Federacion de Clubes Unidos Zacatecanos en Illinois

Story by Jorge Salinas

During WW2, my grandparents would come all the way from Zacatecas, Mexico to work the factories in Chicago. Eventually my father, Ascencion Salinas, would run away from home at 15 years old – 1972 – and come to Chicago to work at a Golden Nugget. Over the years he worked his way up. Opening restaurants and businesses. He brought my mom over and had my siblings and I. My father also founded the non-profit Federazion De Zacatecanos en Illinois. Which was a way for immigrants to stay connected and business owners to pool money they were sending home to Mexico already. He kept working at the restaurants during the pandemic, not wanting to disrupt the lives of the workers and in May of 2020 he died of the complications after contracting COVID-19.