SAN JOSE, Calif.—Robert Gutierrez was like a lot of California Latinos coming of age in the 1970s: He loved cruising the boulevard on weekend nights, in a 1972 tangerine Pontiac Grand Ville modified to ride low to the ground with hydraulics so it could bump up and down.
On weekend nights, he joined thousands of others in processions of so-called lowrider cars, cruising back and forth along Story Road—with tunes like “Suavecito” wafting—on this city’s predominantly Latino east side.