It was a painful, often isolating experience for the Portuguese immigrants to work in factories where no one spoke their language, Lobo says.

In response to the myriad problems facing the quickly-growing Portuguese population, a small group of Portuguese-speaking Cambridge residents joined together in 1969 to form MAPS, a program that works to ease the transition for fellow immigrants. Since its founding, MAPS has grown and is now a mainstay for Portuguese residents of Cambridge.

In fact, the program recently expanded to offer services to the burgeoning Portuguese-speaking Brazilian and Cape Verdean communities.

In East Cambridge, many first-generation Portuguese simply do not need to know English to survive.

"A lot of people just never learned," Cerqueira, whose parents lived in Cambridge for 10 years and did not learn English, says.

"They have their Portuguese bank, their own convenience stores. At church, there are services in Portuguese," Cerqueira says. "They really live an isolated experience. If they spoke English, they would've been able to make a better life. They would've done better job-wise."

It is now up to the second generation to integrate the Portuguese and American culture, Cerqueira says.