Hispanic Heritage Month

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Jose Rivera
  • 8th Maintenance Group
KUNSAN AIR BASE, Republic of Korea --  Hispanic Heritage month is a time of celebration on how all come together as one; not caring the nationality each of us comes from.  Over 52 million strong, Latinos are affecting every aspect of the national landscape--military, pop culture, the workforce consumption, politics and America's identity as a nation.   But you may ask yourself, why does it start the 15th of September and end the 15th of October?  And like everything else that has a beginning so does the Hispanic heritage month.  So let's take a look back in time.

The first Hispanic Heritage month started back in 1968 when Congress passed Public law 90-498, authorizing the president to issue an annual proclamation designating the week of 15th-16th of September as National Hispanic day.  Moving along 20 years later to 1988, Congress passed Public law 100-402 which designated 31 days of September as Hispanic Heritage month, starting 15 September and ending on October 15.  These dates were chosen because it coincides with the independence celebrations of several Latin American countries such as Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Mexico and Chile.  And it was also the time that Christopher Columbus discovers the Americas or as I would like to say it "El descubrimiento de las Americas". During this wonderful month Latinos like festivities that bring out the best in them like for instance their music, exotic food, countries history and rich culture, and you could never forget their different styles of dancing like: Cumbia, Salsa, Bachata, Merengue and for us young adult's reggueton.  Hispanic Heritage month is special here at Kunsan AB, because it's an opportunity to celebrate the observance in a different country and educate the local community about this great heritage. I invite you all to take this opportunity to learn or share Hispanic traditions with your fellow Airmen and Korean counter parts.