Music of the Mill

When the Salcido family departs for the United States, their flight is hardly different from the journeys of the indigenous tribes who roamed America for tens of thousands of years, or immigrants who sailed across entire oceans, or countless others who have left their native lands behind for the promise of a better life. Traveling mostly on foot, Procopio Salcido and his future wife, Eladia, leave Mexico for the United States to escape the bleak realities of their homeland. Finally settling in Los Angeles, the young couple discover that the hopes they have for their children must now be weighted against the backdrop of the mighty Nazareth steel mill, their engine for survival, which will eventually become the lifeblood of their own American dream. Spanning sixty years and three generations, Music of the Mill is set in the industrial boom of post-World War II Southern California, where jobs seemed plentiful, communities thrived, and racial harmony prevailed.