Jose Avalos

Cristina Moreno is a dear family member and the first woman to vote. My cousin was born on the 23rd of June in 1996 in Laredo. When my cousin was 4 in 2001, her parents gave her a brother, at age 5 in 2002 she had a sister, and it kept going till the 7th child. Coming from a large family was hard on the education needs but she would put the extra push to accomplish her dream and be a role model to her siblings. She experienced self-consciously, a dream unlike any other that she had after a fight with her father. Fast forward 2012, she dreamed of becoming a DJ; a DJ is some one that plays recorded music and plays it at clubs. She bought whatever she could afford that would help her in the DJ industry. As years passed, she grew from the idea of being a DJ and joined Hector J Garcia Early College High School. There she was guided towards the right path where she would eventually find a career.

After she competed her four years in high school she had graduated with top honors from dual enrollment in high school. As I would watch, she would receive tons of acceptance letters from different universities. When she applied for one she became the first generation of college students at Texas State University. She would stay in the rooms provided by the school. During this time, she was getting into turntables her favorite bands were the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Arctic Monkeys. She finished college and received a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice at the age of 20, but when she first applied she was declined saying that she would have to wait one more year. She became Detention Officer at the age of 21 in Lewisville, TX Municipal jail. My cousin was given the right to vote at birth, however she became bias of voting, nowadays she likes voting but some presidents rig the election.

Harriet Tubman, born on 1820 as an American slave in a plantation, was owned by a man that went by the name of Edward Brodess in the County of Dorchester, Maryland. Her parents were Ben Ross and Harriet Greene, they were owned by different people and they were Mary Pattison Brodess and Anthony Thomson. Araminta was always placed on brutal jobs at such a young age. She was taken to other households where eventually she became a nursemaid, but the scary part was that she was brutally beaten whenever a baby would cry. Her last job had made her fall ill, the reason is because she would set muskrat traps, she was then taken back to Brodess. While a runaway slave fled he was armed with a heavy metal weight, sadly the weight hit Harriet Tubman in her skull. As days passed by she started to get seizures then they got more frequent and sadly didn’t go away.

Premonitions and vivid dreams such as her being spoken to by God were things she saw as the product of her spasms. In 1840, Harriet Tubman’s father was released as a slave at age 45. In 1844, she got engaged with Mr. John Tubman. Some years passed and after the owner had died he left the plantation in a great debt. Due to this, the next owner had to make a new decision, the only idea they could come up with was selling Harriet Tubman’s sister, separating them even more. When Tubman discovered what had happened she fell ill. Harriet couldn’t take much more of how they were worked to death or other families separated to be sold, and in December of 1850, Harriet with the company of her two brothers ran away from the plantation. As soon as they were far enough to be considered free her brothers had a change of mind and went back, Harriet found out that they were being hunted down by a newspaper that had written that a reward would be paid if they brought back Harriet and her brothers back to the plantation. As she kept going Harriet arrived in Pennsylvania that at the time was a free state. Then she changed her name like we all know her with her mother’s name and her husband’s last name. Once Tubman became stronger and knowledgeable in the field of war, she helped John Brown in the Harper’s Ferry Attack in 1859. The last of her personal quest had come to an end. In 1860 she took her last mission, her goal was to go back to a plantation in which she would go at night, sneak in and take her sister through the Underground Railroad. When she got to her sister, sadly she had passed away.

1861 was the start of one of the greatest wars in history the Civil War. As soon as the Civil War had started Tubman became a nurse and also cook. Under the command of James Montgomery, she became a spy to scout, she also recruited former slaves for the regiment of African American soldiers under the command of General David Hunter. Tubman is the first woman to ever lead an assault during the Civil War in the Combahee river. When she came back to her home in New York she married Nelson Davis who was younger by 22 years. In 1873 a friend of Tubman had lent her some money; she had planned to exchange it for gold but she was attacked and the money was stolen. Gertie was the name of the little girl Harriet Tubman and her husband James Montgomery had adopted in 1874. Bad things still didn’t stop from happening like Tubman’s house getting set on fire, burning it to ashes. In 1898, Tubman became a supporter of the women’s rights movement and would do speeches in different places like Boston and New York. Tubman had brain surgery and like a soldier getting his leg chopped off she bit on a bullet. In 1913 Tubman died at age 93 due to pneumonia and was buried with military honors.
 

The way that her life affects me is by trying harder to accomplish my dreams. I can relate to her because we had the same struggle but I wasn’t born in a big family; it was only me and my mom. As I am now I try my hardest to follow in her footsteps and become someone as great as her. I was also able to see how a strong woman mature at a young age by putting her mind on her goal and striving for victory without hesitation. She’s taught me that even first generations can change the process of future generations, that it doesn’t matter how manly, scary, and dangerous a job could be; just like men women can also go forward and aspire to new jobs. This person, even though she is not that far apart from my life, it was hard to get information about her but when I was waiting for her to reply I remembered that for 13 years I was with her. She taught me English when my teachers gave up on me, math when no teacher was willing to teach, science when I wouldn’t understand and so on. She also made me see voting as an honor because I’ll be the first from my family to vote to make my country better. Local voting is important for the community and people should at least vote because they have a voice.

Voting at state level is when for instance you want to change or add a law and just like any other person you go vote, and federal is basically everything that has to do with laws and policies but they are all important.