 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Gonzales County.-Geography:Gonzales is located at...
, the seat of Gonzales County
Gonzales County, Texas
Gonzales County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. In 2000, its population was 18,628. It is named for its seat, the city of Gonzales.-History Timeline:* Paleo-Indians Hunter-gatherers, and later Coahuiltecan, Tonkawa, Karankawa...
in southeast Texas. In the era of segregation
Racial segregation in the United States
Racial segregation in the United States, as a general term, included the racial segregation or hypersegregation of facilities, services, and opportunities such as housing, medical care, education, employment, and transportation along racial lines...
, he attended a one-room school for Hispanic
Hispanic
Hispanic is a term that originally denoted a relationship to Hispania, which is to say the Iberian Peninsula: Andorra, Gibraltar, Portugal and Spain. During the Modern Era, Hispanic sometimes takes on a more limited meaning, particularly in the United States, where the term means a person of ...
children. A halfback
Halfback (American football)
A halfback, sometimes referred to as a tailback, is an offensive position in American football, which lines up in the backfield and generally is responsible for carrying the ball on run plays. Historically, from the 1870s through the 1950s, the halfback position was both an offensive and defensive...
, running back
Running back
A running back is a gridiron football position, who is typically lined up in the offensive backfield. The primary roles of a running back are to receive handoffs from the quarterback for a rushing play, to catch passes from out of the backfield, and to block.There are usually one or two running...
, kicker
Placekicker
Placekicker, or simply kicker , is the title of the player in American and Canadian football who is responsible for the kicking duties of field goals, extra points...
, and punter, Sanchez was the first Mexican American to play football
High school football
High school football, in North America, refers to the game of football as it is played in the United States and Canada. It ranks among the most popular interscholastic sports in both of these nations....
at Gonzales High School. His excellence at first base in baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...
led to his drafting by the St. Louis Cardinals
St. Louis Cardinals
The St. Louis Cardinals are a professional baseball team based in St. Louis, Missouri. They are members of the Central Division in the National League of Major League Baseball. The Cardinals have won eleven World Series championships, the most of any National League team, and second overall only to...
, but he declined the offer and instead followed his mother's advice and entered college. For a time he played with the former Gonzales Apaches. ("Apaches" is now the name of the Gonzales High School teams.)
During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Sanchez joined the United States Army Air Corps
United States Army Air Corps
The United States Army Air Corps was a forerunner of the United States Air Force. Renamed from the Air Service on 2 July 1926, it was part of the United States Army and the predecessor of the United States Army Air Forces , established in 1941...
, the forerunner of the Air Force
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...
. He was part of the Hell's Angels with the 303rd Bomb Group and was a tail gunner
Tail gunner
A tail gunner or rear gunner is a crewman on a military aircraft who functions as a gunner defending against enemy fighter attacks from the rear, or "tail", of the plane. The tail gunner operates a flexible machine gun emplacement on either the top or tail end of the aircraft with a generally...
in a B-17 Flying Fortress bomber. He flew 35 air combat missions. During the pivotal Battle of the Bulge
Battle of the Bulge
The Battle of the Bulge was a major German offensive , launched toward the end of World War II through the densely forested Ardennes mountain region of Wallonia in Belgium, hence its French name , and France and...
in December 1944, he provided air relief to Allied ground troops in Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
with two .50-caliber
Caliber
In guns including firearms, caliber or calibre is the approximate internal diameter of the barrel in relation to the diameter of the projectile used in it....
machine gun
Machine gun
A machine gun is a fully automatic mounted or portable firearm, usually designed to fire rounds in quick succession from an ammunition belt or large-capacity magazine, typically at a rate of several hundred rounds per minute....
s.
On returning from the war, Sanchez entered Texas State University in San Marcos
San Marcos, Texas
San Marcos is a city in the U.S. state of Texas, and is the seat of Hays County. Located within the metropolitan area, the city is located on the Interstate 35 corridor—between Austin and San Antonio....
, then known as Southwest Texas State Normal School. In college, Sanchez met his future wife, Dora A. Garcia (1929-2003). He received his Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
degree, and the couple moved to her hometown of Laredo
Laredo, Texas
Laredo is the county seat of Webb County, Texas, United States, located on the north bank of the Rio Grande in South Texas, across from Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico. According to the 2010 census, the city population was 236,091 making it the 3rd largest on the United States-Mexican border,...
, the seat of Webb County
Webb County, Texas
Webb County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. The official 2010 population for the county is 250,304. In 2000, its population was 193,117, and in 2006 its population had been estimated to have reached to 231,470. Its county seat is Laredo...
in South Texas, where Sanchez began his long career in education.
Educational career
Sanchez taught sixth grade at Ryan Elementary School for the Laredo Independent School District. One of his pupils was Tony Sanchez (no relation), the Laredo business tycoon who in 2002 became the first Mexican American in state history to win the DemocraticDemocratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
gubernatorial nomination. Sanchez recalled Tony Sanchez as "the only redheaded [boy] in my class . . . freckle-faced, and reminded me a lot of Tom Sawyer
Tom Sawyer
Thomas "Tom" Sawyer is the title character of the Mark Twain novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer . He appears in three other novels by Twain: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn , Tom Sawyer Abroad , and Tom Sawyer, Detective .Sawyer also appears in at least three unfinished Twain works, Huck and Tom...
."
Sanchez also procured his master of education
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
from TSU. In 1964, when the doors of J. W. Nixon High School
J. W. Nixon High School
J.W. Nixon High School is a public high school located in Laredo, Texas and is part of the Laredo Independent School District. The school was built in 1964, as the second high school in the city of Laredo....
opened in Laredo, Sanchez became the assistant principal. In the summer of 1969, he traveled to Evanston, Illinois
Evanston, Illinois
Evanston is a suburban municipality in Cook County, Illinois 12 miles north of downtown Chicago, bordering Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, and Wilmette to the north, with an estimated population of 74,360 as of 2003. It is one of the North Shore communities that adjoin Lake Michigan...
, to study toward a doctorate degree in educational administration through Northwestern University
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....
. When Sanchez returned with his Ph.D.
Ph.D.
A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
in hand, he accepted an offer from Domingo Arechiga (1926–1987) then the president of Laredo Community College
Laredo Community College
The Laredo Community College, or LCC, was established as Laredo Junior College on September 28, 1947, by the Laredo Independent School District in Laredo, the seat of Webb County in south Texas...
(Laredo Junior College at the time) to become the dean of student services.
College athletic director
Sanchez doubled as the college athletic director and oversaw the creation of basketballBasketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...
(since disbanded) and baseball teams. One year LCC basketball was ranked No. 1 in the United States and the players were featured in Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated is an American sports media company owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. Its self titled magazine has over 3.5 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men. It was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the...
magazine, recalled Sal Otero, former sports editor of the Laredo Morning Times
Laredo Morning Times
The Laredo Morning Times is a daily newspaper publication based in Laredo, Texas, USA. It is owned by the Hearst Corporation.The Laredo Morning Times was founded on June 14, 1881 as "the Laredo Weekly," a four-page newspaper published by James Saunders Penn. Two years later, the paper became a...
.
Alberto Patricio Cardenas, Sr., who worked with Sanchez at both Nixon High School and in the counseling department at LCC, recalled that Sanchez was "always advocating for the rights of the students." Jose Roberto "Beto" Juarez of Laredo, the LCC academic dean at the time, credited Sanchez for strengthening the college's counseling and athletic departments. "We worked together many years, and he was very cooperative in terms of handling any student problems," according to Juarez.
Death and legacy
In 1993, Sanchez retired from LCC with twenty-three years of service. After several years of working with his son Pedro "Pete" Sanchez, he moved to San Antonio, to share in the lives of his daughters and their families. He died of a sudden illness. He was survived by five children: Sandra S. Johnson (born 1949), Pete Sanchez and wife Lydia, Irene S. Galo and husband Bradford, Hugo G. Sanchez and wife Mary, and Laura J. Sanchez. There were also thirteen grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. He is interred in his family plot at Calvary CatholicRoman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
Cemetery in Laredo.
Robert Ochoa, the current LCC dean of student affairs, who worked under Sanchez for more than two decades, said that Sanchez helped many students to gain acceptance into four-year schools, medical schools, and dental programs.
Laredo Community College honors Sanchez through the naming of the Crispin "Doc" Sanchez Baseball Field.