Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (A.W.O.C.) and the National Farm Workers Association (N.F.W.A.) pin

This lapel pin features the initials of two organizations that formed the United Farm Workers (UFW), a labor union founded for farmworkers in the United States. The acronym A.W.O.C. stands for the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, composed primarily of Filipino migrant farmworkers. AWOC was led by the Filipino American labor organizer Larry Itliong, who later worked alongside Cesar Chavez as the assistant director of the UFW. The other acronym on the pin N.F.W.A. stands for the National Farm Workers Association, which was led by Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez. In September 1965, the Filipino-led AWOC spearheaded a series of strikes against table grape growers in Delano, California. A week later, the NFWA, whose membership was primarily Mexican farmworkers, struck in solidarity with AWOC. In August 1966, AWOC and NFWA joined forces to fight against the exploitation of farmworkers, merging to create the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee. This pin highlights the importance of cross-racial and cross-ethnic collaboration of Asian and Latinx organizers and farmworkers.