I was born in Edinburg, Texas in late 1967, about three months before Freddy perished in Vietnam. By the time I was growing up, Freddy already had a street and an elementary school named after him. Edinburg still only had one high school when I attended. The school library had a display case containing Freddy's medals and a memorial outlining his achievements. (That display has since been moved to the Museum of South Texas History, located on the town square in Edinburg.)
While Freddy's name was well-known to me, I didn't really ponder him all that much. I'm not sure why I didn't. I was certainly interested in war history. My own father, Cecilio Garza, had served in the Pacific Theater during World War II, mostly in a support capacity as a corporal for what was then called the Army Air Corps (later, the Air Force). He regaled me and my siblings with his war stories, and I eventually interviewed him on-camera and videotaped his photo scrapbook. At his funeral, he was given a traditional 21 gun salute, as I imagine Freddy was as well.
I suppose, like many other Edinburg natives, I took Freddy for granted. His name became just another street, just another school in my hometown--a hometown that I would leave, more or less for good, after my sophomore year of college. Life has a funny way of making you focus on things other than hometown history.
In my case, life meant graduating from the University of Texas at Austin, then entering graduate school at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. I was studying film and television: writing in particular, but also production and editing to a limited extent. I was looking to make it in the entertainment industry, and after I finished at USC, I had the good fortune of landing in the story department at Home Box Office (HBO). I also worked, concurrently, for producer Mike Medavoy at Phoenix Pictures, and director Brett Ratner at what would later morph into mega-production entity Dune-Ratpac Entertainment.
It was easy for a small town boy to get lost in the glittering lights of Tinseltown. Nevertheless, I tried to remain grounded, to stay in touch with my Rio Grande Valley roots. My older brother Rene, who still lives in Edinburg, served as a touchstone of sorts for me. It was Rene who reawakened my interest in Freddy during my time in Hollywood.
Rene sent me a series of articles from The Monitor, a newspaper from Edinburg's larger, neighboring town of McAllen. The articles described a harrowing account of how Freddy's mother Dolia, who had been receiving benefits from the Veterans Administration for nearly 30 years, was suddenly being asked to repay those benefits.
Apparently, the VA had erred in its initial determination and was finally getting around to making a correction, decades later. This correction came shortly before Dolia had returned from Naval Station Ingleside near Corpus Christi, where a destroyer bearing Freddy's name had just been commissioned. The ship, launched in Maine, had made a special trip to Texas, just to honor Dolia.
The military, in one shining moment, lauded a woman whose only son gave his life for his country...and then, in the next moment, a government organization, whose sole purpose was to care for veterans and their families, demanded that the woman pay back benefits that were mistakenly awarded to her through no fault of her own. I was struck by the irony and understandably outraged.
Thankfully, the tight-knit community of the Rio Grande Valley came to Dolia's aid. After The Monitor brought Dolia's plight into the public eye, a now-defunct local grocery chain, Scurlock's, donated money to Dolia to assist her in her repayment efforts. Congressman Ruben Hinojosa negotiated with the VA on Dolia's behalf. Eventually, the VA relented.
I kept tabs on Dolia's story during the remainder of my time in Hollywood. Interestingly, it would be an act of war--of terrorism, specifically--that would propel me homewards, and once more in contemplation of Freddy: 9/11.
I had recently finished a stint as an associate segment producer on the Fox reality show, WORLD'S WILDEST POLICE VIDEOS, and was debating what my next career move would be. Then 9/11 hit, and the impact was devastating. America was shaken to its core, in every conceivable way. Hollywood went into a tailspin, laying off scores of industry professionals. Although I still had a gig with HBO, the uncertainty of my job security...of ANY security in the world, actually...led me to one inevitable conclusion; it was time to return home.
When I moved back to Texas, I trekked down to Edinburg and visited Dolia. We talked at length about Freddy and her battle with the VA. The more we talked, the more convinced I became that his story, and hers, needed to be told. She threw out some names of interview candidates: Freddy's buddies in his formative years, men he had served with, men he had saved. I told her I would try to put something together.
But of course, life had a funny way of intervening. Surviving outside of the entertainment industry meant having to go into a different, but related, field: teaching screenwriting and television writing. I would spend years establishing my professorial presence in the Austin college scene. Once again, thoughts of Freddy and Dolia were relegated to the back burner.
However, I never completely abandoned my entertainment aspirations. During my semester breaks, I would assist local film projects, and I also made it a point to maintain my industry contacts. When a screenwriter buddy in Miami asked for help producing his directorial debut, I walked onto his set and learned valuable lessons on what to do (and not do) on a production.
But it was aiding another friend--a native of McAllen--on a documentary about his famous businessman father, that finally put Freddy (and Dolia) firmly back in my sights. By bringing to life the story of Andrew J. Paris, the one-time Bubblegum King of America, I realized that a forgotten chapter of Rio Grande Valley history had world-changing implications. Paris had put McAllen on the map.
Perhaps Freddy could put Edinburg on the map as well...and in a most unexpected, but also most necessary, way.
As I write this, a few short days away from what will undoubtedly be a historic Presidential election, I reflect upon a crisis that, regardless of where each of us falls on the political spectrum, we can all agree upon. A crisis of character.
In an election cycle when each of the major party candidates is seen as a choice between the lesser of two evils, it has never been clearer to me that America needs a better choice, someone who is, unquestionably, a hero.
Freddy Gonzalez was--IS--that hero.
No one can question the integrity of a man who, by virtue of being an only son, never had to serve, but chose to. No one can question the integrity of a man who was urged not to enter an increasingly unpopular, seemingly unwinnable war, but chose to. No one can question the integrity of a man who could've lived out the rest of his days in a training position at home, who never had to return to an increasingly deadly battlefront half a world away, but chose to.
No one can question the integrity of a man who didn't have to refuse medical treatment for his injuries, who didn't have to rescue his comrades-in-arms, who didn't have to put himself in the line of enemy fire, who didn't have to die...but chose to.
A hero, for all ages. A hero, whose story is long overdue.