actress reached the heights of Hollywood stardom. Lupe Vélez attended high school in San Antonio, Texas as a teenager but returned to Mexico after her family lost their home during the Mexican Revolution. The family struggled financially in those years, and Vélez moved to Mexico City to work in an FAL department store - then considered an upper-class symbol of modern global capitalism. Her breakthrough occurred when she appeared in a popular musical production in the city's revista theater. After moving to the U.S., she made her first film appearance in a short in 1927. By the end of the decade, she was acting in full-length silent films and had progressed to leading roles in The Gaucho (1927), Lady of the Pavements (1928) and Wolf Song (1929). Vélez' roles were varied, though she often portrayed "exotic" and "foreign" women. Though Hollywood had two Mexican star actresses in the 1920s (and the male star Ramon Novarro), there was still controversy over the stereotypical depictions of Latin Americans in film. In the 1920s, Latin America was Hollywood's largest export market. In Mexico, nearly 80 percent of all films screened were made in the United States. Nevertheless, Mexicans and other Latin Americans were often depicted on screen as lazy, barbaric, morally degenerate, or buffoonish. Mexican Americans, already facing an onslaught of discrimination in other aspects of their everyday lives, were concerned that such depictions were contributing to the prejudicial treatment they were receiving in the United States. Spanish-language newspapers criticized Hollywood "greaser" films' depictions of Latin Americans and even called on the Mexican government to take a stand against Hollywood. The Mexican government did launch an influence campaign, but its success was limited. According to one historian, "The Mexican immigrant community in Los Angeles used discussions about cinema to critique American racial and political ideologies." Labor issues In the 1920s, Mexicans met the increasing demand for cheap labor on the West Coast. Mexican refugees continued to migrate to areas outside the Southwest; they were recruited to work in the steel mills of Chicago during a strike in 1919, and again in 1923. Many found work on the assembly lines of automobile factories in Detroit, and in the meat plants of Chicago and Kansas City. Many also worked as agricultural laborers in farming valleys in the border states, such as Tucson in Arizona, the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, and most especially, the Imperial