Hispanic Heritage Project
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- Alexandria Ocasio-cortez
- Alexandria Ocasio-CortezKicking off our list of influential Hispanic Americans is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Born in 1989 in the Bronx, New York, into a Puerto Rican family, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez went on to become the youngest woman ever elected to Congress, at the age of 29.After a successful grassroots campaign that won a great deal of support, AOC (as she is often referred to) entered the US House of Representatives for New York’s 14th district in January 2019.
- In 1988, Ochoa joined NASA as a research engineer and was selected to be an astronaut in 1990. Three years later, she became the first Hispanic American woman to go to space, as part of a mission to study the Earth’s ozone layer.Ochoa completed 3 more missions and later became the Johnson Space Center’s first Hispanic director. She is truly one of the most influential Hispanic Americans in history!
- Ellen Ochoa
- Ellen Ochoa has gone down in history for being the first Hispanic American woman to go to space when she joined the 9-day mission aboard the Discovery shuttle in 1993.Ellen Ochoa’s grandparents emigrated from Mexico to the USA and eventually settled in California, where Ochoa was born in 1958. After earning her bachelor’s degree in physics, she went on to gain a master’s and doctorate in engineering from Stanford University.
- In 1988, Ochoa joined NASA as a research engineer and was selected to be an astronaut in 1990. Three years later, she became the first Hispanic American woman to go to space, as part of a mission to study the Earth’s ozone layer.Ochoa completed 3 more missions and later became the Johnson Space Center’s first Hispanic director. She is truly one of the most influential Hispanic Americans in history!
- She met her friend Marsha P. Johnson, and together they formed Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR), which supported LGBTQIA+ youth in Manhattan. After the Stonewall riots in 1969, the pair worked with the newly founded Gay Liberation Front to fight for their civil rights.
- Sylvia Rivera is not only an influential Hispanic American, but an icon for the gay and transgender rights movements. Born in New York City in 1951 and of Venezuelan and Puerto Rican descent, Rivera had a difficult upbringing and left home at the age of 10. She had to learn to fend for herself as she faced violence and discrimination, and she eventually started down a path of activism.
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