Amid a buzzing, multigenerational crowd inside an auditorium at the University of the Pacific, Lomberto Chavez joined a line of people eager to tell Stockton-raised astronaut José Hernández what an inspiration he is.
He also wanted to ask Hernández a question that had been weighing on his mind.
“Did you take any tortillas to space?” the senior at Denair High School, located outside Turlock, asked, drawing laughter from the hundreds gathered to hear Hernández speak Thursday night.
“Yes,” Hernández said. And he made breakfast burritos with them too.
Part of the presidential speaker series at UOP celebrating the university’s 175th anniversary, Hernández, a 1984 graduate, returned to campus to share his story of perseverance with the community.
During a conversation with Scott Biedermann, UOP’s vice president of development and alumni relations, Hernández explained how his family moved from Michoacán, Mexico, to work in the fields of the Central Valley, ultimately settling in Stockton.
To lively applause and frequent laughter from the nearly full Faye Spanos Concert Hall, Hernández also recounted his 2009 NASA space mission aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery. The thing he missed most during that milestone two-week trip? His wife’s chicken mole, he said.
Hernández was as excited to see the crowd at his alma mater as they were to see him, coming onto the stage with his cellphone in hand to film the audience.
With the event falling just two days after this year’s midterm elections, Hernández — who made a brief foray into politics — reflected on the monumental shift in voting on election night.
“I should have ran this year,” Hernández joked. He made an unsuccessful bid for Congress in 2012 after he said then-President Barack Obama urged him to run as a Democratic challenger. California’s 10th Congressional District, then made up of parts of Stanislaus and San Joaquin counties, stayed with Republican incumbent Jeff Denham after Hernández’s defeat.
But the loss led Hernández to pursue other work, he said, including starting an engineering consulting firm and working alongside his 85-year-old father in Lodi, where they manage Hernández’s vineyard for his wine business, Tierra Luna Cellars.
Tenacity is what carried him through setbacks, Hernández said — from nearly quitting during his first semester at UOP, where he ultimately earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering — to being rejected by NASA 11 times.
That determination came from his parents, migrant farmworkers who pushed him and his siblings to focus on school, he said.
“ ‘Take a look at yourselves,’ ” Hernández said his father, Salvador, would tell him and his siblings after a long day in the fields. “ ‘ You have the privilege of living your future now.’ ”
His father’s lessons are referenced in Hernández’s book, “Reaching for the Stars,” which inspired the biographical drama “A Million Miles Away” starring Michael Peña.
Hernández’s future really took root when he was in second grade, he recalled. That’s when his teacher convinced his parents to stay in Stockton. Until then, the family had moved every few months for agricultural work, with stops in places like Salinas and Chino.
His teacher asked Hernández’s father to imagine repotting a young tree every few months. Just like the family’s constant moves from city to city, moving a tree from pot to pot stunts its growth, she said.
“A tree needs to be in one place where the roots grow deep so the branches can grow big and strong,” Hernández said.
Because he didn’t become fully fluent in English until he was 12, Hernández said math was his refuge in school. Those skills eventually helped him achieve his childhood dream of becoming an astronaut.
As the evening wore on and question time with the audience began, Hernández’s Mexican heritage was revisited. Lomberto, the high school senior, told Hernández he also is from Michoacán. He told Stocktonia in an interview afterward that he moved to the United States when he was about 7.
Lomberto traveled to Stockton on Thursday with dozens of other middle and high school students in a van. The hourlong trip was worth it, he said, to see someone they look up to.
“Because he’s from Michoacán, and seeing him on the big stage … it definitely opens up my eyes to what I can do,” the 17-year-old said. He added that, like Hernández, he enjoys math and is interested in studying architecture, where he hopes to help make cities more walkable.
As for his tortilla question, Lomberto said he had heard that astronauts ate tortillas in space and wanted to confirm it with Hernández.
“Coming from a culture that’s not like the main culture in America, I think it’s important to see that type of diversity in space,” he said. “That’s a big deal.”
Standing off to the side of the auditorium, UOP staff member Gavin Henderson let out an occasional whoop during the event. The 31-year-old wore a black hoodie with crimson letters “CIP” across the front, a nod to the university’s Community Involvement Program, which serves first-generation, low-income students in Stockton.
The program has ties to Hernández, who participated when he attended UOP. It’s part of Henderson’s own story, as well. An alum of the program, Henderson now works as one of its specialists, mentoring incoming students. Dozens of his students were in attendance to hear Hernández speak, excitedly chattering outside the auditorium after the event.
Like his students, Henderson said he came away motivated by the talk with Hernández. He’s working toward a master’s degree at UOP, and said his goal is to develop his own graphic apparel business — a dream he thought about as Hernández spoke.
“He reminded me today of his tenacity and determination,” Henderson said. “Sometimes you can get discouraged, but you have to have the faith in yourself, believe in yourself and the drive to keep moving forward.”