Everything That I Will Ever Know by Guillermo Corona

Everything That I Will Ever Know
for Eddie Montalvo
by Guillermo Corona

The archives are filled with Anita Byrants,
white,
           wealthy,
                        privileged,
  whose voices celebrate discrimination,
          colonization,
filling up boxes and mudding up
  (whitewashing)
   history while erasing
      (bastardizing)
       our existence,
   and yet...

within the nooks and crannies
    within the gaps and interstices,
hidden in the subtext of manuscript collections
  and on the pages of student publications

we continue to exist.

I shared this poem and the zine in November. I wanted to reshare it with its own graphic.

On Wednesday, January 25, 1978, Eddie Montalvo, a veteran of the Vietnam war and former high school football star, strode into Dr. Jose Castrillon’s chemistry classroom wielding a gun and a teddy bear. The news garnered some national attention, even being written about in a Canadian newspaper. Montalvo held the class hostage as a form of protest for homosexual rights. In a letter he delivered to the Edinburg Daily Review, outlined his plan to hold the class hostage for three days before releasing and committing suicide by cop.

In the letter, he addressed Anita Bryant, singer and spokesperson for the Florida Citrus Commission, who single-handedly destroyed her career by advocating against anti-gay legislation, founding the Save Our Children coalition, which created the anti-queer language still used to this day.

I researched Montalvo, hoping to piece together his story in order to correctly (and fairly) report on the event that shook Pan American University (present day University of Texas Rio Grande Valley). As I read his letter, the reports, and interviews with his family, I began to understand his fears and frustrations.

I believe that Montalvo died on October 3, 2021, just months after I learned about his existence and what he did. I hope to one day write a story about him that does him justice.