Ms. Brodyaga (pronounced brahd-YAH-ga) led a peripatetic life, which included working for a circus, before becoming a lawyer in the 1970s and settling in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas. By 1985, she had bought a 45-acre compound, called the Refugio del Rio Grande, where she lived and maintained a law office, medical clinic, dormitories and gardens for immigrants and refugees seeking safe haven.