The Lower Rio Grande Valley holds family histories that have traveled across generations through spoken accounts. Eduardo Saldaña Cantú brings one of these stories to life in “La Mulata,” recounting the past of South Texas during the years following Mexican independence. Reyna, known as La Mulata, was among the very first connected to the founding of Rancho El Capote, where her life became part of a legacy defined by heritage, social justice based on race and gender, perseverance, and survival.
Reyna's story is rooted in a lineage shaped by slavery, hard-won liberty, and pure resilience. Her father, Ramón, was torn from Africa and forced onto a South Carolina plantation as a teenage slave, until he took his destiny into his own hands and escaped into Mexico, a sanctuary where bondage was outlawed. Born into this new life with African and Native American roots, Reyna escaped from a bad marriage and unknowingly found herself north across the river from Reynosa. Rancho El Capote provided her recovery and stability as she found herself navigating an uncharted world unlike anything she had ever known and where she brought astonishing possibilities.
Through Reyna's story, Cantú revisits the polarized cultural clashes that existed along the southern border, the challenges Hispanic communities faced in order to achieve recognition, and the incredible resolve to survive adversity brought on by political changes. The determination to survive has been woven into his family's history generation after generation.
As a central figure in the birth of Rancho El Capote, Reyna forged a life in a corner of South Texas practically isolated from the rest of the world. Cantú paints a vivid picture of her story, capturing not just the punishing grit of daily survival, but the near-mythic tenacity that locals still whisper about to this day. It's an inspiring narrative of the sheer, unyielding willpower required to carve out a home on such an unforgiving landscape.
For Cantú, writing this history realizes a dream of capturing the oral lore of his childhood home before time washes it away. Behind the author's pen is a distinguished laboratory geneticist who built a stellar career pioneering chromosome research, leading clinical labs, teaching at medical schools, and publishing dozens of scientific discoveries. Outside his scientific career, he remains an avid “birder” who enjoys the Rio Grande Valley and its great variety and abundance of birdlife.
“La Mulata” gives readers a telling exposure into a forgotten period of regional history through Reyna's extraordinary life and the community she helped build. Eduardo Saldaña Cantú rescues a fading legacy of historical family stories, generational roots, recollections from the margins of time, and the intriguing personalities who lived through these bygone days. Copies can be found online through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and leading web book retailers.
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