What was meant to be a family vacation to San Francisco ended up being a permanent stay with the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution in 1910, when the family home was destroyed.
The family’s first months in San Francisco were “tinged with sadness as we tried so hard to fit into the strange ways of a new land,” Zelayeta wrote in her self-help book, “Elena’s Lessons in Living” (1947).
Discrimination was routine: At school, students taunted Elena and her siblings for the staccato intonation of their speech.
It was during the throes of the Depression, when it was difficult to find work, that Zelayeta decided to realize her long-gestating dream of running a restaurant.
Their homegrown restaurant was such a sleeper hit that Zelayeta soon moved it to a building in downtown San Francisco.
Persons:
Elena, ” Zelayeta, “, Zelayeta, Lorenzo Zelayeta, chiles
Locations:
San Francisco, Mexican, Mexico