On this day in Texas history, in 1949, the body of Private Felix Longoria of Three Rivers was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. Longoria had died in the Philippines near the end of World War II. When his recovered remains were sent to Three Rivers for burial, the funeral director refused the use of his chapel for a “Mexican.” After the intervention of the American G.I. Forum and Lyndon B. Johnson, Longoria was buried in Arlington with full military honors. The affair provided a model case in the Mexican-American struggle for civil rights.