Steven Schoenherr / South Bay Compass
She was a petite blond who lived in Imperial Beach and graduated from Mar Vista High in 1967. She was also a bullfighter.
Raquel Martinez was 22 when she left her home at 729 Cypress Avenue in 1971 and faced her first bull in the Tijuana Cortijo. She was determined to become the first woman matador since Patricia McCormick and Bette Ford in the 1950s, and to become as famous as the great Conchita Cintrón in the 1940s.
She trained at “The Muleteros,” an exclusive bullfighting club in Lemon Grove, and at the Cortejo San Jose school in Tijuana. She started performing in the rings as a novillera, facing calves and young bulls of less than 750 lbs, and gradually gained the experience to fight larger bulls.
For ten years she fought bulls in Mexico, from small dusty villages to the big corridas of Ensenada and Mazatlan. She faced the hostility of male bullfighters and was excluded from the bullring at Juarez. But the crowds loved her grace and style and courage — and her long flowing blond hair. She became known as “La Rubia” and gained the support of important promoters and sponsors.
Tijuana businessman and Conquistador Hotel owner Alfonso Bustamante arranged for her to be promoted to the full professional status of “matadora.” On Sept. 20, 1981, Raquel was the first woman to take the alternativa ceremony and to wear the “suit of lights,” the traditional garb of the professional matador. She could now fight the largest bulls in Mexico City’s Plaza Mexicio, the largest corrida in the world, and earn the same pay as the male matadors.
She continued to fight for another ten years, then retired to be with her husband Bill Robinson, public relations officer with the San Diego Police Department, and her son Scott Jacob. She made a brief comeback in 2002, but decided a year later that she woud step down as the world’s first professional matadora.
___________________________________
Steve Schoenherr is Professor Emeritus of USD and Co-Founder of the South Bay Historical Society. His is author and co-author of several books, including Bonita and Chula Vista Centennial.
At Large
Latest posts by At Large (see all)
- Future of Journalism is in Our Hands - December 13, 2018
- 30 Arrested at Border for Nonviolent Action in Support of Migrant Caravans - December 11, 2018
- The Dorn Effect | Remembering Bob Dorn - December 5, 2018
Be nice to see the bull win.
Wait — you wanna see the human get killed?
How ’bout we just end such inhuman displays. Even when a woman breaks the sex barrier, it’s still a blood sport.
Well, I’m glad she made it through her career without getting gored.
what about Maria Olazabal? (and the Mt. Signal Cafe on the back road to Calexico with the portrait of her husband in the French beret in the corner and all of her bullfight posters framed around the walls of the cafe’?)