Violeta Miqueli Mayoz de González
Florida-born Violeta Miqueli Mayoz de González (1891-1972) was a household name in the US Hispanic print culture. In the US Hispanic press, she wrote about women’s news, feminism, and social and labor issues in numerous periodicals, among them Cuba Cubana, El Arte, Anagrama, ¡Despertad!, El Hogar, El Internacional, Postal de Key West, El Centinela, El Popular, Pinos Nuevos, and Nueva Vida (New Life) in the 1910s and 1920s. She also published in Cultura Proletaria and España Libre (New York), La Revista Blanca (Barcelona), and La Prensa (Buenos Aires) in later years. In 1962 Miqueli published Women in Myth and History, which examines women's roles in history.
EDUCATION
Her parents were cigar-rolling workers in Ybor City, and she obtained a master’s degree in education and taught in Tampa and Key West.
“Workers have in education and freedom of association the best weapons for their anarchist ideal.” (Miqueli. “Marcha Ascendente” ¡Despertad! (Key West) Trans. Feu. Undated).
AGAINST THE FASCIST STATE
Miqueli was one of the leaders of the antifascist boycotts. Regular announcements were published in Frente Popular and España Libre to boycott products from fascist countries and picket businesses selling them “milking the Fascist hyena.”
Miqueli: “Spanish, Czechoslovakian, Polish, and Finish mothers, all mothers who have suffered the horror of seeing their children torn apart by the bullets of Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, and Stalin ... Women can do a lot of good when … accept the responsibility of our destiny as the vanguard of the people." (Miqueli “Distintas clases de antifascistas.” España Libre March 15, 1940). Trans. MF.
A list of these businesses was published in Frente Popular on 8 April 1938. Exporters: Emilio González, Julio Rojo Fabian, Ramón Garrido, Policarpo Gomez. Shops owners: Carmen Moneo, Casa vittori, La bodega de Paco, Juan Gallego, García y Díaz, Doctor Castro Viejo, Moure, Torres Perona, Juan B. Castro, Maximo Calvo, Lagueras, Alonso, Joaquin Quirons, Ulloa. Performers and empresarios: Hermanos Iturbi, Andres Segovia, Benito Collada.
“a magnificent example of what patriotism means for bankers, the aristocracy, and the privileged, namely international military cooperation with the Nazi-Fascism to exterminate the European workers’ hopes.” (Miqueli, “Lo que dijo Bernard Fay.” Cultura Obrera. June 29, 1940). Trans. MF.
AGAINST THE SYSTEMATIC VIOLENCE OF THE STATE
Miqueli mocked the “capitalist press” that called for law and order. Instead, Miqueli claimed that law and order precisely produce “disastrous results: injustice, extinction, immorality, and selfishness.” Miqueli asserted that it was easy to demonstrate that “law and order” are, in fact, words devoid of justice when they are applied to the poor or to the worker, who have no social or political capital (Miqueli. “Horrores Sociales.” Revista Blanca. April 1, 1932). Trans. MF.
Miqueli continued to provide more examples of injustice: an Italian-American mother died after being evicted when her affluent counterparts still looked young because “they know little of and have never experienced the unsettling worry of a day without bread, without a future, without hope.” (Miqueli. “Horrores Sociales.” Revista Blanca. April 1, 1932). Trans. MF.
"Upward March" Voice over Sydney Bernal
ANARCHISM
Violeta organized the Cigar workers in Florida. With her husband, Herminio González, she had to hide several nights in a cemetery from hitmen supposedly hired by the Cigar factory owners.
In 1940, Violeta finished her article sharing what she believed was the fate of anarcha-feminists, who “have neither certainty, tranquility, sustenance, nor life in this valley of irresponsible, vain, and cowardly people. Nothing protects us. Neither the laws of the state nor the unconditional brotherhood of the world workers. The state calls us “outlaws,” and the unwise look at us with pity because we do not want to root in this quagmire of social pestilence.”
("No tenemos nada seguro en este valle de irresponsible, vanidosos y cobardes: ni la tranquilidad, ni el sustento, ni la vida. Nada nos protege. Ni las leyes de la patria, ni la fraternidad incodicional de los trabajadores del mundo. La patria nos llama "forajidos del orden" y los inconscientes nos miran con lástima porque no queremos hozar en el lodazar de las pestilencias sociales." Miqueli. “La verdad no se viste.” Cultura Proletaria. March 2, 1940). (Trans. MF.)