A very important historical event occurred on Sunday, September 8, 2024, which marked the 124th anniversary of the birth of Adela Velarde Pérez, also known as La Adelita. When I was growing up in my beloved Barrio El Azteca in Laredo, Texas, during the 1940s and 1950s, I often heard the song, “La Adelita,” that was sung by Jorge Negrete, in my mother’s Spanish radio station XENU or the other Mexican radio station XEBK, both being broadcast from across the Río Grande in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico. Actually, the song, “La Adelita,” was heard all over the barrio and I am sure all over Laredo. In a big way, we all grew up hearing this song, which was the most famous corrido of the Mexican Revolution and knowing some of the lyrics. And I am sure that many Mexican American families, who were living along the border during this time, and also in other parts of South Texas, like in San Antonio’s West Side, which is comprised of Mexican and Mexican American families, knew about “La Adelita,” and thus it became very much a part of our cultural, social, and historical Mexican heritage.
“La Adelita”
Si Adelita se fuera con otro
La seguiría por tierra y por mar
Si por mar en un buque de guerra
Si por tierra en un tren militar…