Mi Carnal Frank: A Family Memoir and Biography of U.S. Congressman Frank Mariano Tejeda Jr., 1945-1997. By Juan Tejeda
Written by his brother, Juan Tejeda, Mi Carnal Frank tells the story of their family and Frank’s life from birth to a premature death at age 51. Utilizing interviews with family and close friends, plus, photos, documents and newspaper articles, this book chronicles Frank’s early years being raised by poor Mexicano parents on the southside of San Antonio, through his Marine Corps service and combat duty in Vietnam, college education, and 20-year career as a politician and elected public servant, first as a Texas State Representative, then a Texas Senator and U.S. Congressman. During these twenty years, Frank was a fierce advocate for social, educational, economic, and environmental justice, the rights of the poor and his Mexican American community, and the people he represented.
This is also a story of how Frank developed and was the leader of a grassroots political alliance of elected officials known as the “Southside Coalition” (who some called a “political machine,” while others called it the “Brown Mafia”), and in the process became one of the most powerful Mexican American/Chicano politicians that San Antonio and the State of Texas have ever known.
Written by his brother, Juan Tejeda, Mi Carnal Frank tells the story of their family and Frank’s life from birth to a premature death at age 51. Utilizing interviews with family and close friends, plus, photos, documents and newspaper articles, this book chronicles Frank’s early years being raised by poor Mexicano parents on the southside of San Antonio, through his Marine Corps service and combat duty in Vietnam, college education, and 20-year career as a politician and elected public servant, first as a Texas State Representative, then a Texas Senator and U.S. Congressman. During these twenty years, Frank was a fierce advocate for social, educational, economic, and environmental justice, the rights of the poor and his Mexican American community, and the people he represented.
This is also a story of how Frank developed and was the leader of a grassroots political alliance of elected officials known as the “Southside Coalition” (who some called a “political machine,” while others called it the “Brown Mafia”), and in the process became one of the most powerful Mexican American/Chicano politicians that San Antonio and the State of Texas have ever known.
Written by his brother, Juan Tejeda, Mi Carnal Frank tells the story of their family and Frank’s life from birth to a premature death at age 51. Utilizing interviews with family and close friends, plus, photos, documents and newspaper articles, this book chronicles Frank’s early years being raised by poor Mexicano parents on the southside of San Antonio, through his Marine Corps service and combat duty in Vietnam, college education, and 20-year career as a politician and elected public servant, first as a Texas State Representative, then a Texas Senator and U.S. Congressman. During these twenty years, Frank was a fierce advocate for social, educational, economic, and environmental justice, the rights of the poor and his Mexican American community, and the people he represented.
This is also a story of how Frank developed and was the leader of a grassroots political alliance of elected officials known as the “Southside Coalition” (who some called a “political machine,” while others called it the “Brown Mafia”), and in the process became one of the most powerful Mexican American/Chicano politicians that San Antonio and the State of Texas have ever known.
Juan Tejeda retired in 2016 as a professor of Mexican American Studies and Music at Palo Alto College in San Antonio, Texas. A writer, musician, educator, arts administrator, ex-Jefe Segundo of Xinachtli (the first traditional Mexica-Azteca Conchero dance group in Texas), and activist, from 1980 to 1998 he was the Xicano Music Program Director at the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center where, among his many duties, he founded and directed the annual Tejano Conjunto Festival en San Antonio. He is the button accordionist for the Conjunto Aztlan, and he and his wife, Anisa Onofre, are the publishers of Aztlan Libre Press, a small, independent publishing company based in Yanawana that is dedicated to the publishing, promotion and free expression of Indigenous/Xicanx literature and art.