Nellie Muños is a true heroine.
The oldest surviving resident of Hero Street in Silvis (whose brother-in-law was one of the eight acclaimed heroes), the kind, giving and good-hearted lady will turn 100 on Cinco de Mayo, Friday, May 5.
They’re expecting over 300 people (from all over the U.S.) at her birthday party Friday at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, Silvis.
“My mother comes from a large family anyway,” her son Danny Muños said Thursday. Nellie was one of 13 siblings, and one sister (Delores) is still alive, in her 80s; her brother Benny just passed about a month and a half ago. “It should be a pretty big gala situation.”
A devout Catholic, Nellie has eight children (one daughter passed away in her 30s), 16 grandkids, 31 great-grandchildren and an 18-month-old great-great grandson.
Nellie’s husband Joe Muños, 86, died April 28, 2007. He married Nellie Terronez on Oct. 5, 1941, in Silvis. He served in the Navy aboard the USS George Clymer during World War II. He was former past Commander and Honorary Colored Guard Member of VFW Post 8890. Joe was a member of Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, helping with the Parish Fiesta’s since its conception.
One of her brothers was Joe Terronez, a former Silvis alderman and the first Hispanic mayor in Illinois (who died Jan. 2, 2021 at 91). Their parents had three children in Mexico, before Nellie was born in 1923 in Riverside, Calif. Joe was born in boxcar No. 4 in the Silvis rail yards in 1929, and their father Benito was a blacksmith for the railroad.
When asked if she plans to have fun tomorrow, Nellie said Thursday: “I’m gonna try to. I always have a good time.”
She only had a 7th grade education. Her mother had a heart condition and she stayed home to help take care of her siblings and mom.
“I started cooking at the age of 12 or 13 years,” Nellie said. She got married at 18. “I learned all my mom’s recipes.” Her mom lived until her 80s.
She’s proud of how she raised her family. “I taught them right from wrong,” Nellie said. “Like my dad; my dad was strict.”
“We never took anything from nobody, but one time, my brother took marbles from a friend,” she recalled. “My dad asked, ‘Where did you get these marbles from?’ We told him and he said, ‘Take them back. They are not yours and you shouldn’t have taken them. If you do it again, next time I’ll cut your hands off’.”
“My dad was strict, which was good,” she said. “It showed us not to get out of line and to respect the older people.”
A famous street of heroes
Nellie has been interviewed by Moline-based filmmakers Kelly and Tammy Rundle for their forthcoming documentary in the Hero Street series – “The Last to Fall From Hero Street: John Muños’ Story,” produced by Fourth Wall Films.
The film profiles the brother of Nellie’s husband Joe, starting with the family’s journey from Mexico as they fled the Revolution. John and Joe’s father, Isabel, worked in the rail yards in Silvis, and his mother, Victoria, made their home in a boxcar provided by the railroad.
The families of the boxcar village experienced both acceptance and discrimination in their new community. At the time of the Great Depression, the families living in the railroad village were moved to 2nd Street in Silvis, a former dumpsite.
“When my brother Joe was mayor, the street was all dirt,” Nellie recalled Thursday. “When it used to rain, it used to make ditches. He’s the one that paved the 4th Street, 3rd Street and here.”
“At one time, this was a place where they threw their trash,” Danny said of the street.
“Our back yard, there was all kinds of cans and all kinds of junk. We had to clean that up,” Nellie said, noting she’s lived in her home on the former 2nd Street since 1954, which her husband built.
“He was a carpenter,” she said. Joe Muños worked at International Harvester, retiring with 30 years of service.
The Muños mailbox is red, white and blue and her living room is packed full of family mementos and photos (including many relatives who have served in the military).
The Muños family was one of several families that moved their boxcar to 2nd Street and built a home around it — the home is still standing. That’s where Joe and John Muños were raised and Joe and Nellie first lived there after they married.
After high school, John Muños was working on the International Harvester combine assembly line in East Moline, when his draft notice from the U.S. Army arrived Sept. 15, 1950. He quickly married his sweetheart, Mary Louise Bessera, before he was sent to Korea with Company F of the 38th Regimental Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division.
Sometimes called “the Forgotten War,” the Fourth Wall film will show how John’s wartime experiences fit into the overall Korean War story. On Aug. 27, 1951, John (at age 23) was among 740 Americans killed in the Battle of Bloody Ridge. His body was never recovered.
Only a block and a half long, Hero Street lost six young men during World War II and two in the Korean War, more than any other street in America. Hero Street has provided over 150 service members since World War II.
In 1967, the city council approved Joe Terronez’s motion to rename the street, and the U.S. Postal Service also agreed to the name change to Hero Street. But still the street – grand name and all – remained unpaved until the ’70s.
Terronez served the city of Silvis and his community for 30 years — 26 years as First Ward Alderman and four as mayor.
He worked tirelessly in the renaming of 2nd Street in Silvis to “Hero Street, USA” and establishing Hero Street Memorial Park (a stone’s throw from Nellie’s home), a living memorial to the eight Mexican-Americans from Hero Street and all heroes from Silvis.
“She knew all the boys; she grew up with all of them,” Brian Munos (a son of Danny and grandson of Nellie) said Wednesday of his grandmother. “All those boys volunteered — they felt it was their obligation to step up for something bigger than themselves, to fight for their country that essentially took them in and their parents in.”
Brian, who lives on the East Moline/Silvis border, is a retired Navy veteran (serving 20 years), and was deployed in the Gulf during the Iraq War. He said he’s at least the seventh in the Munos family to serve.
A lifetime of giving
Brian’s parents divorced decades ago, when he was very young, and he said Nellie stepped in to serve in her way, like she’s done her whole life.
“She raised all her grandchildren; at one point we all lived in the house,” he said. “She was the mother, caretaker, grandmother, our matriarch and our strength. Grandpa worked at IH and carpenter jobs and grandma held down the house. She was the queen of the house. She raised me, my brothers, two cousins.”
“How do you quantify one person who did nothing but give of themselves and just be a total human being?” Brian asked. “Her faith in God, that’s a big part of who she is. Her faith is incredible.”
Following his parents’ divorce, Nellie and his mom stayed close.
“Mom and my grandma were super close and she died last year of cancer,” Brian said. “Nellie became like another mom to me.”
Surrounded by love and faith
In addition to Nellie’s copious amount of religious symbols, small statues, knickknacks and framed photos, the near centenarian loves her little Chihuahua “Poochie,” who she named after her youngest brother, Guadalupe (who had that nickname).
“My brother, when he was little, was right by my side, by my dress all the time,” Nellie recalled. “People always thought I was his mother, because he was always by my side.”
“A lot of brothers and sisters, they don’t get along, but we always got along together,” she said. “During the Depression, a lot of kids went to bed crying because they were hungry – not us…We were always happy, laughing, always.”
While Nellie wears glasses, she’s never really had health problems and can still get around the house without a walker.
“My mom said when I was a baby, I looked like a little doll made out of wax,” she said. “I don’t know. I’m gonna be 100 years old and I don’t think I see a wrinkle on me yet…I’ve still got my mind. I’m physically all right.”
“One lady asked her, do you still have all your own teeth?” her son Danny recalled. “She said, ‘Yeah, I paid for them’. She has a good sense of humor.”
“Everything turned out, so far, so good,” the philosophical Nellie said. “When I was young, I really enjoyed myself. My sister and I were the singers of the Quad Cities. We sang at fiestas, wherever they asked us. We used to go and entertain.”
She’s still quite entertaining.
“The Last to Fall From Hero Street” – the fifth film in the series — is slated for release in 2024. For more information about the Hero Street documentary series, visit the Fourth Wall website HERE.
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