Basque Oral History Project

Chronicler: Interviewer: Location: Date:	Trini Rementeria Begona Pecharroman Boise, Idaho 7 December 1997

	Trini was born in Gernika, Bizkaia in 1910 to Baldomero Minteguia and Rosa Loroino. Her father was a bricklayer by trade, and her mother worked at home. One of four children, she was raised in downtown Gernika and went to a school run by Carmelite nuns. Her mother had suffered abdominal injuries, making it difficult for her to do much of the work at home. As the years past, Trini had to take over most of the heavy household chores to help her mother. She scrubbed and pressed the laundry nearly every day and cooked for her family. Even so, she had time to see movies and dance at festivals in Gernika with her friends. Trini's youth was interrupted by the bombing of Gernika in 1937. Her family's home was destroyed in the bombing and the looting that ensued. The new government arrested her for her political involvement during the Spanish Civil War, and sent her to jail in Bilbao. She describes the bombing, her incarceration, the atmosphere in Gernika, and what she imagined her life would be like in the years to come. Trini had no idea that she was to meet her husband, Joaquin Rementeria, marry, and emigrate to the United States in 1947. Her husband, who had been working in the US, was an American citizen. His ability to speak English, coupled with help from several Basque women in Boise, made Trini's transition to life in the United States a little easier. She found work with a cleaning service as soon as her first daughter was born, and with a laundry after seven years. Even though she did not speak much English, Trini enjoyed helping her daughters with school activities and settling into Boise's Basque community.
Trinidad Minteguia Rementeria	Read the interview summary