The Roanoke Times: Land of Opportunity

Stories

A growing presence (July 23): Hispanic immigrants are putting down roots in Roanoke. What shape will their collective footprint take?
Driven to succeed (July 24): Rocio Ortiz’s work ethic and intensity have paid off professionally, but she sometimes wonders — at what cost?
Dollars and dreams (July 29): Hispanic workers and advocates say proposed legislation would change the ways many companies conduct business.
Proud patriarch (July 30): Jesus Arellano’s chain of restaurants no longer fuels Roanoke’s Hispanic growth, but it was the force behind its genesis.
'It's in God's hands' (Sept. 25): What will Nohemi Cedillo risk to find her son?
A journey of faith (Sept. 24): A mother wants desperately to find out what happened to her son, who disappeared last year somewhere along the Texas-Mexico border.
Se habla español (Oct. 15): Many area employers are learning the language in order to communicate with Roanoke’s growing Hispanic community.
Homecoming (Dec. 24): This Mexican town comes alive when workers return from the North.
Dashed dreams (Dec. 25): Broken families remain when villagers migrate north.
Far from home (Dec. 31): Leonardo hopes to one day live the American dream — in Mexico.

n increasing numbers, Hispanic immigrants are putting down roots in the Roanoke Valley. They're pouring concrete, opening hair salons and filling classrooms. Some employers, meanwhile, are attributing their success to this new labor pool. In this occasional series, The Roanoke Times explores the local impact of the national debate about immigration.

Recent Roanoke Times stories on Hispanic immigration have included:

Nov. 3, 2005: For the love of the game
Nov. 9, 2005: A world of good eating
April 9, 2006: Scouting out a new country
April 19, 2006: Expert tamale maker is a true wrap artist
May 2, 2006: Inmigración: Si se puede
May 20, 2006: Radio and TV tune in to Hispanic culture

During a busy Friday night dinner waiter Jesus Malaga serves an armload of food to their Anglo customers. Malaga came to America four years ago from Mexico and, like many Mexican immigrants in Roanoke, first landed a job at El Rodeo.

December 31, 2006

As Congress wrestles with what to do about the estimated 12 million illegal Hispanic immigrants, friends and relatives keep showing up on the Roanoke doorsteps of those already settled here. The Roanoke Times documents the people behind the debate in this series of occasional articles titled “Land of Opportunity.”

Though some subjects were reluctant to have their names used and photographs taken out of fear of being deported, many believed that telling their stories would put a human face on a growing population that is still largely invisible — but which openly co-exists — in our community. In most cases, the newspaper has not pinpointed where the immigrants live or where they are employed.

Beth Macy has been a features writer at The Roanoke Times since 1989. Macy gravitates toward stories that feature real-life struggles of ordinary people, with profile articles that have garnered national feature-writing awards and Virginia Press Association honors. She has published freelance articles in salon.com, The Christian Science Monitor and The Chronicle of Higher Education, and taught literary journalism at Hollins University.

Josh Meltzer has been a photographer at The Roanoke Times since 1999. Earlier this year, Meltzer was named Photographer of the Year (Under 115,000 Circulation) by the National Press Photographers Association. Meltzer previously was a staff photographer at the Duluth (Minn.) News-Tribune for four years. In addition to his still photography, Meltzer has photographed, recorded, edited and produced more than two dozen video, audio and multimedia online presentations that have received awards from the Virgininia News Photographers Association and the Society for News Design.

In 2005, Macy and Meltzer teamed up to produce "An Unlikely Refuge," a multimedia series documenting the resettlement of Somali Bantu refugees in Roanoke. Their work won several national awards, including the 2006 Digital Edge Award for multimedia storytelling and the Associated Press Managing Editors award for online convergence.

Evelio Contreras has been a reporter at The Roanoke Times since June 2005. He began as an editorial assistant in Metro and is now the community sports writer for the New River Valley Current, Neighbors and Sports. Contreras hopes to write narrative stories with a photographer's eye for detail. Before moving to Roanoke, Contreras was a desk assistant at The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on PBS and worked as a sports editor of The News Gram in Eagle Pass, Texas. He graduated in June 2004 with journalism and philosophy degrees at Northwestern University.

Reporters: Beth Macy, Evelio Contreras

Photographer/multimedia: Josh Meltzer

Online designer: Amanda Hicks

Online producer: Jordan Fifer

Editor: Carole Tarrant

Multimedia editor: Seth Gitner

Print designer: Terri Macklin

Photo editor: Michael Stowe

Graphics: Grant Jedlinsky, Rob Lunsford

Copy editor: Alison Weaver

Multimedia

Galleries

Driven to succeed

Soundslides

Dia sin Inmigrantes: Day Without Immigrants March

English School: Summer School for Roanoke's Immigrants

The Latino League: Spanish Soccer Teams

Video

Rocio's Store

September 24, 2006

A journey of faith

By Beth Macy

hree times a week, Nohemi Cedillo kneels on the floor of her Pentecostal church, praying with one image in mind.

Nohemi Cedillo prays for the return of her missing son, Melvin, at her small Honduran-run church in Northeast Roanoke. She last spoke to Melvin in June 2005, as he was preparing to cross into the United States.

See a map of Nohemi's journey

Nohemi Cedillo prays for the return of her missing son, Melvin, at her small Honduran-run church in Northeast Roanoke. She last spoke to Melvin in June 2005, as he was preparing to cross into the United States.

It’s the face of Melvin, her only son. The last time she spoke to him, he was a 16-year-old with a dimpled chin and a quiet smile.

That was 15 months ago.

Melvin is missing, somewhere along the arid and unforgiving Texas-Mexico border. Unlike his mother, he did not complete the long journey from Honduras to Roanoke.

Melvin Cedillo was 16 when this photo was taken, shortly before he left Honduras in May 2005.

For more than a year, Nohemi prayed because she felt powerless to do anything more: How could she, an illegal immigrant, ask the U.S. government for help?

To search for Melvin, she would have to risk being sent back to Honduras — and separated from her five other children in Roanoke.

Not long ago, the answer came to her in prayer: God would protect her.

But she would have to act in faith.

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Comments

this is really weird..my ex husband's name is melvin cedillo and he is also from honduras and was an illegal immigrant until he got his citizenship from the army. but his mother is in california

Posted by: Jess | October 23, 2008 10:08 PM

My Prayers go out to Nohemi and her family. I pray that all will go well with her son Melvin and that "God" will continue to keep them all in his care!

Posted by: J. Thomas | September 25, 2006 3:52 PM

While living in Texas I had heard the horror stories of immigrants crossing the border and the "coyotes". My heart and prayers go out to this family.

Posted by: Lynn | September 25, 2006 12:50 AM

Land of Opportunity