| Just as Ontario began with train tracks, vineyards and
orange groves, the Aguilera family had its start in California between steel
rails and rows of grapevines.
Pablo Aguilera left Mexico to find a better life. He wanted to give his
children more opportunity than he could have had in Jalisco.
“His dream was to have us have a good job,” said Carmen Gutierrez, Pablo
Aguilera’s granddaughter. “I don’t think that he’d see us going out and
being millionaires, just as long as we were happy and had a house.”
The future of the Aguilera family looks less like grapevines and more like
microchips and motherboards.
Aside from a few years in the Army, Ray Aguilera has spent his entire life in
Ontario. He has made his living in the area’s dwindling aerospace industry.
He raised his five children with the same strong work ethic that earned him a
sufficiently solid living to support them and send all five to college.
They have gone on to be a credit manager, an orthodontic assistant, a
warehouse worker and a nurse. One son followed in his father’s career path but
was laid off after Lockheed moved its aerospace operation to Palmdale and is
still looking for work.
Now, Ray Aguilera is watching some of his grandchildren enter their college
days.
He and his children have high hopes for the next generation of Aguileras,
Vasquezes and Gutierrezes.
It appears the community harbors a similar hope for his grandchildren:
Ontario Mills’ community foundation awarded one of 18 college scholarships
last year to his grandson, John Ray Vasquez, 16.
A sophomore at Chaffey High School, John Ray is the third generation from his
family to compete on the school’s track squad, though he prefers running cross
country.
The scholarship will give him money for college as long as he maintains a
certain grade point average and performs 1,000 hours of community service.
John Ray said he wants to attend a UC school, study computer engineering and
stay in Ontario.
“Ontario’s turning into a pretty big city,” he said. “I hope there
will be job opportunities.”
If city and industry leaders have their way, there will be plenty of
opportunities for someone who wants to go into engineering in Ontario.
Several groups, including the Inland Empire Economic Partnership, are trying
to build an atmosphere that fosters the growth of high-tech industry in the
region.
Ray Aguilera said he only wants his grandchildren and great-grandchildren to
be happy.
“In Mexico, it was hard. My dad wanted me to do better than he had done,”
he said. “Me, I want them to do better than I have.”
John Ray’s mother, Nellie Vasquez, said she sees a better job market in
Ontario’s future but maintains a bit of caution.
“That doesn’t mean the people that live out here are the ones getting the
jobs,” she said.
Her sister Carmen Gutierrez said she watches as new businesses sprout,
seemingly overnight, in her hometown. They have little direct impact on her
life, though.
“I don’t know a lot of people that work there. I see a lot of businesses,
but I don’t know what kind are there,” she said.
Gutierrez, who didn’t finish college but plans to return, said she hopes
her sons Tony, 10, Ryan, 3, and Jason, 1, earn college degrees.
“To get a higher-paying job you have to have a college education,” she
said. “It’s going to be up to them” what they do.
Throughout the generations, the Aguilera family has maintained close ties.
All continue to live in Southern California, and most have remained in or
near Ontario.
Perhaps it is their heritage, which emphasizes family over everything, that
has kept them so close.
“I don’t see me moving,” Gutierrez said. “We’re a close-knit
family. I wanted to live close to my parents. I’ve been here all my life.” |
