Ballad of an unsung hero

BALLAD OF AN UNSUNG HERO is a compelling portrait of Pedro J. Gonzalez, an 88-year-old resident of San Ysidro, California. Using rare historical footage and photographs, Gonzalez’s own vintage musical recordings, and dynamic interviews with Gonzalez and his wife, BALLAD OF AN UNSUNG HERO chronicles Gonzalez’s long and colorful life, from his early days as a telegraph operator for Pancho Villa during the Mexican Revolution, to his career as a popular Spanish-language radio personality in Los Angeles in the 1920s and 1930s, to the controversial court case that sent him to San Quentin Prison.BALLAD OF AN UNSUNG HERO was the result of collaboration between San Diego Public Television, Cinewest Productions –an independent production company in San Diego, and local scholars. Despite the difficulties inherent in an historical documentary which by necessity must rely upon oral history in the television documentary form. The program also represents an effort to rescue from obscurity an important story relatively ignored by standard history books.