Alvarez, Julia: Vermont Writer from the Dominican Republic

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Although born in New York, writer Julia Alvarez spent the first ten years of her life in her family's home in the Dominican Republic under Trujillo's rule. Her father's involvement in underground attempts to remove the dictator from power led to the family's move to New York in 1960. Her father worked seven days a week as a physician with an office in a Spanish-speaking section of Brooklyn. During some high school summers and breaks, Julia worked in that office, becoming aware of the class differences between the office and their more prosperous neighborhood.

The Alvarezes were not strangers to the United States. Julia's grandfather had been the Dominican Republic's cultural attache to the United Nations. Her parents had briefly tried living in New York a decade before their 1960 emigration. Her mother, Julia T. Alvarez, attended a girls' private school in New England. She later served for 23 years as the alternate representative from the Dominican Republic to the United Nations, donating her salary back to the country she represented. She worked on the Third Committee, which focuses on the most vulnerable people in developing nations. Mrs. Alvarez put forth efforts on behalf of the aged and was instrumental in the UN instituting the International Year of Older Persons in 1999, as well as setting aside October 1 as the International Day of Older Persons. Although her position was largely ceremonial, Mrs. …