Famous Latinx Birthdays

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Dayanara Torres (1974-     )! Photo from the Chicago Sun Times A Puerto Rican actress, model, singer, and writer, Torres grew up in Bayamón, Puerto Rico with her two older brothers, José and Joey, and her younger sister, Jeannette. She attended Colegio Santa Rosa and planned to go to college to study to become an orthodontist, but she was discovered at age 17 and just a year later won the title of Miss Universe 1993, changing the trajectory of her life. After winning the pageant, she became a UNICEF ambassador and toured Asia and Latin America advocating for the organization before moving to the Philippines, where she learned to speak Tagalog and became a major celebrity. She lived there for five years, appearing in many movies and television shows. In 1998 she returned to Puerto Rico and released the album Antifaz . She married the singer Marc Anthony in May of 2000, and the two had two sons together, Cristian Anthony (2001) and Ryan Anthony...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Litzy (Litzy Vanya Domínguez Balderas) (1982-     )! From Instagram @litzyoficial An actress and singer from Mexico, Litzy has been in two movies and more than 10 television programs (mostly telenovelas). In 2018, she depicted an undocumented immigrant in the United States in the Telemundo show Al Otro Lado Del Mundo (On The Other Side of the Wall), a role she says helped her identify with all those who live this experience (read more, in English, HERE ). Her current role in the show Manual Para Galanes is her first LGBQT role and her first foray into comedy. Read more in this L.A. Times article (in Spanish). She talks about the show, in which she plays the owner of a doggie spa who gives lessons to men trying to be "galánes," or ladies men, in this July 2020 interview, in which she also gives life advice: i.e. En la vida real yo creo que lo que hay que hacer es tratar de ser uno mismo, lo más apegado a la esencia que uno tiene (In real li...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Miguel Otero Silva (1908-1985)! Photo from poeticious.com Miguel Otero Silva was a Venezuelan writer and politician whose 1955 novel, Casas Muertas (Dead Houses), won the Premio Nacional de Literatura (National Literature Prize). A Marxist in his youth, he was repeatedly forced into exile during his life as he fought for free speech and against dictatorial governments. His first political activity was doing Venezuela's Student's Week in 1928, in which he engaged in activities and then a military coup against then-dictator Juan Vicente Gomez. He was forced in to exile, and it was in exile that he worked on his first novel, Fiebre (Fever), published in 1939. In 1943 he founded the daily newspaper El Nacional along with his father. In 1949, three years after marrying fellow journalist María Teresa Castillo, Otero Silva left the Communist Party of Venezuela and dedicated himself exclusively to writing. After the establishment of a democratic state i...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Pedro Martínez (1971-       )! Photo from 2015 Boston Globe story: On the field and off, Pedro Martínez truly one of a kind .  A professional baseball player (pitcher) from the Dominican Republic who played between 1992 and 2009, Martínez is an 8-time All-Star and 3-time Cy Young Award Winner. He this excellent 2015 profile from Sports Illustrated ). was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2015, his first year of eligibility. He won the World Series in 2004 with the Red Sox (their first title in 86 years). One of six children growing up in a small house in the town of Manoguayabo, D.R., Martínez often climbed a mango tree in his backyard for solitude when his parents were fighting (they divorced when he was 6 -- Martínez would help them come back together on more positive terms later in his life). He also inherited a love for gardening from his mother, who tended to flowers at the house. When he was 16 and only 137 pounds,...

Photo from thebogotapost.com ¡Feliz cumpleaños a ...Jaime Garzón (1960-August 13, 1999)! A comedian, journalist, and peace activist from Colombia who in 2010 was voted the 2nd most admired person in the country (after President Álvaro Uribe and before Nobel Prize winning author Gabriel García Márquez - see this 2019 video made by El Tiempo ), Garzón was killed by right-wing paramilitary hitmen with suspected support from members of the Colombian military and security services. On the 20th anniversary of his death, he was the #1 trending Twitter topic in Colombia, with hashtags such as #SiGarzónViviera (If Garzón Were Alive), #MatamosALosBuenos (We Kill the Good Ones), #20AñosEsperandoJusticia (Twenty Years Waiting For Justice). There are many murals dedicated to his memory throughout Colombia, especially in Bogotá. Garzón was the third of four children born to a family in Bogotá. His father died when he was 7 years old. At a catholic school he attended, he was known as being irr...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a... Juan Antonio "Chi Chi" Rodríguez (1934-    )! Photo from pgatour.com A professional golfer from Puerto Rico who won 8 PGA Tours between 1963 and 1979, Chi Chi Rodríguez was inducted in to the World Golf Hall of Fame in 1992. One of six children born to a poor family in Río Piedras, Puerto Rico, Rodríguez helped his family earn money by being a water carrier on a sugar plantation. One day he wandered on to a golf course and saw how much more money the caddies made than him. He decided to be one some day and set out teaching himself golf with a stick and a metal can. By 1947, at the age of 12, he was shooting a 67. Rodríguez joined the U.S. Army in 1954 and practiced golf at the courses near his bases wherever he was stationed. He turned pro in 1960 and won the Denver Open in 1963. He calls his meeting with Mother Theresa "the best 45 minutes of my life" (more on that in this interesting Florida Trend interview  HERE ) and credits it with...

De Carlotto in 2014, the year she found her grandson after 36 years of searching. From npr.org .  ¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Estela de Carlotto (1930-      )! Estela de Carlotto is the long-time president of the organization Las Abuelas de La Plaza de Mayo, which for more than 50 years has demonstrated for truth about those disappeared during Argentina's brutal military dictatorship. She has been considered for the Nobel Peace Prize multiple times. De Carlotto's daughter, Laura, was pregnant when she was kidnapped by the military junta in 1977. After she was killed, her baby, Guido, was adopted into a family to be raised (and not told of his identity). Between 9000 and 30,000 people were disappeared during Argentina's Dirty War (1976-1983), and some 400 babies were robbed of their identities and raised by (sometimes unsuspecting) families approved of by the dictatorship. De Carlotto speaks about the relief she felt upon joining the group (she was not one of ...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Celia Cruz (1925-2003)! Celia Cruz and husband of 42 years Pedro Knight in 1998. Photo from the 2007 New York Times story Amid the Gravestones, A Final Love Song "Because of [Celia Cruz], we have unapologetic Black women in music, Afro-Cuban rhythms and glamour, [and] Latinx presence in entertainment." -Smithsonian Museum #BecauseofHer ( Why Is Celia Cruz Called the Queen of Salsa? March 5, 2020 video ) Celia Cruz is one of the best known entertainers of the 20th century. With her nicknames of "La Guarachera de Cuba" (for the guarachas that made her famous in her native land), the "Queen of Salsa" and "The Queen of Latin Music," she inspired millions around the world with her music, her style, and her joy. She recorded 37 studio albums and numerous live albums and collaborations and won many awards, including two Grammys, three Latin Grammys, and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (in 2016). She was born in Havan...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Luis Saritama (1983-       )! A professional soccer player from Ecuador, Saritama retired in 2020 to focus on his family and his business ventures (he has a degree in International Business and recently became a panelist on the sports show El Picadito). Read (in Spanish) about his decision to retire HERE . Saritama, who has played in Peru, Mexico, and Ecuador, played for Ecuador in two world cups: Germany in 2006 and Brazil in 2014. Born in the town of Loja, Ecuador, in the south of the country, Saritama lived there until he was 13, when he moved to Quito to train. In addition to his World Cup success, he won three national titles with Deportivo Quito. Hear him speak about his career in this video interview (in Spanish). See him in his home, with his dog (who is "betting" on who will win, Japan or Chile) in this video clip (in Spanish) (he talks about getting the dog in Mexico and giving it to his wife when they married). This 10 minu...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Bárbara Jacobs (1947-      )! Photo from August, 2020 from excelsior.com.mx Article is about her latest book, a tribute to the beauty of writing and reading.  A Mexican writer and translator, Jacobs gained fame with her first book,  Las Hojas Muertas  (The Dead Leaves), which was published in 1987 and for which she won the prestigious Premio Xavier Villarrutia.  Las Hojas Muertas  was translated into several languages. The book is the story of her father, Emile Jacobs, the son of a Jewish Libanese immigrant to New York City who covered Moscow as a journalist, fought in the Spanish Civil War with the Lincoln Brigade, which he helped found, and then returned home to serve as a sargeant in the army in the United States. His treatment in the army in the U.S. (he was scrutinized for his liberal views) led him to leave the country and move to Mexico City, where he met and married his wife, Jacobs' mother. A review of Las Ho...

¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Yoenis Céspedes (1985-       )! Photo from Dec. 2019 in  forbes.com Nicknamed "La Potencia" (The Power), Céspedes is a professional baseball player from Cuba who signed a 4-year, $110 million contract with the Mets in 2016. Céspedes grew up in the small town of Israel Lica in Cuba and was raised by his mother, a star softball pitcher for the Cuban National Team who he still calls for batting tips, and her extended family (when she was traveling for tournaments). His father, Cresencio Céspedes, who after the first year of his life was not involved in his upbringing, played for the Cuban National Team. When he was ten years old, Céspedes' mother sent him 50 miles from home to a national baseball training camp.  He was playing for the Cuban National Team in 2011when, after he was not selected for the first team, he decided to try to come to the United States. In order to be able to be a free agent, he went to the Dominican Re...

Photo from artes-uk.org ¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Marina Nuñez del Prado! (1910-1995) Photo from Wikipedia A Bolivian sculptor  from La Paz, Bolivia with MANY accolades to her name, Nuñez del Prado was greatly influenced by the indigenismo movement. After studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in La Paz, from which she graduated in 1930, Nuñez del Prado continued on there as an instructor, and she was the first woman to achieve the position of Chair of the Academy. While teaching, she was also exhibiting locally, but she left her job and La Paz in 1938 to travel. After spending time in other South American countries, Egypt, Europe, and the United States (where she spent 8 years in New York on a fellowship), she returned to La Paz, where she continued working and as artist and a teacher. Her  exhibition Mineros en rebelión (Miners in Rebellion) won a gold medal in New York, and many of her other works received international accolades. In 1972, she moved with her husband, ...