Dolores Huerta, United Farm Workers co-founder and labor pioneer, dies

BAKERSFIELD - Dolores Huerta, the pioneering labor leader who helped transform California’s farmworker movement, co-founded the organization that became the United Farm Workers and, late in life, publicly accused longtime movement partner Cesar Chavez of sexually abusing her, died Wednesday, at her home in Bakersfield. She was 96.

Her family announced her death Wednesday. A spokesman for the family said the cause was cancer.

Few activists were as deeply woven into modern California history as Huerta, USA Today reported.

She grew up in Stockton, organized farmworkers in the San Joaquin and Coachella valleys, helped lead the grape boycotts that brought national attention to conditions in California's fields, and co-founded the organization that became the United Farm Workers with Cesar Chavez.

The movement they built helped fundamentally change the relationship between California growers and the workers who harvested the state's crops. Its campaigns ultimately helped pass the landmark California Agricultural Labor Relations Act of 1975, which established collective bargaining rights for farmworkers.