For McEnery, San Jose’s identity, and his own, was linked to the myth of the great American melting pot, in which diverse peoples came together to form something new and better. In his view, the historical events that supported this myth included a peaceful transfer of power from Mexican to American governments and cooperation between Californios and Americans afterward. Such a story laid a firm foundation for modern San Jose’s vibrant multicultural community.
Of course, that narrative, like all master narratives, was selective. Supporting details were chosen by people with the power to impose their version of history, leaving out details that would, if told, support different stories and different identities.
The selective process of historical mythmaking is universal. It is vividly illustrated in the Confederate monuments dotting the South, which represent white Southerners’ power to impose a master narrative—the “Lost Cause”—and to exclude other narratives, such as the suffering of enslaved people and their efforts to free themselves. The nation’s reckoning with the continuing violence against and untold stories of Black Americans is now shifting that master narrative. About a tenth of the more than 700 Confederate monuments in existence have recently been or are in the process of being taken down.
That same process of historical reckoning led to Fallon’s statue being removed. For descendants of Californios and more recent Latinx immigrants, the Fallon myth whitewashed the violence of the Mexican-American War and a century and a half of exclusion from political power. The majority of San Jose’s citizens wanted a different narrative, one that acknowledged that painful history and included Latinx stories. It is entirely appropriate that communities get to decide which aspects of history they will embrace at particular times and what their master narratives will be.
But what about the real individual behind the heroic bronze? Let’s face it, had Fallon’s story not been put in service of a myth, no one but his descendants and the descendants of those he wronged would remember him. For such people—people like me—the accuracy of the story does matter. When the narrative clashes with the memories of family and community members, whether because of selection bias or outright invention, we owe it to them to listen and revise.
Tom McEnery seems to have had good intentions. His Fallon, had he existed, would have been an admirable figure to include in a multi-cultural curriculum. But McEnery’s characterization of Fallon collapsed under the weight of the personal and community stories that made it unbelievable, for good historical reasons. Triumphalist tales of white heroes on horseback deserve to be complicated, and there are few better ways to do it than telling the long-overlooked stories of people who lost their power, land, and lives. People like the Californios and Indigenous people of early California, and like my grandparents, Baptiste and Sally Exervier.