Juanita Solis Kidder
"This is home; this is where I belong"
Interview
“I’ll have you start by stating you name and your age”
“My name is Juanita Solis Kidder, and I am 75 years old”
“And where are you from?”
“I am from Albion. Even though people look at me and think I am from Mexico, or somewhere else. I was born in Albion; I was raised in southern Texas. And so, I am bilingual. And I have a little accent because Spanish was my first language”
“How long have you been a citizen of Albion?”
“I have, well I was born here, but I was 2 when I left, and I came back when I was 18. So, 57 years”
“And what are you involved with within the community?”
“My main thing is Citizens to Beautify Albion, now. For about 30 years or more. And I also belong to Philanthropic Women, St. Johns Church, I do various volunteer things there. The Historical Society, the Calhoun County Senior Ambassador, the Senior Housing Commission, other things before. Those are the main ones”
“So, why did you choose this location, the Ludington Center?”
“The Ludington is central. It’s a centralized place with a nice view of the river and the Coke Sign, and available to people even though it is owned by the college. It is available to people. It’s a nice space. Comfortable”
“So to kind of switch and talk about Albion a little bit more, what is Albion to you? Are there people, locations, feelings; what really culminates it?”
“I came to Albion, and we, in October, October 22nd of ‘66, and I started seeing the colors in Missouri because we drove up here. But when I came into Albion, I felt home. Even though I had never been here since I left at two years old. People would always say, well where are you from? Well Albion, Michigan. Where in the heck is that? Or what do you mean, you’ve got to be from Texas. Well no. So when I got here I just felt at home. Albion is beautiful to me”
“So this rolls right into the next question, but I am going to ask you anyway. Would you consider Albion to be your home and why?”
“Albion is my home because I have been here so long. Don’t get me wrong, I go back to Texas at least once a year since I came here. Sometimes two to three times, it just depends. Oh I love the language and the culture and the music and the food and all that other stuff. But I’ve never really wanted to stay because I’ve always known that I was coming back home. And when you leave Texas sometimes and they’re having a dry spell, I go to the Corpus Christi area or to Brownsville. I used to go to Brownsville. And a lot of times they were in droughts and everything was brown. And I get off the plane here in Michigan and everything is green after you get out of the airport. And I go like, yes, this is home; this is where I belong”
“So, what does Albion mean to you?”
“Albion has always been to me a very welcoming community and I just love the people. And when I got here I was just used to Hispanic stuff, language, food, everything. And we were segregated then, I was just in the Brown part of where I was at. And then I came to Albion and there’s all these people with all these different names, and languages, and foods, and just different things. And I just fell in love with it because there’s so much culture to learn, if we just pay attention, and make friends”
“So to flip it just a little bit, I would like you to say in what ways Albion could improve”
“Albion could improve, I think we just need to come together more. I think we’re just still separated in ways and I’m involved in a lot of things where we’re together but we’re still separated in some forms. And I would just like to reach out. We’re all just human beings. And we just need to come together more”
“Last question I have for you is to describe Albion in words using the statement Albion is blank”
“Albion is friendly”