Sarah McNamara, who appears at Centro Asturiano de Tampa in Ybor City, Florida on July 19, 2025. Credit: Courtesy photo
Tampa’s Archives Awareness Week will be in full swing by the time doors fly open at this boozy brunch and history talk at one of the city’s oldest venues.

And leading the charge will be Tampeña author and professor Sarah McNamara, who appears at Centro Asturiano de Tampa (est. 1902) on Saturday, July 19.

McNamara’s “Latina Legacies” brunch event, complete with free mimosas, is part of the City of Tampa’s Archive Awareness Week and includes a screening of a city-produced short film about Ybor City’s antifascist march mural.

Drunk Tampa History headliner Manny Leto is also on the bill (which, in full disclosure, is emceed by Creative Loafing Tampa Bay’s editor-in-chief Ray Roa).

The film showcases how the district’s Latinas were the driving force behind activism in the late-1930s. At the time, fascism had become prominent in Spain and was spreading to other areas of the world, but the women of Tampa did what they could to fight back. 

Michelle Sawyer’s 2023 mural on the western wall of the former Ybor City Development Corporation building. Credit: Photo by Jennifer Ring
The women marched with arms linked, to address Mayor R.E.L. Chancey at City Hall. The march was designed to illustrate a funeral—of both freedom and people—with the activists lined up like a mass procession with men and children walking in the back.

McNamara—who released “Ybor City: Crucible of the Latina South” in 2023—is featured heavily in the short documentary and will be at one of the district’s oldest buildings to discuss alongside Leto.

“The Tampa we have today is in part a result of the work done by those who raise their voices in spaces just like this,” McNamara says in the film.

There’s no cover for the Latina Legacies: Brunch, Book, and Film Premiere with Dr. Sarah McNamara happening Saturday, July 19 at Centro Asturiano de Tampa in Ybor City.

Readers are invited to submit their own events to Creative Loafing Tampa Bay’s things to do calendar.

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This article appears in Jul 10-16, 2025.