Examines the social and economic effects on the migrant Mexican families subjected to forced relocation by the United States during the 1930s.

"A detailed, rich, and engaging text on Mexicans in Los Angeles, from the turn of the century, when their presence was virtually unacknowledged, to the 1930s, when Mexican communities created a significant presence in the city. Monroy's book offers a sweeping narrative that carries you into Los Angeles and beyond, through a discussion of immigration pathways, work lives, and the popular culture of the immigrants and the first generation youth."—Lisbeth Haas, author of Conquests and Historical Identities in California, 1769-1936

This book was the first broad exposé of the social and environmental damage inflicted by the growth of corporate agriculture in California. Factories in the Field—together with the work of Dorothea Lange, Paul Taylor, and John Steinbeck—dramatizes the misery of the dust bowl migrants hoping to find work in California agriculture. McWilliams starts with the scandals of the Spanish land grant purchases, and continues on to examine the experience of the various ethnic groups that have provided labor for California's agricultural industry—Chinese, Japanese, Mexicans, Filipinos, Armenians—the strikes, and the efforts to organize labor unions

Mexican communities in the United States faced more than unemployment during the Great Depression. Discrimination against Mexican nationals and similar prejudices against Mexican Americans led the communities to seek help from Mexican consulates, which in most cases rose to their defense. Los Angeles's consulate was confronted with the country's largest concentration of Mexican Americans, for whom the consuls often assumed a position of community leadership. Whether helping the unemployed secure repatriation and relief or intervening in labor disputes, consuls uniquely adapted their roles in international diplomacy to the demands of local affairs.

Migratory movements between Mexico and the United States, 1880-1934 -- The Mexican community in the United States, 1933-1939 -- The Mexican government and repatriation: November 1934-June 1936 -- From the creation of the Demography and Repatriation Section to the elaboration of a repatriation project, July 1936-October 1938 -- The repatriation project, 1938-1939 -- Spanish refugees, the repatriated, and the Lower Rio Grande Valley -- The 18 March agricultural colony in Tamaulipas, 1939-1940 -- The end of the project, 1939-1940