I was sad to hear that San Diego and Barrio Logan Chicano icon Ramón “Chunky” Sanchez passed away Friday at the age of 65.
Born in 1951 in Blythe, California, Chunky learned to play music from his family, and lived his childhood as a migrant farmworker. He left the farm he worked with his father soon after hearing the owner tell his dad that Chunky would make a great foreman when he was gone.
He decided to go to college, and eventually landed at San Diego State. Chunky and his brother Ricardo’s band Los Alacranes Mojados were a fixture when I was a MEChista at San Diego State; I can’t tell you how many events they played for us and for the entire movimiento.
Mas…RIP y QDEP: Ramón ‘Chunky’ Sanchez, pocho hero of San Diego