Mexico:

A Personal History

By Dean Webb

Unauthorized reproduction or use is strictly prohibited.

Mexico:

A Personal History

Table of Contents

Mi Herencia Mexicana 4

A Friendly Note to My Readers 7

Making a Point with Tezcatlipoca 8

A Brief Note on Pronunciation 8

Back to Tezcatlipoca 9

… and a Note on Usage 10

Speaking of America… 10

I. From Corn to Conquistadors 11

Corn and Beans 11

The Olmecs 12

Outside the Olmec Heartland 15

Teotihuacán 17

Classic Veracruz, Dudes 21

The Maya 25

The Toltecs, Huastecs, and Chicimecs 31

Quetzalcoatl 32

The Aztecs 33

II: El Imperio Español 45

Mexico on the Eve of Conquest 45

The Totonacs 46

The Tlaxcalans 47

The Aztecs 48

The Conquest of Mexico 52

La Nueva España 53

The Other Conquest 57

The Viceregal System 60

III: 1810 to 1917 72

El Tesoro Nacional 72

Previously on… Mexico: A Personal History… 75

Can’t Get the Hell Out of Texas 82

From San Jacinto to the Pastry War 97

La Invasión Estadounidense 100

The War of Reform 104

Oh No, Not Again 106

Cinco de Mayo 107

¡Sufragio Efectivo! ¡No Reelección! 109

Sufragio Efectivo, No. Reelección. 111

La Sucesión Presidencial en 1910 116

Interview with a Dictator 118

Epic Fail and Loathing in Mexico City 123

The Last Steps to the National Treasure 129

IV: Modern Mexico 139

The End of the Beginning 139

Obregón and ón and ón… 140

The Cristero War 144

El Maximato 149

Cárdenas and the Conclusion of the Revolution 151

1940-2000: 60 Years of PRI Hegemony 152

The Man from PAN 160

You Are Here 165

Appendix A: The Timeline 167

When Everything Happened… mas o menos… 167

The Viceroyalty of New Spain: 1521-1821 169

Independence to Revolution: 1821-1910 173

The Revolution and on: 1911-Today 181

Bibliography 190

Sources Available Upon Request 190

Acerca del Autor 191

In loving memory of Grandma Lilly,

because you always explained the telenovelas to me when I asked “What are they saying now?”

Also dedicated to my son Calvin,

for the topes, the road less traveled, the Pyramid of the Sun, Chapultepec Park, and all our other adventures in Mexico together.

Mi Herencia Mexicana

Everyone from Northern Mexico has a Pancho Villa story…I actually have two.

The first one is about how Pancho Villa learned how to read and write in Spanish. Most of his biographers have no idea exactly when and where he picked up literacy in the first place. I mean, how does a peón like Villa learn how to read?

That’s where my great-grandfather comes in. Frank Webb was an engineer way back when. He was involved in the construction of the Copper Canyon Railroad across the Sierra Madre Occidental and had two crews working for him. One was a group of Tarahumara Indians, the other a gang of Mestizos run by one Doroteo Aranga. These guys did all the shovel work and my great-grandpa, being the engineer, got to ply the mountains with dynamite.

Frank’s wife, Edith, served as the doctor and teacher of that operation. She got both jobs pretty much by default. Someone had to do them, and she had a little knowledge about both and wasn’t already occupied with a pickaxe or a detonator. The doctoring job came out of necessity. The teaching job came out of compassion.

Edith was teaching herself Spanish out of an exercise book and then found out most of the women and children in the camp couldn’t read. So, she took it upon herself to teach them. As the days passed, some of the workers came by in the evening to learn how to read. One of them was Doroteo.

Later on, once Doroteo decided he was done workin’ on the railroad all the live-long day and took up a career in creative financing, he changed his name to Pancho Villa. Ironically, the workers all called my great-grandpa “Pancho.” That’s Spanish for “Frank.” But, anyway, that’s how Pancho Villa learned how to do this:

I promised two stories, and I had to tell that one so I could tell the next.

Fast forward to early 1912. Since meeting my great-grandfather, Pancho Villa had transformed his group of bandits into a revolutionary army. It really wasn’t that hard. He just had to make sure they did all their looting and pillaging in the name of the revolution. Anyway, Pancho Villa had become a revolutionary leader and was stealing just about anything of value that wasn’t nailed down. If it was nailed down, he could always choose to burn it or distribute it amongst the peasantry.

Villa did this sort of thing because he did, deep down, despise the people that had oppressed the poor of Mexico. Villa included the rich, the Catholic Church, and citizens of the USA among the oppressors. One day, he came across Frank’s brother, Lee Webb.

While Lee wasn’t rich or part of the Catholic clergy, he was, technically, a US citizen. All the Webbs in Mexico were part of Mormon colonies in Northern Mexico. The Mormons were there because they had fled religious persecution in the USA and Mexico had given them sanctuary. Mexico had granted them sanctuary partly to spite the United States, which had pretty much mugged Mexico for more than half its territory back in 1848.

So although the Mormons were from the USA, they weren’t the rich guys that went to Mexico to make even more of a fortune by beating down on the poor laborers who brought wealth from the earth for much cheaper than their Northern cousins would. The Mormons were self-sufficient and worked hard to try and fit in with their neighbors. But Pancho Villa didn’t care about that distinction. To him, norteamericanos were bad guys that had money to blow on ransoming captives.

And Lee Webb had become his next captive.

“Aha, the young caballero! The nephew, is it not, of the Señor Webb? The señor who fattens like a vampire on the lifeblood of poor Mexico! Up with your hands! We want no unpleasantness if the norteamericanos youth has a gun to play with!” That’s what Villa said, according to my family history.

Villa looked over Lee’s horse and saddle. They were nice. “A horse and saddle exactly to my liking! How thoughtful of the señor! Now we have only to dispose of the nephew. Flores!” One of Villa’s soldiers stepped forward, ready to kill Lee. But then, “Wait! Evidently the señor is very fond of the boy. Note the value of the gifts he gives him. He will give even more to save his life. What do you think?”

Now, you may be wondering how my Great-great-aunt Estelle was able to get Villa’s dialogue down so perfectly. Well, for starters, she knew how he talked. Villa had hung around with the Webbs for quite some time and had let the little Webb children ride with his crew back when he was working with Frank Webb.  As far as getting exactly what he said, well, let’s just chalk this up to good ol’ oral history. The story is more important than the actual quotes.

Anyway, Villa wrote out a ransom note on a scrap of paper and sent it along to the Mormon colonies. The note never got there, of course. The guy with the note had tried to commit an act of revolution and liberate a better horse than the one he had and the horse’s owner committed an act of counter-revolution and shot him dead, then dumped his body in a lime pit, along with the ransom note. The only way my family ever found out about this was from discussing Lee’s capture with the locals. One guy must have piped up, “Oh, I think I know why the guy with the note never got to you…”

After Villa sent off the guy with the ransom note, Lee felt like things were gonna be OK. Poor Lee. He didn’t really understand Villa’s revolutionary sense of humor. Villa told Lee to dismount and then climbed on to Lee’s steed and sat on Lee’s fancy custom-made saddle. Lee thought they were going to switch mounts, but as he reached for the reins of Villa’s horse, Villa yelled out, “STOP! Pig of a dog!” and then some other nasty things best not repeated in family histories. “Does this dog of an American think he is going to ride? ¡Caramba! Flores, you take my horse! Vicente, take that of Flores!”

Everybody moved up a horse, taking over the mount that used to belong to the guy one rank higher. The last one of Villa’s men got off his blind mule and upgraded to a broken-down pony with a blanket.

Lee had to walk.

This was no fun. It was dark now and he had to move through a mess of rocks on the ground, and then through a bunch of mesquite brush. If you’ve never walked into a mesquite bush, consider yourself lucky.

For about a mile, Pancho Villa had been cursing more and more and then he finally called a halt in the march to address an issue that had been bothering him since he’d taken over Lee’s horse. “¡Alto! Fool, does this devil of a saddle fit you?”

“Perfectly. It was made to order for me.” I should note that all this communication was in Spanish. Not just the words in Spanish here, but all of them. The infrequent Spanish words are included for purposes of enhancing local color, which all good English teachers will encourage in your writing.

Villa then came up with another of his great revolutionary jokes. “If the fit is so perfect, you will doubtless be happy to wear it again! With me it pinches where it most hurts!” In case you’re wondering what that means, let’s just say that Lee was slim of build, but Villa was built along more generous lines.

Villa dismounted and tossed Lee’s saddle off his horse. When one of Villa’s lieutenants acted like he was going to try the saddle on for size, Villa wouldn’t have it. He took his old saddle and put it on Lee’s horse, then made everyone dismount and give his saddle back to its former owner. The guy on the hobbled pony had only known the luxury of a blanket for a few brief minutes…

And Lee had to carry his saddle on his back. While it put a little more stuff between himself and Villa’s prodding bayonet, it made going cross-country nearly impossible.

The ordeal ended around dawn as they reached Villa’s camp. Someone shoved Lee into a cabin and Lee fell asleep on top of his saddle. Pancho Villa had said something about only killing men at sunrise or sundown because he was a sentimental man, but all Lee thought about was that he had 12 hours to await delivery of the ransom.

No ransom was on its way. Villa had a history of killing captives anyway after getting the ransom. Lee had no clue how much trouble he was in.

Lee woke up when he heard horses approaching. Lee thought it was a group of riders with the ransom, but when Villa’s men started to scramble to put the camp in order, he realized this wasn’t a bunch of Mormons riding into the camp, hats in hand. When the riders entered the camp, Villa and his men saluted them.

The recipient of the salutes was General Pascual Orozco, Villa’s superior in the revolutionary military organization. Orozco’s superior was either Madero or Huerta or nobody, depending upon how Orozco felt at the time. No matter what Orozco’s situation was, Villa reported directly to Orozco and had to do as Orozco ordered.

Orozco didn’t even dismount. He hurled a stream of abuse at Villa. The family history says Orozco’s Spanish was too fast for Lee to follow. I speculate Lee may have been unfamiliar with the insults and invectives Orozco employed to convey his views. Often, those with a textbook education in Spanish don’t pick up on profanities when they first hear them. Either way, Orozco’s tone and demeanor changed when he saw Lee.

“Friend of my friend, this dog of a peón has made another of his stupid blunders! A thousand pardons! I hope you will not judge us all by this son of a cross-eyed mule. At least we were in time. I will make suitable apologies to Señor Webb when you are safely escorted to his home!”

Orozco was more of a revolutionary and less of a looter, so he respected the Mormons and their contribution to settling the northern frontier of Mexico. He’d heard of Lee’s kidnapping from an Indian employee of Lee’s that saw his boss run afoul of Villa’s men. The railroad worker hid behind a rock until Villa’s men were out of the way and then made his way to Orozco’s camp.

Orozco made Villa give Lee his horse and saddle and Lee made out of that camp like a bullet from a gun. Lee got back to the Mormon settlement to find absolutely nobody worried about where he was. That had to have hurt his feelings until he discovered nobody knew about the ransom note.

After that, the revolution got more and more violent. Various bandit gangs formed up and raided all over the nation. While Lee was saved by the intervention of General Orozco, the rest of the Mormons were losing property to repeated raids from these “revolutionary armies” that really weren’t anything more than bandits with a license to steal from norteamericanos. Once more in their history, the Mormons found themselves packing up their personal belongings and walking away from their homes and bulkier possessions to an uncertain future somewhere else. They were going to have to rebuild from scratch one more time.

My great-great-grandfather, Edward Milo Webb, Jr., arrived at Tucson, Arizona in 1912 and he dwelt in a tent. He was 65 years old at the time and had to start over like he was a young man with nothing to his name. And yet, he remained positive: “Well, now the worst is over! By next year, things will be better!” The next year was better, and he had eight more “next years” after that, passing away in 1921.

Maybe Pancho Villa is a hero to some people, but to me… well, he’s much more complicated of a figure. While I sympathize with his struggle against oppression, I don’t have any sympathy for the way he created a situation that led to my ancestors getting driven out of their homes, even though they had once tried to help him as best they could.

That’s what history does: it takes the good guys and bad guys of popular mythology and makes them much more complicated, human figures. Mexican history is full of bad guys people want to cheer for and good guys that nobody wants to be seen with. No hay rosas sin espinas, as they say in Mexico…

A Friendly Note to My Readers

Let me be totally honest with you. I write gonzo history. That means I insert myself into the narratives, put in a few travelogues here and there, and lace the volume with my opinions in very obvious ways. This doesn’t make me a bad historian. This just makes me a historian that’ll never get tenure at any university. The history part I’m writing is still good, so you can use it to study up or get informed or whatever you want to do in learning about Mexican history.

I choose the “gonzo” style because it’s how I teach and talk about history and it makes the subject much more enjoyable. I also choose it because I generally take on an irreverent approach to persons in power. They’re human – always are, always have been – and they don’t ever deserve to be worshipped or anything like that. They deserve to be studied, faults and all.

Strangely enough, Mexican history seems best suited for the gonzo history approach. While the US produced tons of characters that managed to preserve a pristine exterior in spite of their darker sides, Mexico makes more honest portrayals of the men that appeared on its stage.

And what a stage! It’s crowded with people like Moctezuma, Hernán Cortés, Antonio López de Santa Anna, Benito Juárez, Emiliano Zapata, Pancho Villa, Porfirio Díaz, Álvaro Obregón, Lázaro Cárdenas, Subcomandante Marcos… The Toltecs, Olmecs, Mayas, Aztecs, Yaquis… Conquistadors, the US Army, the French Foreign Legion, the US Army (again)… Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, David Alfaro Siqueiros, José Clemente Orozco… and with special guest appearances by Ambrose Bierce and Leon Trotsky… what a stage!

So, yes, the history will often be told as a story full of the passion of life. Such is Mexico, where God is a verb and corn is a mother to all. Pyramids, human sacrifices, calendars that tell the future, miracles, ironies, ancient gods that still draw breath… they’re all there, all in the history of Mexico. It is a place that both fascinates and terrifies, but not always in alternating moments. Quite often it fascinates and terrifies at the same time. There is an understood duality in every person in Mexico, which is perhaps why they understand that those who dominate their history will not be uncomplicated myths, but real men, rich with emotion, blood, and ambition.

Making a Point with Tezcatlipoca

In the Western religious tradition, and by that I mean Christianity, God created the world and none can overthrow God’s work. Satan tries, oh he does try, but ultimately to no avail. God triumphs over all. Jesus did some important stuff and although Satan did his best to make Jesus miserable, Jesus won out over Satan in the end because, after all, He is God. We see in this the Western idea that good and evil are, ultimately, exclusionary and at opposite ends of a moral spectrum.

I now ask you consider an aspect of the American religious tradition, and by that I don’t mean the USA. I mean the American way, the way older than Columbus and his crew. Take a look at the Aztec god Tezcatlipoca…

A Brief Note on Pronunciation

Oops. Forgot how to tell you how to pronounce “Tezcatlipoca”. It’s said the way it’s spelled. Tez-ca-tli-po-ca. The only words you won’t say the way they’re spelled will be in English.

Back to Tezcatlipoca

OK, now that we can pronounce that bad boy’s moniker, let’s talk about his role in Aztec religion. He’s definitely not a morally one-dimensional figure. Tezcatlipoca helped to create the world by sacrificing his foot as bait to Cipactli, the earth monster. Cipactli ate his foot, but in so doing left itself vulnerable to Tezcatlipoca’s partner in creation, Quetzalcoatl. Quetzalcoatl moved in, captured Cipactli, and together with Tezcatlipoca, created the world. Tezcatlipoca then became the sun and Quetzalcoatl became jealous of his enemy and took him out of the sky. Tezcatlipoca responded by destroying the world. Quetzalcoatl got even by creating a new world, which Tezcatlipoca also destroyed in a sort of eternal “neener neener neener” competition. The survivors of this second world’s destruction became monkeys.

Tlaloc, the god of rains, then tried a hand at being the sun, but Quetzalcoatl didn’t approve of that arrangement, so he wiped out that world with fire. Survivors of the third world became birds.

I know what you’re thinking… OK, if that explains the monkeys and the birds, where did we get fish? I’m glad you asked that question. Chalchihuitlicue, the goddess of water, became the fourth sun and ruled over a world that wound up getting destroyed by floods and the survivors of the fourth world became fish. So there you go.

So far, the score on world destruction is Tezcatlipoca 2, Quetzalcoatl 1, and (I guess) bad luck 1. One can see this isn’t a pure battle of Good™ vs. Evil™. There are other forces at play and, every now and then, good and evil are working together. Sometimes, they don’t work together or against each other. Sometimes, they just do their own thing and leave well enough alone.

In the world of the Fifth Sun, the one we’re on now, Tezcatlipoca drove his ally Quetzalcoatl into exile, possibly after killing him, or maybe just poisoning him. The killing or poisoning isn’t important, but the exile is. From this, Tezcatlipoca is known as a treasonous god. But, he’s also known as “He by whom we live” and “Possessor of the Sky and Earth”, so he’s not to be discounted as a god on the outs just because he opposed Quetzalcoatl, whom people of Western heritage typically identify closely with Jesus.

Tezcatlipoca is a god of kingship in the Aztec tradition, and a very important god as such. He’s also known as “The enemy of both sides”. In him, good and evil are not exclusionary, and neither are they balanced. His closest parallel in Western culture wouldn’t be Satan, but Don Vito Corleone from The Godfather… the crime boss that is not above murdering his opponents but, when he dies, says, “Life is so beautiful.”

So why this divergence into the esoterics of Mexican religion? Well, that view of the world in which good and evil are not exclusionary and can exist in various measures in various people is part of the Mexican way of seeing things and has remained so in spite of 500 years of imposed Western civilization. It’s part of the strong, ancient undercurrent in Mexico and it colors nearly everything in that land. Keep that in mind as you read Mexican history…

… and a Note on Usage

While most people that live in the USA call themselves “Americans” and get called “Americans” by folks in the rest of the world, I’m not doing that here. I’ll use the term “American” to refer to the hemisphere, rather than a nation in it.

After all, Mexico is as much a part of North America as is Canada and the USA. That’s why it’s part of NAFTA, right? So, in the spirit of “American” not being specific enough, I’ll identify people from the USA as “people from the USA” or as norteamericanos, as they’re often referred to in Mexico. I could also call them “gringos”, as that term isn’t necessarily pejorative. But they’re not the only Americans I’ll be discussing here.

Speaking of America…

You may be thinking that Mesoamerica is all of Mexico and all of Central America. Well, buckaroos, I’m here to disabuse you of that notion. It isn’t.

Mesoamerica is the rainy part of Mexico and Guatemala, with a few other bits of Central America tacked on at the bottom. These areas were similar in terms of how people could make a living off the land, so they developed very similar cultures. North of the rainy part of Mexico is “Aridoamerica,” which extends northward into the desert southwest of the USA. South of Mesoamerica is a bunch of thicker jungle, where peoples didn’t really need to copy the action going down in Mesoamerica.

Interestingly, although the folks in Aridoamerica didn’t share agricultural techniques with the Mesoamericans, they did eventually adopt a significant chunk of their culture, so we can reconstruct quite a few ancient Mesoamerican activities from their Aridoamerican descendants.

That last mouthful makes me realize I should comment on how I plan to talk about the indigenous peoples in the Americas. I don’t think I’ll call them Native Americans all the time. That’s cumbersome. In Mexico, they’re “indigenous”, so that adjective works. Referring to them by their tribal names is a good idea, but one needs to keep in mind that a good number of tribal names weren’t original to the tribes themselves, but came from nearby tribes, which, in a worst-case naming scenario, could have been their enemies. I’ll therefore try to note the origin of the various tribal names when they crop up.

And speaking of crops…

I. From Corn to Conquistadors

There are footprints in the Valley of Mexico from 40,000 years ago.Or thereabouts. Some archaeologists say that’s way too early for people to be in America, saying they can only be 10-15,000 years old. But does it matter? They’re old, no matter how you slice it, and they show that people have walked that ground for a very long time.

Corn and Beans

How long people have been roaming around Mesoamerica isn’t relevant to this history. I will say this, though. Given the road and traffic conditions I observed in the Valley of Mexico, I’m thinking the arrival of humans may have been closer to the later date. Many businesses in Mexico don’t open promptly at whenever their business hours say they’re going to open, so I’d say that seems to favor a more leisurely pace for early man in getting to Mexico. Mexicans seem to like to take time to enjoy the good things in life around them. But, as I said, this bit isn’t relevant.

What is relevant is when those people stopped roaming around and decided to settle down. When they did, anywhere from 10,000 years ago to 8000 years ago, they messed around with some plants that grew seeds on cob-like structures. As they worked with those plants, they developed what we now know as maize or, in the USA, corn.

Before corn, folks most likely hunted big animals. And by big, I mean BIG. Like woolly mammoth big. Archaeologists have found woolly mammoth skeletons in the Valley of Mexico, so they know the mammoths were there. How do they know humans were involved in creating the skeletal remains thereof? The big pile of hand tools buried nearby and the scraper marks on the bones are the biggest clues.

By the way, in case you’re wondering what folks did with all that meat once they whacked a mammoth… well, they didn’t eat it all at once. They’d let it ferment. Properly-rotted meat is (mostly) safe to eat and good for the digestion (when it doesn’t’ kill the person eating it). Taste-wise, well… let’s just say folks ditched fermented meat pretty quickly with the advent of refrigeration.

As popular as the fermented mammoth was as a dinner entrée, when temperatures warmed up at the end of the Ice Ages, they weren’t as available as they once were for one’s primitive dining pleasure. That meant the locals either had to subsist on berries, bugs, and small critters for sustenance, or find a better way. Corn was the beginning of that better way.

Corn is the staff of life in Mexico, and has been since the ancient times when it was first cultivated. It’s the grain that allowed populations in Mexico to climb to the levels which they reached. For protein, they didn’t have big animals they could domesticate, so the people of ancient Mexico turned to beans as a primary source of protein. Add in all the fruits and vegetables native to the region, and the people of Mexico were able to have a varied enough and plentiful enough diet for their populations to really take off.

As the populations grew, they developed urban centers. From the urban centers, as happened in other places in the world, civilizations developed.

Civilization did not develop as early in Mesoamerica as it did in Mesopotamia, Egypt, India, or China. Mesoamerican civilization got underway around 1500 BCE. Although there may have been a few centers that came a few centuries earlier, none were as influential as the one that developed on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, along the Coatzacoalcos River.

The Olmecs

The Olmecs didn’t call themselves that. “Olmec” is a Nahuatl word that means “rubber people”. The Olmecs got called “Olmec” because they were the first civilization to make rubber. They were the first guys in Mesoamerica to do a lot of things, as it turns out. They were the first to take that rubber and make it into a ball and, with that ball, make the infamous “Mesoamerican Ball Game” in which teams would try and knock the ball through a stone hoop by using their hips or forearms. There’s another version with bats that uses a really massive ball – 13-15 pounds!

First team to score eight points wins. The longest known modern game went on for eight days. Not all the games involved the mandatory sacrifice of the losing team. That aspect doesn’t show up until later on in Mayan history, anyway. The solid, heavy rubber ball could still kill players if it hit them in a vulnerable spot and could bruise players so badly that said bruises would have to be lanced to allow for proper healing. That’s some crazy sport.

Neato Mesoamerican sports gear! (Author’s photo)

That’s why the ancients in Mesoamerica came up with these things to the right…

Well, I should stress those are replicas of the actual gear used in playing the ball game. No self-respecting athlete would use stone pads for protection. But the fact that some self-respecting artist working for a self-respecting rich dude felt these were important enough to make stone replicas of goes to show how the game was viewed by the cultures that played it. It was certainly central to their society. Was it a matter of religion or political power, as some theorize? Or was it just a load of fun that people could get fanatical about, as I theorize? Modern Mesoamerican fans of fútbol have started wars and riots over the outcome of important matches. Members of losing teams have been murdered by distraught fans. Who’s to say that sort of fanaticism didn’t exist back in the day?

And take those big ol’ heads the Olmecs carved up. They’re so big, we have to refer to them as “colossal heads” in the history biz. That wall in China only rates as “great.” These babies are “colossal.” That’s how amazingly cool they are. I only wish we knew more about Olmec writing… or had more Olmec writing so we could know more about who the heck the colossal heads were supposed to be.

We’re pretty sure they had to be some important folks. Only 17 colossal heads have been unearthed, so it’s not like everyone got to have his own colossal head. This leads to another important facet of ancient art: if there’s not a lot of it, it may very well be really important stuff.

That is one colossal head! (Author’s photo. Author’s son in Author’s

picture, to the left of the colossal head, which is in Tres Zapotes,

Veracruz. Mexico, if you had to ask…)

What really blows scholars’ minds about the ancient Mesoamerican civilizations is how they managed to develop in places best considered the antithesis of river valleys. These civilizations arose in jungle areas, rough highlands, and blistering hot savannas.  Even so, they did develop the urban centers, social structures, and public spaces that folks like to associate with “civilizations.”

The Mesoamericans are also considered to be pristine civilizations. They may have pulled all kinds of influences from each other, but they didn’t get influences from other regions. That means they had to do everything on their own, without any help, kind of like a single mom having a really bad day. This may be why they developed later on than the civilizations in Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, and China. The Olmecs, for example, didn’t start really swinging until around 1200 BCE and they kept rocking up to 100 CE.

And what kept them rocking?

We don’t know. Not entirely.

By the way, if I had said “I don’t know” instead of “we don’t know,” I would have sounded like an idiot that didn’t do his research. But by going with “we don’t know,” I’ve got an undetermined number of frustrated academics on my side. Heck, even if I really am an idiot that didn’t do his research, by going with that phrase, I sound like a guy that knows his stuff that you best not argue with. Try it  when you’re being grilled on a topic you didn’t study. Be impressed with the results.

Anyway… what were the Olmecs into? Well, what we do know from the archaeological evidence is that they were totally into calendars. They invented the things, that’s how into calendars they were. Which I find odd.

I mean, I guess knowing the day of the week is important… and knowing when the sun’s due to disintegrate and in need of rebirth with a fire circle ritual is also in that “need to know” category… but time as a concept as understood in the United States does not exist in Mexico, or most of the world, for that matter. Mexico has mornings, afternoons, and nights. Anything more specific usually requires a margin of error of 30-90 minutes, mas o menos. That’s not a bad thing, I want you to know. It’s just a different way of dealing with the universe. I suppose maybe the Mesoamerican obsession with time has more of an eternal perspective of things than does a crabby manager that wants a report on his desk by close of business TODAY. If the world is going to end in cataclysm and ruin on a certain day, what does it matter if your report is on time or not? World’s still gonna end in cataclysm and ruin on that day. Can’t change that…  not with a dumb report, anyway.

Were-jaguars, Olmec-style! The pronounced upper lip and slanted

eyes are your first clues they’re were-jaguars. Next look for puffy

cheeks and snarls. Some also have cleft heads. Not these.

(Author’s photo. Your Author took a lot of photos for this book, in fact.)

The Olmecs also had a pretty cool religion. Now, you may think your religion is pretty awesome, but does it have were-jaguars as a central aspect of it? I think not! And that’s what made the Olmec religion totally cool. Were-jaguars. Half-man, half-jaguar. Awesome sauce. It wasn’t all of their religion, but it sure was the coolest part and the part we see most in their art, as one can see in this collection of artifacts on display at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City.

OK, so I mentioned the ball game, the colossal heads, and the were-jaguars… and the calendar… and the corn… Well, Olmecs also contributed architectural styles to Mesoamerica, such as the pyramid and the organization of city centers around astronomical themes, such as where the sun rises on a certain day or where stars show on certain nights. The Olmecs are considered to be the “mother civilization” for Mesoamerica, because many other civilizations have aspects derived from Olmec influences.

This means that Olmec influences spread all over Mesoamerica, although their artistic styles tend to be concentrated around times of their cultural heights. In later days, other civilizations would be dominant in the region.

So good for them. Until we get to a new section, how about a few more hits of Olmec art from the AMAZING collection at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City? It’s specifically in Chapultepec Park, which is an excellent place to visit when in that town.

(All these here pictures courtesy the Author, taken at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City.) Top left: Colossal Head (Author’s son nearby for a height comparison); top right: Olmec figure… could be a wrestler, could be a ball player… we don’t know… bottom left: cool Olmec figurines, mixed in with Classical Veracruz (Totonac) and Jalisco/Michoacán figurines – note the contrasts in style; bottom right: “Offering no. 4”, a great little group of dudes found stood up this way in an Olmec grave. If we knew more about the Olmecs it wouldn’t confront us the way an abstract painting stares us down.

One thing about Olmec art that I don’t get is why they made all their figures asexual. Other Mesoamerican cultures made figures with clearly identifiable sexual characteristics, but the Olmecs chose another path. While their sculptures seem incredibly lifelike, they are more symbolic than realistic. The “why” behind that state of affairs cannot yet be answered. We can but marvel at them and their beauty.

Outside the Olmec Heartland

Olmec influence spread across Mesoamerica, but it spread most to areas already conducive to the development of settled, urban life, which pretty much was all along the Gulf Coast and into the mountain valleys and plateaus of Central Mexico. The area had already begun to be quite densely populated, so culture spread fast in that kind of environment. Big temples popped up. Courts for playing the ball game got built up. Artisans began producing, well… art. Now, not everything was a copy of Olmec style 100%, but there was a lot of doing as they had already done.

One of the coolest civilizations to develop in parallel with the Olmecs was the Zapotec. These guys had their own written language and everything. At places like Mitla and Monte Albán, the Zapotecs got down with their interpretation of the Ball Game and running their affairs. They flourished around 500-400 BCE and had a great time flourishing. How about a sampling of their art? You ready? OK! Here goes!

(More pics the Author snapped at the Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City. He took about 1645 pictures on the trip, all told. Went through a whole set of batteries, even.) Top left: Zapotec dudes arranged in a way that reminds me of Olmec “Offering no. 4”; top right: Zapotec carvings from a wall… the first one from the left is a “dancer” figure. Neat, huh? Anyway; bottom left: Zapotec wildness with numbers and writings. Total awesome, here; bottom right: model of Monte Albán, complete with broad streets and high temples.

Further away from the Olmecs, the art wasn’t nearly as exquisite and detailed as the Zapotec stuff. In the mountain highlands of the Valley of Mexico, Jalisco, and Michoacán, folks produced some art that had definite Olmec influences, but they also show a unique and more primitive approach.

(Author’s pictures. Bet you wish you were there with him, huh? Man, it was a blast, doing the shoot.) Top left: mix of Michoacán and Jalisco figures. The Michoacán ones are squatter, while the Jalisco ones are taller, proportionally. You can tell that they’re NOT gender-neutral, like the Olmec figures. They were formed additively, with bits added on by hand until it was time to fire the figures in the kiln; top right: cool carved stone from the area… can you spot the were-jaguar? bottom left: more from Michoacán, including some pottery reminiscent of the US’ southwest… we’re getting closer to Aridoamerica; bottom right: a chac-mool figure… these are more plentiful in Maya country, indicating a contact with those people, as well. The platter in the middle is for handling sacrifices… OF ALL KINDS! ::dramatic sting::

Teotihuacán

During or just following the decline of the Olmec civilization, urban life in the Valley of Mexico took off. The biggest urban area was Teotihuacán, which means “Place of the Gods” in Nahuatl. Again, the Aztecs applied their views and language to the world around them when there wasn’t anything there from the original inhabitants to indicate who they were or what they were about. The Aztecs just made the best guess they could manage about the site and went from there.

What they called the Pyramid of the Sun and the Pyramid of the Moon they were probably right about. What they called the Street of the Dead and the Temple of Quetzalcoatl they were probably wrong about. Let me explain.

The Pyramids of the Sun and Moon really are aligned with those heavenly bodies. They have man-made caverns beneath them that we’re only beginning to understand and learn about. But the big attractions there are the pyramids themselves. They’re totally awesome, too. Let me show you…

(Author’s photos. These were taken at Teotihuacán itself. LOTS of climbing there…)

Top left: The Pyramid of the Sun, with my son in the foreground for perspective; top right: the Temple of Quetzalcoatl, as seen from the top of the Pyramid of the Sun. It’s way off, there. Big hike to get there, too. But easy to find: Just head south on the Road of the Dead, then hang a left at the end. Can’t miss it. We’re pretty sure the guys in Teotihuacán didn’t have a god like Quetzalcoatl, so its name came from the Aztecs that discovered it; bottom left: The Pyramid of the Moon, as seen from the top of the Pyramid of the Sun. Although it’s shorter than the Pyramid of the Sun, its top is about the same height, because it’s situated on higher ground. It’s also a more difficult climb; bottom right: The Pyramid of the Sun, as seen from the base of the Pyramid of the Sun. It’s the third-largest pyramid in the world, behind Cheops’ Pyramid (#2) and the Great Pyramid of Cholula (#1). Like the pyramids in Egypt, these were at one time covered with smooth stones and decorated – in this case, they were painted red.

Anyone who can, should head up to the top of a pyramid at Teotihuacán. Don’t do it on your first day in Mexico: take two days at that altitude to get used to the thinner air. As you head up, take a while to marvel at the fact the huge mass of stones you’re on was built by a Neolithic culture.

And that Neolithic culture was pretty handy with other arts and crafts… see for yourself:

(Author’s photos from that anthropology place in Mexico City.) Top left: Teotihuacán stone carving of an important dude, possibly a god or king. If it’s a god, it’s possibly the god of rain. The other three: Various frescoes from Teotihuacán. amazing colors and composition on these bad boys. Just wow.

(Screen capture from “Santo en el Hotel de la Muerte.”)

Beneath the B-movie, one can see Teotihuacán style

architecture. It’s got some great wrestling, terrible

continuity, and a really cool plot twist. It’s so awful,

it’s a masterpiece. Get a copy and watch it!

One can see that Teotihuacán had contact with the Mayas from these frescoes. While the figures are not exactly done in a Mayan style, the influence is definitely there. Later on, when Mexican artists after the Revolution sought inspiration for their works, these murals from Teotihuacán caught their attention and they were, in turn, influenced in their art by a long dead, but very Mexican, style and manner of presentation.

The Teotihuacán style did not stand on its own. No, its style is evident in many pyramid complexes in and around the Valley of Mexico. If you ever get a chance to see the lucha libre film, “Santo (El Enmascarado de Plata) en el Hotel de la Muerte,” for example, you’ll see a lot of Teotihuacán-style architecture even though the film used a set of pyramids near Cuautla, far to the south of Teotihuacán in Morelos, for the film.

Here are some more examples of Teotihuacán style, from the site itself and from other areas under its direct influence:

(Author’s photos. Again.) Top left: Teotihuacán stone carving of an important dude, possibly a god or king. If it’s a god, it’s possibly the god of death; top right: carvings from a talud-tablero temple… the Aztecs said they were Quetzalcoatl and Tlaloc, but we don’t have confirmation from the Teotihuacános; bottom left: another fresco from Teotihuacán; bottom right: OK, we’re pretty sure this is a god of the dead. The skull is our big tip-off.

Teotihuacán itself was very powerful. At its height, around 500 CE, it covered about eight square miles and had a population of around 250,000 people. The only cities on the planet at that time with populations approaching that level were in China. Teotihuacán most likely held military control of the surrounding regions, holding a wide swath of cities in tributary status. Later empires in the region would also be tributary in nature, following the cues given them by the Teotihuacános.

And then… it went into decline. How much decline? So much decline that when the Aztecs came across the place, they called the road in the middle “Street of the Dead.”

The “Street of the Dead” was actually a main road, with nobles’ palaces all along that axis. While the palaces are in ruins, the workers’ houses further out seem to be largely intact. This indicates that Teotihuacán wasn’t wiped out, as some thought when it was first excavated. Rather, something happened to cause the people there – or those invading – to rise up and wipe out only the leaders, leaving the rest of the city untouched.

If so, it wouldn’t be an isolated moment in Mexican history. The threat of a peasant rebellion, bloody and ferocious, has been a constant fear to Mexico’s rulers. Consider that several other civilizations show signs of abandonment, and one sees a pattern among the people of the land, conscious or unconscious.

So what did happen in the city? It could have been failed harvests – there was a volcanic eruption in the 6th century that messed up food production all around the world. It could have been invaders from the nomadic north – nomads were ruining everyone’s game up until the 14th century. It could have been a loss of authority – we do know that Teotihuacán once had power and influence over a wide range of territory, and a loss of that power could have shut down tributes needed to support the city.

It could have also been people that did not want to continue sacrificing their children for the state’s religion – bones of human skeletons have been found at the bases of temples at Teotihuacán, and they show signs of having been sacrificed, not buried carefully. At any rate, the city, unable to sustain itself, fell apart and became a home only for ghosts and the winds that feed them.

Classic Veracruz, Dudes

(Author’s Photo of Diego Rivera’s “Classic Veracruz” mural

on the north wall of the National Palace. In the top center, one

sees the Voladores descending from the pole with the famous El

Tajin Pyramid of the Niches just to the right of the Voladores.

In a museum in Veracruz, I tried to call this civilization “Classic Veracruz,” but the curator insisted the better term would be to call them the Totonacs. Well, many archaeologists want to keep identifiers for this civilization open, since they don’t yet know enough about it to qualitatively state that there wasn’t any other culture there, so they call it “Classic Veracruz.” Other archaeologists say the Totonacs arrived much later than the Classic Veracruz culture, and merely inherited the sites in their territory. So, in spite of my guide’s admonitions, I’ll have to err on the side of vagueness. I should note that the Veracruz in this case refers to the state of Veracruz, not the town Cortés founded in 1519.

Anyway, when Teotihuacán fell, the cities of the Classic Veracruz civilization became stronger. Heck, most of the cities in Mesoamerica increased in strength when Teotihuacán ebbed in power. One of those “circle of life” kind of things, I guess. The period after the decline of Teotihuacán is known as the “epiclassic” period and runs from about 600 CE to 900 CE.

During this epiclassic period, one of the coolest places to find Classic Veracruz stuff was in El Tajin. I never made it to El Tajin in my trip to Mexico, but I wish I had been able to get out that way, especially to see the elegant Pyramid of the Niches. It’s terribly elegant – almost Mayan in its decoration – and one of the gems of Mexican archeology. It’s certainly more elaborate than the crude, yet impressive, ruins of Cempoala, a Totonac site to the south.

The people of Veracruz are still very enthusiastic

about their sports, in this case Lucha Libre.

(Oh yeah. Photo credit… Author took the pic.)

But Mexico is nothing without its museums, and I promise you some fun with Classic Veracruz exhibits in just a bit. First, a few words about what we know regarding the Classic Veracruz culture.

First off, these guys ate well. Even when famines hit other parts of Mexico, the folks in Veracruz always seemed to have enough to eat. They also had lots of neat stuff to eat, too. The seafood in the region is amazing. It was so good, in fact, the Aztec emperors would employ runners to rush the stuff from the shore to their dinner table. But that came later.

Another extremely notable aspect of the Classic Veracruz culture was its enthusiasm for sports. And when I say sports, I mean the king of Mesoamerican competitive arts, the Ball Game. In El Tajin alone, there are 18 separate ball courts.

(Author’s photo and meme.) A classic example of

Classic Veracruz lolchaeology.

The Classic Veracruz civilization also seems to be the first one to start adding human sacrifices to the outcomes of the ball games. For the record, Teotihuacán has NO ball courts to speak of, something quite unusual for a Mesoamerican civilization. I find it interesting to note the lack of ball game in Teotihuacán at around the same time the superfans of Classic Veracruz were making their modifications to the game.

Those Classic Veracruz guys weren’t just playing ball. There’s a reason they’re considered important enough for their own section. They had some amazing cool art.

The Classic Veracruz stuff isn’t as well known as the Mayas or other guys because it was discovered later than they were and the word on them hasn’t hit all the streets. But the cool kids know where to go to get that sweet Classic Veracruz stuffs.

One of the most important sets of Classic Veracruz artifacts are all their sports-related sculptures. While most other civilizations just had protective gear for their players, the Classic Veracruz guys took those pads and put all kinds of embellishments on them – hachas and palmas, axes and palms – that look totally cool.

Another important group of cool Classic Veracruz stuff is all their smiling heads. Alone or on whole statues, they had loads of these smiley faces in their cities. Officially, the historical jury is out on exactly what they were for or even if they were really happy. Maybe this culture had a different way of looking at the world and the expression meant something… different…

Yeah, right.

(Author’s photos, from the Anthropology museum place. After this section, I’ll be pretty much done with the pictures I took there.) Top left: Classic Veracruz ball players with their hachas, palmas, and game faces on. They roll mad deep, yo. Top right: Classic Veracruz smiley head statuettes. They are obviously a hip-hop trio. Yeaaaah, boyeeeee! Bottom left: A mix of Classic Veracruz stuff. The tall figure looks like he’s telling a “yo’ momma” joke. I see a modern version of this figure that tells such jokes as a possible hot Christmas gift in some future year. Bottom right: Classic Veracruz fun for the whole family. First, take note of the definitely feminine figure in the bottom left of the picture. Ain’t no Olmec influences there, I tell you what! The other five figures are obviously having a great time. Looks like they’re laughing at all the archaeologists that can’t figure out what they really mean. I love the Classic Veracruz lolchaeology!

Come on, they’re smiling. No, more than that, they’re having a great time. Veracruz itself is a sunny area, near to a beach, with lots of wonderful flowers and great fishing. How could they not have a good time there, short of being invaded by a bunch of Toltecs or Aztecs or whatever… but that didn’t happen until hundreds of years after the Classic Veracruz civilization waned.

In its heyday, Classic Veracruz knew how to party. And, given how they smiley heads are EVERYWHERE there, maybe they also invented mass media. Think of it… thousands of years before the internet or even television, they had cultural memes. Had the Classic Veracruz civilization lasted longer, I’m sure they would have carved lolcats on their stelae and left inscriptions like “colossal head is colossal” all over the Olmec ruins.

(Author’s photo.) Xipe Totec. Yipes!

For a final note on the Classic Veracruz culture, I do want to mention it wasn’t all fun and games for them. They did have a serious side.

I mentioned they probably came up with the idea of sacrificing the losing team in the Mesoamerican ball game. Well, one can see the fun in that. There’s something a bit more sinister in their culture, if you take the time to dig it up…

Take a look at their god of corn, Xipe Totec. If you don’t have a picture of the fellow handy, I’ll just put one here for you…

Now, you may be thinking it’s a statue of a baby with an odd t-shirt on and something draped over his right forearm, like a waiter’s napkin.

It’s not.

This is Xipe Totec, god of corn. He’s also known as “The Flayed God” because he wears the – ulp – skin of his fallen enemies. That’s why his “shirt” has a hole

(Author’s photo.) Voladores performing

in Chapultepec Park, Mexico City.

in the chest area that’s been stitched over… and that’s not a napkin… that’s a hand. The line around his neck is where the skin had to be cut to fit over his head… and this whole wearing skin thing can explain why it looks like he’s got four lips. If you were to go around behind him, you’d see more stitching along the back and legs, with some feet hanging like diabolical booties near his ankles.

The sculptors were able to create such a work so accurately because they had actual models to work with. You see, the priests of Xipe Totec dressed up like their god…

But before you run screaming in terror from this section of the book, you need to know about the Voladores.

Legend tells us that there was once a severe drought in Veracruz and the people there wanted to let Xipe Totec know that they needed help. So they went and found the straightest, tallest tree they could, cut off all the branches, and set it up for their clever ritual.

Five men climbed to the top. One had a drum and flute. The other four dressed as birds and had long ropes tied around their ankles. They wound the ropes 13 times around the pole – so that each complete turn times the four dancers would equal the weeks in the year. Once wound up, the four bird-men – voladores – would lean backwards and fall to earth slowly as their ropes unwound. It’s absolutely magical to behold and experience in person. I’m sure it caught Xipe Totec’s attention as much as it caught mine.

We now leave Veracruz and head to the east… the land of mystery… the land of…

The Maya

Nice segue there! I love it when I can pull off something that cool. And the Mayas certainly deserve something cool.

Now, they’re not my favorite Mesoamericans – I like the Nahuatl groups more – but they sure do have a boss way of showing up in style. We saw some of it in the earlier Teotihuacán murals, and we’re going to see more of it in just a little bit. But first, let’s know some more about their history.

The Maya came from… uh… well, we don’t know. I mean, they didn’t land here in flying saucers or anything like that. But, like the Olmecs, they seem to rise up out of the jungles of Yucatán and Guatemala, fully formed and ready to go. One possible explanation why it seems this way has to do with the jungle itself: it can obscure many, many things, including older aspects of a civilization that may reveal its progress over time. Mesoamericans tended to build atop earlier settlements, so it’s entirely possible the Mayas destroyed their own history as they built for their future.

The Maya definitely inherited influences from the Olmecs: corn cultivation, elaborate carving, and that neato ball game. The Classic Maya civilizations flourished from around 250 CE to 900 CE, in parallel with the Classic Veracruz and Teotihuacán. Maya stuff before 250 is known as Preclassic Maya and their stuff after 900 is known as – are you ready for this? – Postclassic.

We could use some stuff on the period info, here.

Paleo-Indian: 10,000–3500 BCE – people were just getting started with things like cultivation and what-not. They don’t yet have time for fancy things like temples or pyramids, let alone digital watches.

Archaic: 3500–1800 BCE – people be growing corn! With increased food surpluses, folks can spend some time making little statues and such-like. Of course, if a massive civilization based entirely upon biodegradable building materials existed during this time, we’d have no way of knowing.

Preclassic (Formative): BCE 2000–250 CE – a new era! Let’s examine it by sub-eras! Gogogogo!

Early Preclassic: BCE 2000–1000 – OLMECS IN DA HOUSE!!! They got the party of Central American civilization rolling with their smash hits at San Lorenzo. We also see beginnings of civilization in the Zapotec and Mayan regions.

Middle Preclassic: BCE 1000–400 – the Olmecs were still rocking at La Venta and Tres Zapotes; The Zapotecs whipped up something delightful at Monte Albán and the Mayans got ready to make a big splash with their civilization.

Late Preclassic: BCE 400–200 CE – by this time, the Olmecs were winding things down and entering their “chillout” phase, but the Maya got their party started at Tikal. Meanwhile, Teotihuacán made the scene in Central Mexico and influenced Mesoamerica for centuries.

Classic: 200–900 CE – a new era, also significant enough to warrant having sub-eras. Discuss.

Early Classic: 200–600 CE – Teotihuacán was still strong, along with Maya centers at Copán, Palenque, and Tikal. Along with the Zapotecs, all three civilizations were at their height.

Late Classic: 600–900 CE – after “early” comes “late.” Teotihuacán went into a big decline, but on the Gulf Coast, El Tajín and the Classic Veracruz culture made a huge splash.

Postclassic: 900–1521 CE – during this era, the Toltecs rose to fame and glory, also influencing the late Maya at Chichen Itzá. After around 1200, both those civilizations had declined and the Nahuatl-speaking cultures of Central Mexico rose to power, culminating in the Aztec Empire.

Post Conquest: 1521-1700 CE – this is the era in which indigenous culture took a big ol’ back seat to European influences, and we’ll talk more of this in later sections.

Like just about everywhere else in Mesoamerica, the Mayan civilization’s political structure resembled Ancient Greece or Mesopotamia more than it did the sprawling empires of Han China or Rome. It’s almost as if the farmers of Mesopotamia produce a certain amount of tribute every year and the question is but a matter of which direction to send it in. Sometimes, the dominant city of year A gets sacked and everyone has to send tribute to another major urban area in year B. Barbarians arrive and take over that city? No problem, just keep sending the tributes to the barbarians. Another city rises up and subjugates the barbarians? Ah, time to send the tribute to that new, tougher city.

One can see why, when the Spanish showed up, it became rather easy for them to take over as the new recipients of the tributes: it was an extension of a pattern that had been going on for thousands of years. History pretty much only happened to the guys running the cities. For the farmers, there was no real change.

As for the elites among the Maya, they made some amazing cities across their region, including Palenque, Tikal, Chichen Itza, and Copán. OK, so Chichen Itza is actually a Postclassic site, but it’s still amazing. Interestingly enough, perhaps the greatest Mayan archaeological site is underneath Guatemala City… but it’ll never be completely unearthed on account of all of Guatemala City being on top of it. So it goes.

The Mayans developed a very entertaining system of writing that involves multiple ways of writing the same sound, along with using symbols as both pictograms and ideograms, and produced both art and architecture to stagger the mind. Their astronomy was quite advanced and they made refinements to the calendar they inherited from the Olmecs. Mayan religion was very complex and their merchants traded chocolate and shells throughout Mesoamerica.

As mentioned earlier, Mayan politics involved a number of struggles among city-states and their surrounding territories. The kings of each city liked to glorify themselves with cool statues and stuff like that. Can’t blame them. They were the kings, after all…

So how about that art, huh? Here it is:

(Big pictures from the big museum… Author’s photos, no less.) Top left: A bunch of Mayan figures, arranged by the museum to show all the Mayan social classes. They had a stratified society, it would seem… top right: That dude is a king or something. The writings around him say who he was and whatever famous things his spin doctors say he had done. And yes, all great kings employed spin doctors. How else do you think we managed to remember them as “great”? The humble kings are forgotten because they never really tooted their own horn, if you know what I mean. Bottom left: Examples of the Mayan writing system. It’s very complicated to those who don’t know it. To those that do know it, it’s perhaps the only writing system in the world based upon puns. Bottom right: More important Mayan dudes. If someone took the time to carve stories about you in granite, you were an important person back in that day. For serious!

While it’s pretty easy to spot Mayan influences on surrounding cultures, it’s not so easy to notice the influence of other cultures on the Maya. The influences are there, especially after the end of their Classic period, but it takes a sharper eye to see them. But at least we know when to look for them, thanks to the excellent Mayan system of dating almost everything in sight. No, not “can I take you out to the movies” dating. Putting calendar dates on stuff dating. Agh. I think I’m starting to confuse myself. How about some more art, whaddya say?

(Author’s photos) Top left and right: More cool Mayan stuff. Man, they could carve!

Bottom: A for-reals Mayan chac-mool reclining sacrificial altar. This is definitely something you won’t find down at the Ikea store. I mean, one, it’s not Swedish. Two, it’s not something one assembles at home. Three, it doesn’t bear the marks of clean Scandinavian design… so, yeah…

I know I mentioned the chac-mool wouldn’t be featured at an Ikea store, but there’s an outside chance Maya-style beakers might just make the catalog as “Keramik” or something like that.

(Author’s piczorz.) All the pictures: Mayan beakers and other sorts of pottery, among other things. The better the decorations, the more likely it was used as an ornamental or ritualistic item. They don’t show the signs of wear that the plainer pottery has, so that’s how we know the Mayans had a concept of “the good dishes we save for company.” For all we know, Martha Stewart may be channeling the spirit of an ancient Mayan party planner, which would explain her joy at carving into beasts and removing their hearts… but I digress. The Maya never had a potter’s wheel. Instead, they got into clay by making little ropes with it and coiling it around and around and up and up until they had something roughly in the shape of whatever it was they wanted to make. I suppose if it came out shaped like something else useful, they might have just gone with that and said “oh yeah, I meant to do that…” Next step would be to smooth out the sides and let it harden somewhat in the sun. After that, various mixtures of earths and water, known as “slips” would be applied to the kinda-dry pottery to color it up nicely. The most elaborate pots come from the Late Classical period, in case you were wondering. Anyhow, after everything got all colored up, the pot went into the kiln and got hardened up… ceramic style!

These ceramics show a wide range of decorations, from abstract patterns on up to stuff that looks like it was ripped from one of their elaborate wall treatments. These guys were versatile. The ones with human-like figures on them may be depictions of once-great leaders, now chatting with gods, perhaps to show how close their leaders were to the gods, or maybe to facilitate the meeting of the leader with his makers. Often, the Maya artists would exaggerate features to make them more attractive – which many artists today will do. The catch is that what the Maya found attractive doesn’t meet our current standards o’ beauty. So it goes…

When the Maya buried one of their beautiful people, no expense was spared. Forget pricey coffins or even mausoleums: these guys built pyramids, like the real undertaking pros.

(Oh my heck! NOT MORE PHOTOS FROM THE AUTHOR! WHEN WILL IT STOP?)

Top left: A Mayan god of the dead. Many Mesoamerican religions had more than one deity in charge of death: they had an oligopoly structure for their afterlife, not a monopolistic one. Anyway, I think it’s cool how his noodly appendage can also be used as a goal for the Ball Game. Top right: Schematic of a Mayan temple. The tomb at the base was NOT easy to get to. That was by design. Mayan temples, while oriented to celestial objects, were not part of an overall building plan, in contrast to the gridded cities of Central Mexico. Bottom left: Actual poses of dead folks found in Mayan temple basements. These guys would have been minor folks, not big-time kings or priests. Bottom right: This is how a big-time priest or king got the send-off to the Big Cornfield in the Sky. Jade/turquoise deathmask and buried in a massive stone sarcophagus with all his bling. All over the room, carved gods watched over his last rest in and among the inscriptions detailing his deeds in life that were good enough to be carved on a wall.

So, what did in the Maya civilization? Here’s what we know: their cities were running along just fine, then in a historically sudden way they abandoned their cities. Folks went back to the countryside and maintained a much simpler existence. Many cities started to shut down around 900 or so. Chichen Itza held out until 1225 but it eventually was left to the jungle.

OK, so why all the abandonment? There are theories. Historians speculate that perhaps the climate changes that affected Europe around this time disrupted agriculture enough here to make urban living unsupportable: when Rome collapsed, so did its cities, so maybe something similar happened here. Another theory speculates a massive disease hit the Maya. I know there are funky viruses in those jungles and I don’t doubt one could have wiped out their population, but they’d have to be vulnerable and stressed – and a famine could leave them in just such a way. Another stressor would be warfare: these guys were fighting each other and their neighbors A LOT. Wars can wipe out populations, although they also tend to leave cities in ruins: why are most of the Maya buildings not knocked over? Hmmm…

Eco-guerrillas and their fellow travelers will jab accusatory fingers at overpopulation and soil exhaustion, and those are valid accusations, indeed. The soil in Yucatán is pretty thin and if there are too many people relative to the amount of food available, bad things happen, like abandonment of the cities and their very society that brought on the exhaustion.

Those are all nice, but where are the conspiracy theories? I mean, come on! I’m sure there had to have been some shady Maya types that got together to try and subvert their governments so they could rip off all the wealth and power for themselves… then kill off the people they were manipulating when they were no longer convenient to keep around.  Oooh, now that’s a juicy theory, I tell you what! And in the course of subverting all the governments, maybe some do-gooder types got together to try and fight them in a massive battle that eventually left everyone in a state of anarchy. OK, so now my theory falls in the “warfare” category, but my Maya-as-Somalis theory at least has shady backroom deals in it. I know I can’t prove any of it, but that just goes to show how advanced the cover-up really is!

(Author’s obligatory photo of a 9-foot-tall Toltec

warrior statue. Could be Huastec, for all we know.

The statue, that is, not the author’s son. Although,

now that I look at it, there is a certain similarity

between him and the statue… hmmm…)

And if you don’t believe that Mesoamericans were into official cover-ups, just keep reading…

The Toltecs, Huastecs, and Chicimecs

The Toltecs came out of the forbidding lands of Aridoamerica and built mighty cities, full of glory. They built a vast empire that took in all of Mesoamerica, then fell apart quickly, leaving a power vacuum the Aztecs would later fill.

Maybe.

That was the Aztec version of Toltec history, and if you look at it carefully, you’ll see several key aspects of the story that would justify the Aztecs in their wars of conquest. They’d simply be filling the shoes of their imitable ancestors.

In the last part of the 20th Century, historians have been much more critical of Aztec official histories, as they have occasional tendencies to have no basis whatsoever in fact. For example, the Aztecs were sworn enemies of the Huastecs. OK, you say, so what? Well, the Aztecs also admired all the cool stuff in Tula, particularly the massive warrior statues there.

I should show one of those statues. Every time someone starts a discussion about the Toltecs, somebody’s gotta show one of them huge statues. So I’ll hunt down a pic in my collection, Click “Insert -> Text Box” and put it on the right side of the page.

Whoops. It just went to the previous page. Oh well, win some and lose some… where was I?

Oh yeah, the Huastecs. They were linguistically related to the Maya, but had split off from the Maya heartland back when the Olmecs were just getting fired up. Seems as though these Huastecs were always fighting wars with the Aztecs – and beating them down. So, of course the Aztecs couldn’t stand them. Now, since the Aztecs admired Tula, they figured there was no way on earth their sworn enemies’ ancestors could ever have made something that cool. So, they simply called whoever made the stuff there “Toltec.” That word came to mean “really cool artist” in their language, as opposed to “Chichimec,” which meant “uncouth barbarian.”

The Chichimecs, by the way, were actually a lot of peoples in Aridoamerica. The Aztecs knew they themselves had come from that region, and referred to their barbaric history as their “Chichimec” period, as opposed to their urbanized “Toltec” period. The Aztecs, by the way, saw no problem with their usage conventions referring both to historical periods and general lifestyle patterns.

I imagine their world would come crashing down around their ears if someone ever proved to them that they were admiring the work of… THE HUASTECS! And, yes, that’s who modern archaeologists think the Toltecs were.

Aztec historical inventions aside, the so-called Toltecs were the source for one of the most powerful and enduring beliefs of Mesoamerica, particularly in the Aztec world: Quetzalcoatl.

Quetzalcoatl

Rather than try and explain all the origins and implications of the Quetzalcoatl legend, I’ll stick primarily to the Aztec version of the story, as that’s the one with the biggest impact on the history and art of Mexico. So here goes…

Quetzalcoatl was a god that helped in the creation of most of the previous worlds. As a god, he was often depicted as a feathered serpent – and many cultures in Mesoamerica have a feathered serpent god, not just the Aztecs. The bird feathers in question are those of the Quetzal bird: iridescent feathers of green and blue. At various times in his godly career, he’s been hailed as a giver of corn, bringer of fertility, a hope of resurrection, creator of worlds, and other cool stuff like that.

Some aspects of Quetzalcoatl worship were seized upon by Christian missionaries in their hope to convert the peoples of Mexico: they would emphasize versions of his legend in which he disapproved of human sacrifices, died and was resurrected, and had a virgin birth. Granted, they wouldn’t be taken in their purest form, but those aspects certainly did have resonant echoes with the Christian religion.

Quetzalcoatl was also a king of Tula that ruled wisely and wonderfully, etc. But, as in all stories with really nice guys, there was a nasty chap that wanted to spoil everything for him. This nasty chap did, in fact, ruin Quetzalcoatl’s life. The details vary, but it’s fun to put them all together. Apparently, the baddie, Tezcatlipoca, managed to poison Quetzalcoatl after getting him drunk, then got him to sleep with a celibate priestess that was also Quetzalcoatl’s sister and then Quetzalcoatl died, but came back to life and had to leave Tula on a flying raft made out of snakes. He headed east, if that makes a difference. (And it does later on…)

(Author’s photo of Diego Rivera’s mural depicting life in ancient Mexico, from the National Palace: north panel of the main staircase. Note Quetzalcoatl in the center, under the sun – and on the flying raft to the right of the sun.

Before he left, Quetzalcoatl promised he would come back and reclaim his kingdom. That’s another important bit.

Just to complicate things even more for historians, the kings of Tula really did take on the name “Quetzalcoatl” or its equivalent and there was, in fact, one such king that managed to get himself banished from Tula and later turned up in Maya country. If the folks in charge of Tula were, in fact, Huastecs, then their language would be pretty close to the Mayan tongue. That would explain, to some degree, the “Toltecization” of the Mayan centers of their Postclassic period.

Anyway, just remember these details. They’ll be important in a few more pages. Trust me.

As for the rest of Toltec history, well, they fell into decline like so many other civilizations before them and farmers ran their herds of techichi dogs past the former glories of the Toltecs. The next group to dominate Mesoamerica in the final days of the fifth world would arrive shortly after the Toltecs faded from view.

The Aztecs

I should make a disclaimer: The Aztecs weren’t.

“Aztec” didn’t really exist as a term for describing anyone Mesoamerican until Alexander von Humboldt used the term to describe a pre-Columbian alliance of three Nahuatl-speaking city-states in 1810. In 1843, William H. Prescott used “Aztec” to refer to pre-conquest Mexicans… with post-conquest Mexicans being, simply, “Mexican.”

To be precise, the pre-conquest folks hanging out in and around the great city of Tenochtitlan called themselves “Mexica.” That’s what the Spaniards called them, as well. Most likely, the name Mexica came from “Mexi,” a secret name for their top deity, Huitzilopochtli.

The Mexica themselves were one of a group of Nahuatl-speaking peoples that had migrated into the Valley of Mexico and parts surrounding, starting around 500 CE or so. The Nahuatl people had a common origin legend, that they came from a land far to the north, called Aztlan. “Aztecatl” is a Nahuatl word meaning, “one who comes from Aztlan,” which is where Humboldt got his word, “Aztec.”

So, from this, we learn that we can use the terms “Nahuatl,” “Mexica,” and “Aztec” interchangeably with equal amounts of inaccuracy, but that being inaccurate makes things easier to understand.

A quick note on Nahuatl today: it’s alive and well and a primary language in many parts of Mexico. For many other Mexicans, it’s a secondary language that adds vocabulary to standard Spanish. Ultimately, it’s all over place names and bits of slang in the Valley of Mexico and surrounding areas. Revolutionaries like Zapata used it to rally people to his cause. It’s one of the best-known and most-used Native American languages.

Which brings me to a pet peeve: marking differences between Native Americans from tribes wiped out and subjugated by the United States of America and those tromped on and oppressed by Spanish and Mexican elites. They’re ALL indigenous peoples: calling some Native Americans and others Mexican-Americans is a form of divide and rule, in my opinion. Of course, if I keep going with that logic, I’ll be uniting all downtrodden groups in a non-racial identity that puts the whole group at odds with the ruling elites… and then folks will call me a Marxist, which I’m not. So I’ll stop tangenting here and get back to a discussion about the Nahuatl peoples.

From 500 to around 1250, various Nahuatl groups moved into the Valley of Mexico. The Mexica were the last group, making their way to Lake Texcoco around 1248.

(Author’s photo of Diego Rivera’s depiction of all kinds of yummy

corn from his mural “La Gran Tenochtitlan,” in his series of

murals along the north wall of the National Palace in Mexico

City. Seriously, if you ever get the chance to go there, go! It’s free.)

Surrounding the lake were a number of city-states, each part of a hierarchy of power in the region. Over time, one city-state would be dominant in the region, but never to the point where it could run roughshod over any of its neighbors. The region itself grew to be quite prosperous, mostly because of its massive agricultural bounty.

With that bounty, religion in the Valley of Mexico became highly focused on the things that made all that possible: the most important gods to them were those of rain, sun, fertility, and corn itself.

As marauding bands of less-civilized Nahuatl came in from the north, gods of war increased in importance to the folks of the Valley of Mexico. They had to fight to control the barbarians who, in turn, could be used as troops to further the power of the various city-states of the region.

And, you know what? A map would be really helpful right about now.

(Author’s photo, shot at the Naval History Museum in Veracruz. Jolly nice museum.) Map of the Valley of Mexico. The big blue thing is Lake Texcoco. The squares are different cities that surrounded the lake, or, in the case of Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco, were surrounded by the lake. The lake has since been filled in and a lot of these squares are now neighborhoods – or subway stops – in the greater Mexico City area. Keep your eye on Azcapotzalco, which was one of the top dog cities when the Mexica first arrived on the scene. Also watch out for Tlatelolco, Tenochtitlan, and Texcoco which formed the “Triple Alliance” around 1430 and then took over…

When the Mexica arrived around 1248, they were a bunch of country hicks that didn’t have all the fancy learnin’ the other Nahuatl peoples had. That is to say, their leaders didn’t have the same refinements common to the leaders of other, urbanized peoples. Peasants is peasants wherever you go, and none of them were of the reading persuasion, no matter which tribe they belonged to.

Not having many career options, the Mexica made a few inquiries as to which city around Lake Texcoco was the toughest. Folks referred them to Azcapotzalco. The Mexica offered their services as mighty warriors to Azcapotzalco and the Azcapotzalcans hired them on the spot. For a while, the Mexica served as hired muscle for Azcapotzalco and made a pretty good living at it.

The Mexica settled south of Azcapotzalco, around the hill of Chapultepec, and began to till the earth there and grow their crops of corn. Life was good for them.

But their god, Huitzilopochtli, was not happy. He wished to rule over a tribe of mighty warriors, and corn was no place for a mighty warrior. He ordered his priests to tell the leaders of the Mexica that they were to face a severe trial and that they’d have to bring it upon themselves. They would also have to keep wandering until they found a place where they saw an eagle perched on a nopal cactus, killing a snake.

Fearing the wrath of their great god Huitzilopochtli, the Mexica nobles agreed to do as the priests directed.

The Mexica requested to further their political bonds with Azcapotzalco by way of a royal marriage. Eager to make sure the Mexica stayed on their side, the lord of Azcapotzalco sent one of his daughters over to the Mexica. On the day of the wedding, the lord of Azcapotzalco entered the dark chamber where his daughter was to marry a prince of the Mexica… and noticed that his daughter didn’t look… quite… right…

Remember Xipe Totec? Well, the Mexica had killed the daughter and had someone wear her skin at the wedding ceremony in front of her father. This provoked a reaction, to say the least.

The Azcapotzalcans gathered their allies and commenced to curbstomp the Mexica, driving them from their happy fields, never giving them a rest as long as they were within striking distance of Azcapotzalco. The Mexica made their way to the other side of the lake and had a bit of refuge, working as mercenaries for the city-state of Culhuacan.

(Still from the film La Otra Conquista depicting a

chinampa on Lake Texcoco.)

About 20-25 years after getting shelter from Culhuacan, probably in the year 1423, the Mexica claim they saw their vision of where their promised land would be: but the eagle was perched on a cactus on a barren, half-submerged island in the middle of Lake Texcoco! Heck of a place to build a massive city…

… and yet, they did. Lake Texcoco wasn’t very deep at the time the Mexica showed up, maybe only 4-6 feet deep in most parts near the western shore. In those shallows, the Mexica could build up chinampas, baskets of earth anchored to the lake bed in nutrient-rich waters. These hydroponic wonders produced a vast agricultural bounty for the growing city of the Mexica, Tenochtitlan. Another Mexica city, Tlatelolco, started up just north of Tenochtitlan and later merged with that city.

Because his people were where he told them to be, Huitzilopochtli blessed his people and allowed them to prosper in their teeming, floating city.

A century passed… by 1418, Tenochtitlan had patched up its differences with Azcapotzalco. Since 1376, the Mexica paid a tribute to Azcapotzalco and enjoyed good relations with the dominant power in the valley. Also in 1418, Tezozomoc, the king of Azcapotzalco, led an army into the city of Texcoco, home to the Acolhua tribe of the Nahuatl peoples. Tezozomoc’s forces slew the king of Texcoco and most of his family: of the few survivors was the young prince Nezahualcoyotl.

Nezahualcoyotl’s flight eventually took him to Tenochtitlan, where he became friends with the Mexica. Nine years later came Tenochtitlan’s turn to face the might of Azcapotzalco.

In 1427, Tezozomoc died. His son Tayauh was supposed to inherit the throne, but Tayauh’s brother, Maxtla, started a rebellion against Tayauh. The lord of Tenochtitlan, Chimalpopoca, allied with the rightful heir, Tayauh. Leaders of both factions attempted to assassinate each other, with Maxtla finally succeeding in assassinating his brother. Maxtla’s men then attacked Tenochtitlan and took Chimalpopoca prisoner, putting him on display in the center of Azcapotzalco. Afterwards, either Chimalpopoca committed suicide or was murdered by Maxtla, but he certainly died while in Azcapotzalcan custody.

When Chimalpopoca died, his brother Tlacalel stood to inherit the throne. Tlacalel declined, choosing instead to be the chief priest of the Mexica, which, when the chief god was a god of war, also meant he would be the head of the army of the Mexica. With Tlacalel stepping aside, Chimalpopoca’s brother Itzcoatl became king of the Mexica in 1427.

When Itzcoatl sought allies against Maxtla, he found a ready friend in Nezahualcoyotl, who commanded a sizable group of Texcocoans opposed to the puppet Tezozomoc had installed in their city. The king of Tlacopan, Totoquihuatzin, joined forces with Itzcoatl and Nezahualcoyotl in what came to be known as the Triple Alliance. Fortunately for bad spellers everywhere, Totoquihuatzin became a minor partner in the relationship, with Itzcoatl taking the lead role.

The Triple Alliance benefitted from its strength, strategic location, and the superb generalship of Tlacalel. In a year of hard fighting, the Triple Alliance first destroyed the allies of Azcapotzalco, then Azcapotzalco. Nezahualcoyotl himself sacrificed Maxtla to Huitzilopochtli.

With the collapse of Azcapotzalco, Tenochtitlan moved to not only assume rule over the Valley of Mexico, but to take on the grander role of becoming the new Toltec Empire, which itself was the rightful descendant of the Teotihuacán Empire.

Er, well… that’s the version we get from Tlacalel. You see, as the chief priest of the Mexica, he also re-wrote their history to be more epic… and I have to say, he did a pretty darn good job. I love the Tlacalel version of history. It’s loaded with violence, plot twists, divine retribution and reward, and would make an AWESOME miniseries.

But as for truthfulness… uh… um… yeah… It’s not entirely truthful. Tlacalel simply said, “This is truthful” and burned all the competing versions. In his place behind the throne, Tlacalel guided the destiny of the Aztecs – and that’s what I’ll call the Mexica from here forward – into what he wanted it to be. While it may be debatable how extensive the tribute networks of Teotihuacán and Tula may have been, we know that on the eve of the Spanish conquest, the Aztecs ruled over a tribute network that included upwards of 15 million people.

(Author’s photo of the plaque in El Jardin de la Triple Alianza, just across the street from the Taco Inn on Tacuba Street in Mexico City.) Left to right: Izcoatl of Tenochtitlan, Nezahualcoyotl of Texcoco, and the guy that ran Tlacopan. There are larger versions of these high relief statues in the garden itself, which is rather tiny, as far as gardens go. It’s more like a set of bushes underneath some cool statues. But, if you’re chowing down at the Taco Inn before hitting the art museums, you might as well pay it a visit and be edified by the grace of these statues.

The center of the Aztec world was Tenochtitlan, a massive city of canals and plazas that had a population of 150,000-250,000 in 1519, as big as one of China’s teeming cities. Today, it is Mexico City, one of the largest urban areas in the world, built upon the sinking soil where Lake Texcoco used to be. While all the cities in the Valley of Mexico had regular grid patterns for their roads, those grids crashed into each other as Mexico City outgrew the borders of Tenochtitlan and merged with the surrounding communities.

But, in its day, Tenochtitlan floated on Lake Texcoco and received the tributes from the lands conquered by the razor-sharp macuahuitl blades of the Jaguar and Eagle Knights of the Aztec Empire.

As long as the tributes flowed to Tenochtitlan, things went well for the tribute states. Whenever one got uppity notions, Tlacalel sent in a massive force on a punitive campaign to remind them of their obligations. He also insisted upon vast numbers of prisoners, to satisfy his revved-up standards for human sacrifice in the Aztec religion. As the Aztecs ran out of places to conquer, they were also running out of places to get captives for sacrifice. To keep the sacrifices a-comin’, Tlacalel hit upon the idea of xochiyaoyotl, or “Flower Wars.”

In a nutshell, the Flower Wars were special wars fought in a ritualized way that would get more prisoners than casualties. Tlacalel insisted that some nearby states, like Tlaxcala, not be conquered and made tributaries so that they’d always be open targets for raiding. Clever stuff, those Flower Wars.

Tlacalel’s influence upon the Aztecs cannot be understated. The changes Tlacalel brought to Aztec society are felt even in this modern era. To illustrate the far-reaching impacts of Tlacalel, I will refer to the film, Wrestling Women vs. the Aztec Mummy.

(Author’s screen captures…) Yes, I said I’d refer to Wrestling Women vs. the Aztec Mummy, a dubbed English version of Luchadoras Contra la Mumia Azteca. I insist that this movie is a for-reals historical source document and I can prove it. Not only does it take place in and around some cool pyramids, but it has the statement at the end that the National Institute of History and Anthropology of Mexico helped in making the film. That’s a for-reals Mexican governmental entity, and they don’t mess around when it comes to historical accuracy. So… yeah!

In the film, a sinister Chinese crime boss with two Japanese sisters leads a vaguely Asian gang of criminals in a bid to acquire a recently-discovered Aztec codex that promises the key to locating the lost treasure of the Aztecs. His gang kills off a number of the archaeologists that found the codex, and finally narrows down its target to one surviving professor. They then proceed to steal three of the four parts of the codex. When one of the guys guarding the codex threatens to burn it instead of allowing it to fall into the hands of the criminals, the sinister Chinese crime boss offers a deal: his sisters will fight the Wrestling Women (who are in the group guarding the codex) in a public ring match and whoever wins the bout will get all parts of the codex. The guards agree and the time and place of the match is set.

(Oh good grief, the author can’t be serious! More screen caps from a Mexican b-movie!) The Wrestling Women have a tough match, but eventually prove victorious over the Judo-chopping Japanese sisters of the sinister Chinese crime boss.

This form of ritualized combat is a direct descendant of Tlacalel’s Flower Wars. Lucha libre, like the Flower Wars, has many rituals and protocols to observe, making it an almost poetic expression of human energy, in contrast to the vulgar brawls of Ultimate Fighting. In the Flower Wars and lucha libre, the combat is stylized and intended to be non-lethal: a fight to the subdual, not to the death.

After the Wrestling Women win their match, the sinister Chinese crime boss hands over the stolen codices and keeps an eye on the professor as he deciphers them. Once the professor figures out where the lost treasure of the Aztecs is, the sinister Chinese crime boss says he’ll move in to take it from him.

Well, the prof finally gets a translation for the codex and as he reads it, the movie cuts to a pretty cool Aztec ritual shot at a temple complex, complete with a shot of a model of ancient Tenochtitlan, dancers, musicians, and some nice marching.

Understand that in the world of Tlacalel’s reforms, song and dance wasn’t all just a bunch of song and dance. By that, I mean that musicians and dancers were held to some really high standards of performance. They had to practice a lot because if they made a mistake in a performance, the death penalty awaited for them.

And you thought Simon Cowell was a harsh judge. He wishes he was Aztec tough.

The Aztec music system itself was pretty straightforward: they had four main types of songs – ti, to, ki, ko. A “ti” song would stress a downbeat and have a high pitch. A “to” song would have a downbeat and a low pitch. “Ki” songs had upbeats and high pitches. If you can’t figure out a “ko” song from those bits of information, should you really be reading this book? Hm?

The beat and pitch of the music also determined how the dancers would be positioned and how they would move. It was all quite systematic. It had to be. With no written notation of music, everything had to be memorized. Given the Aztec’s lethal reaction to imperfection, it made sense to keep things as direct as possible.

There were a few factors that could explain why the Aztecs would want to kill off musicians that made mistakes in performances. Now, some of you may be thinking of a few musicians you might like to see killed off for one reason or another, but your reasons probably aren’t the Aztec ones, or at least the reasons exclusive to the Aztecs. The most prominent reason, in my mind, would be that the musicians were not just performing for mere mortals, but for the gods observing their proceedings. A mistake could offend the gods, and we all know what happens when the gods are offended, right? Plagues, droughts, calamities, earthquakes, and all kinds of horrible things follow in the wake of the anger of the gods: best to kill off a musician to let the gods know there’s no way that sort of thing would happen again.

The Aztecs also had an interesting social code. You see, in most world societies, laws were written so that the richest and most powerful people in society would face the lightest sentences for their crimes and any commoners who wronged the upper crust would find themselves meeting a very sticky end. Not so in the Aztec world.

The Aztecs held the view that the rich and powerful had much greater responsibilities than the poor, so they also faced stricter penalties than the poor. If a poor man got drunk and made a public nuisance of himself, he could expect to be beaten soundly for such a thing. A drunken nobleman would face the death penalty for the same offense. Noblemen, in fact, had a lot of death penalties for various infractions. They had to really walk that line to keep from losing their heads.

(Yes, the author’s still on this b-movie stills thing…) Top left: An Aztec conch-shell chorus. The conch shell was called atecocoli in the Nahuatl tongue. Top right: A big ol’ Aztec procession, with the Aztec social order represented in how everyone’s involved and lined up. Center left: Some great Aztec dancing. Too bad it’s a still image, or you’d see them swirling and moving to the beat of those drums – huehuetl in this case. Center right: An Aztec flute player. The flute is called a tlapitzalli. Try saying that ten times fast. Also, you can’t see it, but he’s also playing a  small ayotl drum with his right hand. Bottom left: An Aztec percussionist doing his good work with a drum called a teponaztli. Bottom right: Another atecocoli dude. I needed six pictures to balance this page out, and that’s all the music shots I had left.

Musicians enjoyed an elevated social status relative to the commoners so, it stood to reason in the Aztec scheme of things that they also should face stiffer penalties for their mistakes. Hope this explains things for you and helps you understand why a guy could get killed for playing “ki” when he should have played “ko.”

While most Mexicans tend not to kill off their musicians, that nation nevertheless produces some amazing music, and that foundation of excellence laid by Tlacalel no doubt provides support for Mexico’s current musical excellence. Interestingly enough, the Spaniards also prized musicians among the Aztecs and rewarded them handsomely, further encouraging Mexicans to pursue a noted career.

Back to the movie. When the flashback ends, the professor heads to where the key to the treasure is supposed to be, but unwittingly unleashes an Aztec mummy from his confinement. Just as the vaguely Asian gang moves in to attack the professor, the Aztec mummy shows up and annihilates them to a man, but has to retreat to his lair before the sun comes up. Then there’s a twist, sort of, and the movie ends. I won’t give away the ending, but it really won’t be that hard to figure out, unless you’re too clever, then you’ll figure out a better ending than the one actually used for the movie.

(Creepy mummy from that awful film the author keeps using pictures from…)

I want to focus on the mummy because he shows another aspect of Aztec life courtesy of Tlacalel: a close association with death. Death was everywhere in the Aztec world, and not in a bad way all the time. It was seen as a phase in life, but also as the end of the weak when in conflict with the strong. Life was used to pay for life – human sacrifices kept the sun in its orbit and the rains regular. The mummy here looks an awful lot like the decorated skulls the Aztecs had and the masks they wore in their sacrifices and ceremonies. The exception would be the presence of the nose: cartilage rots away, but I’ll forgive the low-budget producers for not finding a noseless actor to take on this difficult role.

But, yeah, death… consider the Aztec tzompantli, or skull-rack. At the base of the skull-rack was a platform surrounded by relief skulls. The rack itself would rise many feet above the platform, with tens of thousands of skulls of slain enemies on display. Skulls were so omnipresent, kids saw them every day – and nowadays, they can munch out on sugar skulls on the Day of the Dead. That’s right! Thanks to Tlacalel, little children in Mexico consider skulls to be tasty treats.

(Legitimate author’s photos taken at an honest museum… seriously, how could INAH have gotten mixed up in that awful Wrestling Women flick?) Left: A really rough-looking god of the dead, with a monster head and a skull emerging from his bellybutton… talk about an outtie! Yikes! Right: A row of sculpted skulls from the base of a tzompantli. Every major town had one of these, chock full of skulls. Even the enemies of the Aztecs took on their ultra-violent influence.

Death itself became something one did not fear, particularly if one was doing what was right. There is a tale told of a chief that was captured by the Aztecs and told he would be offered as a sacrifice to the god of war. He was then given the opportunity to fight for his freedom, and he won it. Rather than return to his home, he demanded he still be sacrificed, but as a free man, not as a captive.

One could argue from that story that the Aztecs must have had some extremely effective propaganda. But one could also argue, more effectively I think, that there’s a Mexican spirit that does not fear death and that is willing to fight even a losing battle, if it’s the right thing to do.

When the Mexicans gained their independence, in fact, they chose to celebrate that very violent, fearless world Tlacalel created as having more “Mexicanness” than the world given them by the Spaniards.

Granted, their understanding of that world depended upon the accounts they had at hand. Those written in the Spanish era tended to glorify the tribe of the author of the record and/or whitewash the reputations of certain characters in history to make them more palatable to Spanish gentility. The other records would have been the scant ones available from pre-Hispanic times and the oral traditions of the people – but those are now considered suspect as accurate sources by modern scholars because of the way Tlacalel essentially re-invented Aztec history. Therefore, nearly everything the Mexicans had to look back on about their Pre-Columbian past had a slant to it, one way or another: another legacy of Tlacalel.

Tlacalel died in 1487, after an incredibly long time spent influencing the culture, politics, and religion of the Aztecs. He had dealt with many challenges successfully, and one wonders how history might have been different had he been on hand to deal with the Spaniards’ arrival.

That task fell to Moctezuma II, who ascended to the helm of the Aztec tribute empire in 1502. Much of what we know about Moctezuma comes from accounts written after his death – and these accounts may have been written in a way to explain reasons why Moctezuma was the last Aztec ruler to hold sway over Mexico – history, Tlacalel style…

(Author’s photo of a statue of that particular heroic chief. Fig leaf courtesy the

Victorian Era.)

II: El Imperio Español

Columbus didn’t have a clue, did he?He thought he was discovering India or China. Worst case, Japan or some other islands just outside of India.

Of course, we all know what he really found… or do we?

The history of New Spain is not as cut-and-dried as you may have learned it…

Mexico on the Eve of Conquest

In 1519, Mexico had seen some sign of Spaniards, but they were only glimpses of tall ships off its coasts. Some Spaniards had gone ashore in Yucatan, but their expedition had been annihilated.

The Spanish had started to tire of their colonies in the Caribbean. They really didn’t have all that much gold in them and the conquistadors were wiping out the native population with their harsh labor policies. About all they were good for were as bases for trying to explore further for a route to Asia – and that route wasn’t becoming readily apparent. Balboa had found a great sea on the other side of the Panama Isthmus, but that isthmus was some pretty hostile jungle… if the only way to the Pacific was overland, was it possible to find some better land to go over?

The governor of Cuba, one Don Velázquez, had sent two expeditions around the coast of Mexico before putting Hernán Cortés in charge of a third, this time to go into Mexico and somehow secure the inland areas.

I should note that there are four ways to secure an area:

1. Turn off all the lights and lock the doors before leaving.

2. Take out a 12-month lease with an option to buy.

3. Post guards at all entrances and install a security system.

4. Lay down suppressing fire from artillery and then attack from several directions until the opposing forces disengage combat and/or surrender.

From early in his expedition, it was clear that Cortés was the kind of guy that favored option #4. How do we know this? So much has been written about Cortés that is not true: too damning, to praising, too empty of detail, too full of myths or lies… Where is the truth?

Well, one can see some truth in his actions. For example, just before he left Cuba, he heard that Don Velázquez was going to cancel his mission. That’s when he decided to leave Cuba: if Don Velázquez’ messenger didn’t reach him, his mission couldn’t be canceled!

Brilliant logic like that would get Cortés out of more than one tough scrape.

When Cortés landed along the coasts of Yucatan and Tabasco, he didn’t just hang out on the beach: he sent out raiding parties to see if there was anything of value in the surrounding area. In Yucatan, he found a Spaniard from an earlier expedition that had learned the Mayan language. There was another Spaniard from the same expedition that had gone native and that fled the Spaniards when they approached. In Tabasco, Cortés’ men beat a native force that turned over 20 young women as tribute: one of those women was a former Aztec princess that could speak Nahuatl and Mayan. She later became known as Malinche. Through Malinche and the Spaniard, Aguilar, Cortés was able to communicate with the Aztecs and their subject peoples as he moved through their lands.

… and then he started moving through their lands…

The Totonacs

(Author’s photo of the beautiful spot Cortés found

to moor his ships. Or near that spot. Still really

beautiful… La Antigua, Veracruz.)

(Author’s photo of a Cempoalan temple. The shrines

to the native gods were quickly removed by Cortés’

forceful conversion of the Totonacs. The temple

itself does not appear to be from the Classic Veracruz

period, but from the Less-Than-Classic Veracruz

period.)

In April, 1519, Cortés brought his fleet into the mouth of a river near a native settlement. The settlement is labeled as “Zempoala” on a modern road map, but everyone else there uses the spelling “Cempoala,” as that’s how it’s known in the writings of Bernal Diaz del Castillo, author of an epic memoir about his days in Cortés’ army.

The guys that lived there were the Totonacs. Their ruler was known to Diaz as, simply, “The Fat Cacique.” “Cacique” is a Nahuatl word for “chief.” I use it because it has more panache than just “chief.”

The Totonacs were a Nahuatl-speaking tribe that paid tribute to the Aztecs. So, yeah, they were kinda Aztec, too, but they didn’t eat lunch with the cool kid Aztecs. Like the other Aztec tribute states, they didn’t have a close tie with Tenochtitlan. Cortés was a clever guy and figured out how to exploit this political situation.

But Cortés wasn’t just a political creature. He was serious about his religion, as well. We know he destroyed the idols of the Totonacs and replaced them with the cross and the Virgin Mary, even over the objections of the priests with his expedition. Cortés had no time for careful explanations and patient prayers: his missionary strategy of choice was the forced conversion. While it may not reach the soul, it does have a desired external effect of letting everyone know who the boss is.

Say what you will about Cortés, but you cannot deny that the man was bossy.

He was so bossy, he took over all of Mexico.

He started, of course, with the Totonacs of Cempoala. After Cortés showed up in Cempoala, Moctezuma, the Aztec emperor, sent a batch of emissaries that way. In front of the Fat Cacique and his tribe, the emissaries presented Cortés with two 6-foot diameter discs: one made of silver and one made of gold. The emissaries said they were gifts to the Spanish, but that the Spanish really shouldn’t try to come to Tenochtitlan, as the way was very dangerous and full of speed bumps and potholes.

Cortés responded that the voyage to Mexico had been even rougher, and that he didn’t come all the way from Spain just to show up and turn around. He thanked the emissaries and then sent them packing. After that, he noticed the Fat Cacique was starting to waver in his support. A few days later, Cortés seized the Fat Cacique in a public assembly and held him at knife-point until he agreed to be much more supportive of Cortés and the changes he wanted to make for the area.

For his part, the Fat Cacique probably realized the Spanish had a greater strength than the Aztecs in spite of the Spaniards’ smaller numbers. The Spanish had made several military demonstrations to the Totonacs, and they seem to have been sufficient for convincing that crowd.

The next group the Spanish encountered needed somewhat more convincing. Cortés had no choice but to meet them, as Cortés had burned all his ships and had assumed the role of the official representative of the King of Spain, with authority to kind of… conquer… all of Mexico…

The Tlaxcalans

Cortés and his men crossed the Sierra Madre Oriental mountains and stepped on to the Plain of Anahuac… and into the land of the Tlaxcalans. The Tlaxcalans weren’t monsters or zombies or anything. They were just a tribe of Nahuatl-speakers that weren’t part of the Aztec tribute network. Instead, they were in a condition of nearly constant conflict with the Aztecs as a target for captives of war.

That didn’t mean they were happy to see the Spaniards. As the Spanish moved through their territory, the Tlaxcalans massed an army of nearly 100,000 and attacked the 500-600 conquistadors, hoping to get some captives of their own.

Things did not go well for the Tlaxcalans in that battle. Their performance in battle had more to do with cold, hard battlefield facts than with any supernatural explanations that invoke ancient legends. The Spanish defended a hilltop: they had the advantage of higher ground. The Spanish weapons were made of steel: they kept their edge while the native obsidian swords dulled quickly after a few bashes. The Spanish had cavalry: I don’t care who you are, but when a few guys on horseback charge down on you, you’re going to try your best to get out of the way. Even Spanish soldiers would run from a cavalry charge.

The biggest advantage for the Spanish was their swordplay. Their weapons had greater reach because they had stabbing points. The Tlaxcalans had to get close enough to hack their foes: the Spaniards could stand them off at sword point. The years of ritualized warfare also meant that the Tlaxcalan fighting style was no match for the Spanish system of fencing. The Spanish beat the Tlaxcalans because the Spanish had better technology and training for killing people.

After the Tlaxcalans stopped attacking the Spanish, they offered them an alliance. This was a much bigger deal than the Cempoalan alliance: the Tlaxcalans could actually fight. Allied with the Tlaxcalans, Cortes headed across the plains to the mountains around the Valley of Mexico.

The Aztecs

When Cortés entered the Aztec heartland, one of two things happened. Either Cortés met with an Aztec attempt to ambush him that he successfully defeated, or his soldiers got the jitters and massacred most of the people of the city of Cholula. Maybe both things happened to some degree and each side tried to describe the events with the best possible spin for their side. Since the Spanish won, the Spanish explanation stands. According to them, the Aztecs tried to ambush them and they foiled that attempt.

Yes, sports fans, the winners really do write the history books.

Cortés’ men then crossed the mountains surrounding the Valley of Mexico and quite likely saw something similar to this:

(Author’s photo of Dr. Atl’s view of Tenochtitlan in pre-Conquest times. This mural hangs in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City.) A great view of Tenochtitlan, but from the east. Cortés would actually have seen it from the opposite direction, from just south of the mountain in the top right of the mural. But no matter how one looked upon ancient Tenochtitlan, one would have seen the great temple complex in the center, the temples and markets of Tlatelolco to the north (left in the mural), the great causeways, and the neighborhoods linked with canals. The Spaniards that saw this marvel wrote of its amazing beauty and color.

One of the great mysteries of history will be in understanding exactly how and why Cortés was able to enter Tenochtitlan unopposed. Cortés and Bernal Diaz made no mention of the story that the Aztecs supposed the Spanish were emissaries from Quetzalcoatl, if not the god himself: that tale is first told in later Spanish sources. Some historians have challenged that account of “Spanish – as – gods in the year the world was supposed to end,” holding it to be an invention of Catholic missionaries hoping to use it as leverage to convince natives of the divine nature of the Spanish presence there. Some other historians say the legend was the product of a post-conquest Aztec mind that wanted to explain why his empire had fallen to the European conquerors. I’m not so ready to dismiss it. Other Native American tribes, in particular the Hopi, had legends of a white god that had left and would return, which caused them to hesitate when the Spanish arrived.

(Author’s photo of Cortés as he appears in the mural on the east wall of the National Palace: the greenish guy on the left. I don’t think Cortés would have liked it…)

DIEGO RIVERA: I wish I had words, man. I wish I had words… I can tell ya something like the other day Cortés wanted to kill me. Somethin’ like that…

FRIDA KAHLO: Why’d Cortés wanna kill you?

DIEGO RIVERA: Because I painted his picture. He said “If you paint my picture again, I’m gonna kill you.” And he meant it.

Bernal Diaz wrote of how there were Aztec leaders that wanted to wipe out the Spanish. I’m pretty sure that if Moctezuma was hesitant to smite them, he had councilors that were of an opposite mind, especially given the events that followed Cortés arrival. All the same, Cortés arrived with a certain sense of respect from the Aztecs. If the respect wasn’t born of Aztec awe at Pedro de Alvarado’s golden hair and beard, then it may have been a testament to Cortés’ political skill.

Bear in mind that the Aztecs could not command mass numbers of soldiers from outlying tribute territories: those cities and regions were free to declare their freedom and fight whatever army came to punish them. With Cortés moving through their tributaries, the Aztecs may have hoped to avoid a larger conflict by accommodating the strange visitors and then packing them along home.

Cortés then pulled a fast one, changing the entire situation. As in Cempoala, he took the top guy captive and used him as a hostage to get what he wanted. Although he treated Moctezuma well as a captive, he still held him against his will and forced him to provide him with information and treasure.

As Cortés planned his next move around April-May 1520, he got word that a group of Spaniards from Cuba had landed at La Antigua. That wasn’t good news. Cortés knew those guys were there to arrest him and drag him back to Spain in chains. He wasn’t gonna go down like no punk, so he cooked up a plan and put it into action.

Cortés left Pedro de Alvarado and about 100 men to babysit Moctezuma and took the rest of his force to confront the posse from Cuba. His men found that force in the wilderness, encamped with insufficient security… that meant Cortés’ boys could infiltrate that camp and ninja the guys in charge of arresting Cortés.

That’s right: they ninja’d the errand boys sent by grocery clerks to collect a bill.

In the film Apocalypse Now, Willard reads a statement from Col. Kurtz that pretty much sums up the situation: “In a war there are many moments for compassion and tender action. There are many moments for ruthless action - what is often called ruthless - what may in many circumstances be only clarity, seeing clearly what there is to be done and doing it, directly, quickly, awake, looking at it.” Cortés acted with clarity, all right. He put out an eye of the captain of the hostile expedition and sent him packing back to Cuba and then promised the rest of his force a share in the Aztec treasure. In one night, Cortés turned a larger, hostile force into reinforcements that more than doubled his total manpower.

As for the charges against Cortés, he was unconcerned. He was beyond their timid lying morality, and so he was beyond caring. Like Col. Kurtz, he was operating deep in the jungles without any authority to do so – and is it just me, or does “Kurtz” sound a lot like “Cortés”? – with the knowledge that if he brought enough gold back to Spain, all his crimes would be forgotten.

He just had to survive, that’s all. When he returned to Tenochtitlan, he found the streets deserted and silent at his arrival… one of those moments when some guy says, “Things sure are quiet” and then another guy says, “Yeah… a little too quiet, if ya ask me!” Cortés got to the palace where Alvarado was holed up with Moctezuma and once he was in, the Aztecs came out and surrounded the place, screaming bloodcurdling threats against the Spaniards.

To paraphrase the late, great Desi Arnaz, Pedro de Alvarado “had some serious ‘splainin’ to do.”

Seems as though Pedro de Alvarado had kinda massacred a bunch of unarmed Aztecs when it looked like they were about to start up human sacrifices during Cortés’ absence. That was his story, and he stuck to it.

(Still from the film La Otra Conquista depicting the

aftermath of Alvarado’s massacre at the Grand Temple

in Tenochtitlan, May 1520)

CORTÉS: (Surveys the crowd of thousands of hostile Aztecs) Looks like we’re surrounded by thousands of screaming Mexica because of Pedro’s thoughtless massacre.

CRISTÓBAL DE OLID: The heads. You’re looking at the heads. Sometimes he goes too far. He’s the first one to admit it. There is only love and hate. You either love somebody or you hate ‘em.

CORTÉS: Blood lust… they say… all the men that I have read about… they say the human animal is the only one that has blood lust… killing without purpose… killing for pleasure… you take the ones who can think, but can’t act… gaaack! (Makes a terrible face.)

CRISTÓBAL DE OLID: What happened, amigo? You all right, there?

CORTÉS: I swallowed a bug… Where was I in my meandering ramble?

CRISTÓBAL DE OLID: The ones who think, but can’t act.

CORTÉS: Right… It’s our time to grab… this moment in history… It’s our time… to teach… to…

CRISTÓBAL DE OLID: To what?

CORTÉS: I can’t think of any more dialogue today… I’ll be in my palace… (Exits)

The Aztecs, meanwhile, wanted Cortés dead. He just wanted to go out like a soldier, standing up, not like some poor, wasted, ragged renegade. Even the jungle wanted him dead, and that’s who he really took his orders from anyway.

But unlike his almost-namesake, Col. Kurtz, Cortés wasn’t going to go out with a whimper, not at this moment of his life. During the night of 1 July 1520, Cortés led his men out of the palace in a desperate attempt to get to a place where they could at least survive, if not eventually prevail.

The Spanish made their breakout attempt during a rainy night. It wasn’t a passionate, desperate rain that acts as a force to be reckoned with. It wasn’t a gentle, soaking rain, either. I know the rain Cortés and his men walked through because I have walked through it, too. It is a cold rain, a silencing rain. It is a rain that drives the merchants from the streets, a rain that finds the bones and chills them with the touch of death, and, with that touch, brings a sense of judgment.

Thank goodness I had an umbrella.

I was in Mexico City during a rainstorm on the anniversary of La Noche Triste, “The Sad Night,” what the escape event came to be called. I felt an eerie sense of history as I walked down a road built over the very causeway the Spanish used to try and escape from the hells that awaited them in Tenochtitlan. I leaped over puddles that may have been where Spaniards tried to leap over gaps in the causeway, gaps created after a lone woman saw the Spanish try to escape and screamed, alerting the Jaguar Warriors to fill the streets and the Eagle Warriors to fill the canals, removing the bridges that connected segments of the causeway to each other.

The Spaniards had their own portable bridge, but as the struggles of the night progressed, the Spaniards in the rearguard became separated, many falling into the lake, drowning because of the golden treasures weighing them down. Even in death, the Spanish did not relinquish their yellow metal. Many others did not fall into the lake, but fell captive to the Aztecs. The Spanish survivors recounted how terrible it was to hear the pounding drums of the sacrificial rites and then the screams of their comrades as the Aztec temples came to life to receive their harvest of death.

But Cortés survived, even though his forces were almost completely massacred. Those that survived were those that had dropped their gold into the lake or who only took a handful of gems. Cortés’ top commanders and La Malinche survived: they were able to recover in Tlaxcala and receive a slow trickle of volunteers from Cuba.

The Aztecs did not rest: Moctezuma had died before La Noche Triste. The Spanish claim he was struck by a stone or an arrow as he tried to calm the mobs outside the palace. The Aztecs claim the Spanish strangled him when he had outlived his usefulness. Whatever the story, he was dead and a new emperor, Cuithualac, promised to destroy both the Spaniards and the Tlaxcalans. After La Noche Triste, there was no hesitation on the part of the Aztecs, no calculation of politics: they were enraged, and Huitzilopochtli demanded the hearts of his enemies, particularly those of the Spaniards’ horses. The drums in Tenochtitlan continued to pound away…

… and then fell silent.

The Conquest of Mexico

(Author’s photo of a detail in Diego Rivera’s epic mural in the stairwell

of the National Palace. This is on the northern part of the west panel,

towards the bottom. This detail shows the Spanish conquering and

enslaving the native populations.)

(Author’s photo of the cool diorama of the Battle for Lake Texcoco on

display in the Naval History Museum, Veracruz. The Spanish boats

proved too much for the Aztecs to handle.)

The war for Mexico could begin because the Aztecs were unable to carry out Cuithualac’s wishes. When the force to capture Cortés landed at La Antigua, they unloaded a slave that had died from smallpox. The corpse was still contagious, and triggered a smallpox epidemic in Mesoamerica. Due to their isolation from Eurasian strains of diseases, the Mesoamericans died in disproportionate numbers when exposed to them. Many of them could not resist the disease, even though they had their own version of smallpox. Perhaps as many as 50% of the people in the Aztec Empire died in the smallpox epidemic of 1520.

Among those dead was their emperor, Cuithualac. Many other Aztec elites perished, plunging their tribute empire into chaos. They could not organize an effective attack on the Spanish and Tlaxcalans as they dealt with the millions who suffered and died in the epidemic.

During this time of near-anarchy, Cortes’ recovered forces struck at the fringes of the Aztec Empire, conquering their tributaries and forcing them to support the Spanish effort. The Spanish also made a few moves against the Tarascans, who had never been conquered by the Aztecs. The Spanish canceled that move when they realized the Tarascans used iron weapons. Those iron weapons were lots better in war than the obsidian macuahuitls.

Other than the Tarascan setback, Cortés’ forces took the Aztec provinces, one by one, and then encircled their capital for the final confrontation. Wary of the Aztec canoes, Cortés had ordered the construction of a number of boats in Tlaxcala. The Tlaxcalans built the boats, then took them apart and carried the parts – along with the cannon Cortés had salvaged from the ships he’d burned – to the shores of Lake Texcoco. There, the Tlaxcalans rebuilt the boats and the Spanish prepared to destroy the Aztec naval presence on the lake.

(Author’s photo of a Siqueiros mural on display at the

Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City. The mural depicts

the last Aztec emperor, Cuauhtémoc, fighting defiantly,

wearing the “skins” of his fallen enemies – their metal

armor. The muralists of the Mexican Revolution tended to

glorify the native heritage of Mexico while condemning the

Spanish influences.)

When the Spanish cannon boats moved out, they smashed the Aztec canoe brigades and then they moved to breach the barrier that kept the salt water from the eastern part of the lake from mixing with the fresh water around Tenochtitlan. At the same time, Spanish forces on land took the fortress of Chapultepec and cut the aqueduct that provided fresh water to Tenochtitlan. With those moves, Cortés was sure Tenochtitlan would fall quickly.

Yet, he could not take the heart of the Aztecs so easily. In spite of starvation and dehydration and disease, the Aztecs fought on – very nearly capturing and killing Cortés on more than one occasion – as the Spanish destroyed the city, leveling block after block until forced to retreat in the face of superior Aztec numbers.

Finally, the devastation of Tenochtitlan complete, the last emperor of the Aztecs, Cuauhtémoc, laid down his weapons and requested that the Spanish finish him off.

La Nueva España

Cortés refused to kill off Cuauhtémoc. It wasn’t that Cortés was terribly noble and kind in combat: he needed information and he needed prestige.

By having Cuauhtémoc rule for a few years as a puppet, Cortés was able to better control the remaining Aztec elites in surrounding areas. Remember, in spite of conquest and disease, the Aztecs still vastly outnumbered the Spanish. Cortés needed all the help he could get to establish himself as their new emperor.

The information Cortés needed involved two things. One was where the Aztecs got all their tribute payments from. Any codex that recorded payments made to Tenochtitlan was taken up and used as a guide to where the most profitable areas of the empire were located. The rest? Burned. They only had pagan rubbish on them, right?

The other thing Cortés wanted to know was where “The Aztec Treasure” was located. I put that in quotes because nobody has ever found it. It’s a thing of myth. All the gold the Spanish remembered in Tenochtitlan was gone when they had finally conquered the place. Even the gold dropped into the shallow waters of Lake Texcoco on La Noche Triste couldn’t be found.

The Spanish wanted that gold. Cortés in particular wanted that gold: He had promised to pay his soldiers with it. They knew they took about half of the massive pile of gold they’d seen in Moctezuma’s palace on La Noche Triste and that meant the other half should have been in Tenochtitlan… unless someone hid it! They also knew where they had dropped gold where they fell along the causeway in their escape, and it should have been there… unless someone moved it!

Because the Aztecs didn’t use gold for money, they didn’t attach the same value to it as did the Spanish. That meant they wouldn’t suffer any financial dislocation if they suddenly didn’t have any gold on hand. I’m pretty sure they did hide it, and they probably hid it in such a way that the Spanish would never find it. And, being Aztecs, they probably hid it in such a way that they would never find it again. There’s something about Native American cultures that allows them to completely abandon things of the world when they need to.

(Author’s photo of a painting in the National Museum of Art in

Mexico City: It depicts Cortés torturing Cuauhtémoc. Note how

defiant Cuauhtémoc is: this painting was definitely done well after

Mexico secured its independence.)

In both Santo en el Hotel de la Muerte and Wrestling Women vs. the Aztec Mummy, both the villains are searching for the lost treasure of the Aztecs. In the Santo movie, the guy finds it, but only after he’s been defeated by Santo. Insane with gold-lust, he shrieks with laughter as he clutches at all the finery around him. Santo sees this, shakes his head, and walks away from the scene, telling the police that he has found his own punishment. In the Wrestling Women movie, the good guys find the treasure, but choose to leave it where it is rather than try to destroy the Aztec Mummy to gain it. In both movies, the good guys just walk away from the treasure. It’s only gold, after all. That’s the Mexican point of view.

Cortés was a European. He wanted to possess that gold. At first, he opposed torturing Cuauhtémoc to discover the location of the treasure. Cuauhtémoc was either silent or insisted he didn’t know where it was, so Cortés allowed his men to torture Cuauhtémoc and one of Cuauhtémoc’s close friends by oiling their feet and holding those feet to the fire.

Cuauhtémoc and his friend never spoke of a treasure location in spite of all that torture. The episode became legendary in Mexican folklore and later became a subject for bold oil paintings and murals when Mexico broke with Spain and began to celebrate its heritage from an American, rather than European, perspective.

That all came later. When the Spanish found out they had no real treasure to divide up amongst themselves, they set about doing two things. They divided up the land and the peasants on the land amongst themselves and then organized new expeditions to fan out over the rest of New Spain to try and find other civilizations that had lots of gold.

To the north, there were a lot of rumors, but nothing substantial. The climate there was too arid to support any big civilizations, but the Spanish took an interest in those areas, anyway, just to keep them from anyone else.

To the south, there was a civilization that had some promise for plunder: The Mayans.

Unfortunately for the Spanish, the Mayans weren’t ready to be conquered. They fought as fiercely as the Aztecs did but, due to their decentralized power structures, were not vulnerable to a masterstroke the way the Aztecs were. Therefore, they were able to resist Spanish control for a good long time. The Spanish conquered a lot of Maya country by 1546, but didn’t conquer the whole area until around 1697.

But that’s getting ahead of myself. Let’s focus on the time just after the conquest. Cortés and his lot pretty much took over the Aztec Empire and tried to run it for a profit, which meant much harsher conditions for their Indian subjects. Long-term, that would wipe them out, just as conquistadors had exterminated the peoples in the Caribbean and on the Canary Islands. While the conquistadors wanted to make a fast buck, the Spanish Crown wanted to take on a more strategic approach to running colonies and have the native population survive to produce annual income rather than a lump-sum cash payment.

The problem for the Crown was finding a way to rein in the conquistadors that were trying to wring out every last peseta from their Indians. Cortés presented the greatest obstacle to the Spanish bureaucracy, as he tried to set himself up as lord and master over the whole of New Spain.

He’d done a good job, too. While he kinda botched things when he hung Cuauhtémoc during an expedition to Honduras (he feared Cuauhtémoc was about to start a native uprising), he did take Montezuma’s daughter into his circle and used her as a symbol of legitimacy for his rule over the Aztec Empire. To satisfy the Crown, he wrote numerous letters to justify his actions and made sure the king always got his Royal Fifth – 20% of all the loot Cortés managed to haul in. Attention to those details may very well have kept Cortés alive… as they were, they not only kept him alive, they advanced him in the ranks of the nobility.

Cortés had hoped for more power and titles than he received, but the Crown was not about to let a man like Cortés have that much power. He was an exciting man that took risks and who was willing to buck the system. That’s not the sort of person one would want in charge of administering a vast bureaucracy on behalf of a faraway king.

Cortés wound up as a nobleman, but not the duke he’d hoped to become. He held title to vast tracts of land in Mexico, making him a very wealthy person, indeed. Although the bureaucracy sidelined him, it could not entirely dispense with him, as he was about the only man that could keep the other conquistadors in line.

(Author’s photos) I managed to visit two of Cortés’ old homes. The first one I saw, on the left, was his castle in Cuernavaca, south of Mexico City in the midst of some gorgeous mountains. It is a museum today and, like most museums in Mexico, is closed on Monday. Just my luck, I came through Cuernavaca on a Monday.

The one on the right is what’s left of his home in La Antigua, just north of present-day Veracruz. This was the site of the first Spanish settlement on the North American mainland and the first seat of government in Mexico. The centuries-old growth there shows that La Antigua did not remain the seat of Spanish power.

In both cases, one sees that Cortés himself is not celebrated as a hero in Mexico. Unlike his opponent Cuauhtémoc, he has no major roads, no statues, no heroic poses in Revolutionary murals, no beers named for him. Like Patton’s old soldier, he didn’t die so much as fade away…

As the conquistadors – including Cortés himself – died out, the Spanish rulers found it much more easy to maneuver politically around the sons of the conquistadors who had grown up as comfortable nobles and not hardened soldiers. When Cortés’ son was disgraced in a scandal to take over New Spain, the era of the conquistadors was not only over, but would not be coming back in any way.

The Other Conquest

In the Aztec system, a conquered people only needed to send tribute to Tenochtitlan and include the Aztec gods in their religious observances.  OK, so the tributes could be pretty massive at times, but the arrangements themselves were pretty straightforward.

When the Spanish took over, they added a new wrinkle: their gods weren’t merely to be included in religious observances. They wanted their gods to take the place of the native gods.

While Catholic theology maintains that the Virgin Mary is not part of the Godhead and that Jesus and God the Father and the Holy Spirit are all one God, such fine points were not readily apparent to the Aztecs and other Indians. When they were governing themselves, those technicalities were of little consequence. When the Spanish ruled over them, the missionaries that came along with the military conquest were heavily engaged in seeing to it that those technicalities did matter to the people of New Spain.

And while the missionaries of the various orders – Franciscan, Dominican, and Augustinian – found many converts to the Holy Catholic Faith, the conversions themselves weren’t… well… complete. Yeah, the Indians would pray to Jesus and honor the Virgin and observe the feast days of saints… but…

When I went to the Metropolitan Cathedral in Mexico City, I was awed by the interior of the place. The peace in there, and the sincerity of the worshipers there was truly touching and I wept while having that experience. Yet, as I wiped away a tear, I heard the drums outside… drums from a native dance performed in and around groups of curanderos, vestiges of the native religion that existed before Columbus.

And it was then that I realized it must always have been so in Mexico. Always, the imposition of the European facades and culture and religion and language, but also always, the beat of the drums just outside… the incessant beat of the drums.

It’s no mistake that the Virgin of Guadalupe is readily identifiable as an expression of the Aztec mother goddess. The Spanish knew it was an Indian Virgin, not a European one. When the Mexicans first began their war for independence, they marched under the banners of the dark Virgin of Guadalupe while the Spanish loyalists marched under the banners of their blond, European Holy Virgin.

Go deep into the Mexican interior, far from the resorts and private beaches, and you’ll hear those incessant drums in the procession taking place on the day of the local saint. That procession will pass through town and, perhaps, snake into the foothills into an ancient grotto where the saint will be honored in a manner first used for a god that did not know Columbus.

The faith is real. The devotion to the saint is no illusion – it hides no crypto-pagan rite. But many of the expressions of the very real faith and devotion in Mexico did not originate in Europe. So much so, people openly question if there really was a conversion to Catholicism or if there was a syncretic event when Old met New. I watched as people went to a curandero, then proceeded into the cathedral. I suppose that’ll have to stand as the answer to the question of conversion.

Complete or otherwise, the conversion process has a story to it. After all, the Spanish didn’t just call up a cartographer and request that he change the colors for his maps of areas of religious influence to reflect the sudden presence of Catholic missionaries. And while maps may show neat, tidy, colored areas to depict where the Spanish Catholic influence was strongest, they don’t show the details that left such areas of influence incompletely converted. One needs a historical guide for that information.

The first missionaries were the conquistadors themselves. Cortés himself set the example by toppling native idols and placing newly-hewn crucifixes in their stead. Such methods were most effective when Spanish swords were nearby to back up the conversion by force, but when the conquistadors left the area, the natives had either a lack of desire or knowledge to continue in the Holy Catholic Faith.

(Screen capture from La Otra Conquista, a Mexican film the author just so happens to own…)

Scene of Spanish soldiers just before they descend upon a hapless Mexican village to help convert them to Christianity… the hard way…

With the conquest of New Spain, Charles V wanted to see his new subjects properly converted to Christianity. To secure that end, in 1528 he sent Juan de Zumárraga to be the first archbishop in New Spain.

Zumárraga arrived during a time when Cortés was in Spain, trying to defend his reputation. The guys that had slandered Cortés, forcing him to return to Spain, were the ones running Mexico at the time. They were making a mess of the place and their government of “the auditors” was a total disaster. By total, I mean “bad for everyone.” The Indians were raped, branded, and enslaved. Cortés’ supporters faced death or slightly lesser persecutions at the hands of the auditors. The auditors and their faction would, in turn, be wiped out by Cortés and his men when Cortés returned in 1530. See? Bad for everyone.

The religious situation was equally chaotic. Zumárraga was a Franciscan, and his order worked to try to protect the Indians. The rival orders resented the power held by the Franciscans and their leaders both supported the oppression of the auditors and spread lies about Zumárraga. Because the auditors controlled all traffic going back to Spain, Zumárraga had to smuggle out messages to the crown in order to try and set the record straight.

Zumárraga’s version of the record wasn’t entirely truthful, what with Indians often exaggerating how bad things are… OK, I know that’s hard to imagine, what with things being rotten enough for them as is, but I have to say in response to that notion that the Indians had very vivid imaginations. Everybody was trying to leverage the chaos for some kind of benefit. It was like a Jerry Springer episode without burly security men on hand to separate the meleeing guests. Even after Cortés cleaned house and a viceroy followed up with a stable government, the various orders continued to vie with each other for leadership in the Church government.

Zumárraga remained Archbishop of Mexico until 1548. It was on his watch that the Virgin of Guadalupe entered into the religious vocabulary of Mexico. Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe appeared to one Juan Diego, a converted Indian, from 9 December to 12 December 1531. Juan Diego reported his vision to Bishop Zumárraga. The bishop then requested a sign from the Virgin to prove the vision was true. Juan Diego then returned with a bouquet of Castilian Roses (which were really really hard to find in Mexico in December of 1531…) and when the bishop received the roses, he saw the image of the Virgin Mary in the folds of the cloth Juan Diego used to carry the roses.

(Author’s photos of works on display in the National Museum of Art, Mexico City) The painting on the left is a work commemorating the story of Juan Diego: in it, God the Father is painting the image of the Virgin Mary that would appear to Zumárraga. The painting on the left is a traditional depiction of the Virgin of Guadalupe. She can be identified by the horned moon, her blue shawl with stars on it and, of course, her dusky skin tones.

That’s the official story. There are historians that doubt it and historians that believe it, each with their evidences and rationales to back up their views. I’m not going to get into an argument over the origin story of one of the most important Marian visions in the world. But I will say that the first publication of the story of Juan Diego did not happen until around 1648. A Nahuatl language version, purported to be a printed version of the story first written in 1556, was published in 1649. Bishop Zumárraga himself makes no mention of the vision in his papers.

So was the vision a hoax? I told you, I’m not gonna go there. But I will say that worship of the Virgin at the location associated with the vision is noted in Catholic documents as early as 1556, but not in a good way. Early Church officers spoke out against the worship of the Virgin at Tepeyac because it was too much like the worship associated with the Aztec goddess Tonantzin.

Tonantzin was the mother of the gods in Aztec belief, so it’s easy to see how they’d make the connection. Although persecuted, the worship persisted there and, over time, became more worship of the Virgin Mary and less worship of Tonantzin.

Also over time, the Virgin of Guadalupe became more and more a symbol of the Mexican people. She’s often referred to as “The First Mestizo,” the first mix between Spanish and Indian cultures. Other Mestizos had already been born to Indian mothers of Spanish fathers, but the Virgin of Guadalupe, poised upon her horned moon with light extending from her like blades of the maguey plant… she was the first cultural mix.

As the symbol of the poor and downtrodden among Mexicans, she has always been invoked whenever a social movement rose up among them. Hidalgo’s rebellion marched under the banners of the Virgin of Guadalupe, as did Zapata’s. When I saw a political rally in Mexico in June of 2008, the people carried banners for their party, their candidate, and the Virgin of Guadalupe. She always marches with her people.

Today, the basilica built upon the site where Juan Diego saw the Virgin is the second-most visited site in all Catholicism, just behind St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican City.

… and always, always the drums pounding away, just outside the cathedral walls..

The Viceregal System

The first government for New Spain was the ayuntamiento in La Antigua. Ayuntamiento is a fancy Spanish word for “municipality” and, like a city council government is usually insufficient to run an entire nation, the ayuntamiento of New Spain could not hack it as a government for the region. As noted above, corruption was rampant and violence endemic.

In the movies, Clint Eastwood or Jackie Chan or some other cool action hero would show up and clean up the mess, culminating in a big boss fight at the end. In Mexico, Viceroy Mendoza showed up with his posse and pretty much did the same thing. Except, instead of using the power of his fists, he used the power of his bureaucracy.

Mendoza arrived in Mexico in 1535 and ruled there until 1550. He served the longest of all the Viceroys of New Spain and his rule is considered by many to have been one of the most successful. Mendoza knew how to rule, unlike the conquistadors, and this alone made his administration more compassionate and fair than what had gone on before him.

It didn’t mean he had a lack of problems. He was just more compassionate, fair, and competent in dealing with them.

As a good Catholic – and unlike most of the conquistadors, who were very bad Catholics – Mendoza worked well with Archbishop Zumárraga in building up New Spain. Both cooperated in developing higher education in Mexico, including the establishment of the University of Mexico for the training of an indigenous priesthood.

From 1541-1542, the Mixtón War raged in New Spain. The Mixtón War began as an outgrowth of Indian resentment at the rough way they were treated by the conquistadors, and it quickly increased in size and scope to threaten the whole of New Spain. Many historians feel that the Mixtón War could have resulted in the ejection of the Spanish from Mexico had things only gone slightly better for the Indians. Mendoza managed to suppress the revolt, but figured something had to be done to prevent another one from happening. Mendoza knew that, in politics and in war, second chances are often non-existent and should be exploited to their fullest potential when offered.

And so, with an intention to limit the possibility of native rebellion, Mendoza introduced laws in 1544 that limited the oppression of the Indians. Churchmen sympathetic to the plight of the Indians, like Father Bartolomé de las Casas, applauded Mendoza’s new laws, which were known as “The New Laws.”

I know, real creative…

(Video still from La Otra Conquista) The Spanish really did some massive mistreatment of the natives. This depiction is not an exaggeration. Indians frequently had to carry around Spanish nobles all day long… in wooden chairs… and then be told how to stand just so when the noble had to interact with others… that was just a sample of the exploitation they had to face.

Well, Mendoza couldn’t press those New Laws too hard. The Viceroy of Peru attempted an aggressive application of them and triggered a revolt in his bailiwick. Mendoza backed down from them and tried to find a less threatening way to save the poor from the ravages of the rich.

He didn’t really hit on that magical formula, but not many have. Let’s face it, there are lots of guys with power and wealth to spare that just love to oppress the guys at the bottom of the economic pyramid. In Mexico, human laborers were made to carry loads in excess of 200 pounds on their backs for the entire day, among other things. Since the rich tend to maintain a monopoly on violence, they tend to also get to have things their own way.

(Author’s photo of painting in the National Museum of Art, Mexico

City) This is a painting that recorded a historical event in

Puebla: an auto-da-fe in the city square. The people in the hats

in the middle are the victims: the people in the nice clothes are

their judges and other nobles. The guys in the peanut gallery

are the locals that are either viewing the proceedings with

horror or as a form of entertainment. Even though the painting

dates from a much later period, it was executed in a Medieval

style, without perspective and with some distortion that makes

the socially more important bigger than the others.

And while Mendoza and Zumárraga were level-headed gents that followed a moderate course in their lives, their views didn’t always hold sway in Mexico. As slavery and diseases destroyed the native population, harsh religious and artistic persecution destroyed the native cultures. Most of the time Spaniards found pre-Columbian native books, they burned them. And, with the advent of an Inquisition in Mexico, persons whose faith was less than complete would face the tortures and horrors of the auto-da-fe, a public mocking and beating that, in extreme cases, would see the victims burned alive for failing to fully embrace the faith of their violent overlords.

And although things were less Wild West in style after the Viceroys took over, the law and order Mendoza brought to Mexico didn’t last forever. The administrations after Mendoza were more concerned with keeping things from going all to pieces than with trying to make them better.

They started down the path of corruption. The viceroys held sway over a Mexico that saw more and more communal land intended for the Indians come under the control of the Church or nobles or pushy merchants that wanted to become nobles. The whole place was on the make.

Sure, the Indians were able to complain early in the history of the viceroyalty, but those complaints never were resolved. As time went on, those complaints were pretty much ignored. I mean, things really lose their effectiveness with too much repetition… and when the powers responsible for the actions that led to the complaints are also the ones responsible for resolving the complaints, well… they weren’t about to take those complaints seriously, now were they?

One way the Indians could escape the world of forced labor in humiliating circumstances was through music: Indians that were able to become part of church choirs or orchestras enjoyed a tax-free status. Beyond that, musicians had always enjoyed a high status in Aztec society, so it wasn’t like the Indians weren’t already inclined to take up that profession. Of course, singing in the church meant participating in the church: music increased the rate of conversion among the natives and helped to solidify the nebulous faith among the converts. By 1530, native choirs were already the rival of European choirs – at least according to a choirmaster,  Father Pedro de Gante.

He wasn’t the only fan, as things turned out. Other guys came to Mexico and were blown away by the quality of the music there. Soon, the Indians were also composing works both for performance in the church as well as in secular settings. Artistically, things were working out pretty well for the Indians that got work in that area.

The visual arts were another place Indians could shine. Men like Miguel Cabrera rose to fame when he was called up from the Double-A Carolina Mudcats to swing bats for the Florida Marlins. Cabrera had an outstanding rookie year and was one of only three players since 1900 to knock a game-winning homer outta the ball park in his first game with the big leagues. Currently, Cabrera plays at first base for the Detroit Tigers and has a .309 batting average. Truly a wonder for a guy born in 1695.

Wait a minute…

Oops.

Kids, when you’re using Wikipedia to research historical figures, be sure to check and make sure you haven’t stumbled across a more popular namesake. It seems as though I have fallen into that perilous trap. There just so happens to be a Miguel Cabrera the baseball player that I just typed up a rather lovely paragraph about when I actually wanted to put something together about Miguel Cabrera the painter. I tell you, I first got suspicious when the article kept going on about his challenges in facing down Freddy Sanchez for the NL batting crown and hadn’t once mentioned his brush technique or famous commissions.

I will leave that section in as an object lesson to you all to do better research than I did. Now, for the do-over…

The visual arts were another place Indians could shine. Men like Miguel Cabrera rose to fame when he was called up from the Double-A Oaxaca Zapotecs to swing brushes for the Mexico City Jesuits. Cabrera had an outstanding rookie year and was one of only three painters since 1531 to have access to the icon of Our Lady of Guadalupe. He founded Mexico’s first art academy in 1753 and helped paved the way for the founding of the Royal Academy of San Carlos in 1785. Currently, Cabrera is hailed as one of the greatest painters ever and has a lifetime portrait average of .305, with 755 canvas runs and 2297 SPI (Subjects Painted In) – he also holds a Major Painting League record of 15 consecutive seasons as president of an art academy. Truly a wonder for a guy born in 1695.

Think of him as the Hank Aaron of painting and you won’t get him confused with the other Miguel Cabrera.

Artists during the viceroyalty period had three sorts of subjects they could paint: religious topics commissioned by and on behalf of the Catholic church, portraits commissioned by men that wanted to prove just how wealthy and important they were, and casta paintings for popular consumption. Major artists like Cabrera had some leeway in painting as they chose, but most artists had to accept commissions as they came, and those three subjects were what paid the bills.

(This particular author’s photo comes from an exhibit at the City

Museum of Veracruz. It’s a fun little museum, well worth a visit.)

Set of paintings depicting ethnic mixing in Veracruz. The

bottom two paintings would be from a set of casta paintings.

Casta paintings featured combinations of mixed-ethnicity parents and their offspring. They would have captions accompanying them. They were often done as a series. 16 paintings made up the basic set of mixes, but there were over 100 combinations to choose from. Always, the Spanish mixes were presented first, as the Spanish held themselves to be ethnically and biologically superior to the other possible combinations.

Of course, that’s terribly, terribly ironic. The Spanish themselves weren’t a pure strain of any sort of breed. Their DNA included collective contributions from proto-Europeans, Celts, Romans, Carthaginians, Greeks, Goths, Moors, Arabs, and Jews. The Spanish in the 17th Century didn’t know from DNA, so they naturally thought they were ethnically pure Spanish, whatever that means. What I find most interesting is how some of that ideology persists to this day, when we do know about DNA.

I once taught a kid that came over from Spain. The school classified him as Hispanic. When he found out, he hit the roof. “I’m not Hispanic! I’m WHITE!” I tried to explain that he’d have more opportunity to get scholarships that way, but he wouldn’t hear of it. But before I accused him of anything unsavory, I did remember that it was our own government that was requesting this sort of casta information.

Later on, I taught a Palestinian kid that was thrilled because the guys in the district he’d been in previously classified him as Hispanic. His friends were happy for him and tried to get reclassified, but to no avail. Another kid from Egypt successfully got changed from being “White” to “African-American” because the definition of “African-American” isn’t “Sub-Sarahran-African-but-not-a-White-Guy-from-South-Africa-American.”

So let’s be careful to not throw rocks at the racial sensibilities of the Spanish colonial government. Our own government in the USA isn’t yet color blind…

The French took over running Spain and its empire in the early 18th Century, which meant French administrators and their culture showed up in Mexico shortly thereafter. The best part of this French connection was the introduction of French-style baking and pastry crafting in Mexico. The fresh bread and pan dulces in Mexico are amazing. When in Mexico, be sure to hit the bakeries and have some fun with them. Also be sure to score fresh fruit at the roadside stands. Just do it, all right?

The Frenchiness showed up with what were known as the Bourbon reforms. No, it wasn’t a matter of trading out the tequila for some other sort of distilled spirit. The Bourbons were the French royal family. So, when they took over the Spanish Empire, their reforms became known as the Bourbon reforms. The first big reformer guy in Mexico was José de Gálvez. He tried to shake things up in a big way in Mexico, but a lack of funding and a surplus of resistance meant that he could only shake things up in a medium way, and kind of small-medium at that. All the same, the Bourbon reforms managed to keep the deteriorating Spanish Empire from collapsing totally and allowed it to continue for about another 100 years or so.

During this time, the people of Spanish descent born in the New World wondered ever more aloud why it was they were held to be inferior to the people of Spanish descent born in Spain. They couldn’t be that different, could they? The air wasn’t that different in Mexico, was it? As the Spanish-born peninsulares showed how similar they were to the Mexican-born criollos in terms of both success and failure, the criollos began to agitate for an end to policies that favored the Spanish-born over the native-born in consideration for appointments and jobs.

(Author took this pic at the Caracol Museum in

Chapultepec Park. Lots of cool dioramas there.)

A gathering of the “Literaria” in the late 18th

or early 19th century. These guys planned

and plotted revolution: a certain Father

Hidalgo is on the far left…

Sure, the criollos could make a fortune in mining or in running a sugar plantation, but they couldn’t enjoy the same social status as even the lowest of the peninsulares. To say that proved irksome to the criollos would be an understatement, even though it uses a cool vocabulary word like “irksome.” While they saw nothing wrong with keeping the rest of the native-born people that had some (or all) native ancestry in a state of peonage, they expected much better treatment for themselves.

At that point, they became a pesky middle class.

Lots of people like to define a middle class by its income and access to wealth. I reject that definition. I define a middle class by the way it expects to become richer over time and by how it’s willing to sell out its allies, particularly in the lower classes, in order to attain that goal. Every revolution in history kicks off when the middle classes feel frustrated in their bid to become rich. Once they can have a shot at getting rich, they simmer down and forget to implement the finer points of whatever plan of social equality they may have had during the revolution.

In the case of Mexico, the pesky middle classes started to form “literary societies.” Hehehe. Nice cover story. Imagine if Oprah’s Book Club was actually a secret gathering of social revolutionaries all over the nation, each local club a cell that fomented unrest. That’s what was happening among the criollo elites in Mexico. They met to “discuss books,” checked to see if the coast was clear, then got down to some serious discussion about how to stick it to The Man and start a revolution.

They had plenty of beefs with the way things were going in Mexico. I mentioned the lack of social opportunity for criollos. There were also the economic schemes that benefited the manufacturers back in Spain. The criollos didn’t like those, either. The pirates along the Gulf coast were a mixed bag from a criollo point of view: on the one hand, they ruined commerce and pillaged cities… on the other hand, they did smuggle in some pretty neat stuff from parts of the world the Spanish government had forbidden Mexico to trade with… but, overall, the pirates were bad. They simply charged too much…

So the “Literaria” clubs decided that some big changes were necessary. One such club in the city of Querétaro went so far as to set a date for a revolution. That will be for another discussion in another section: for now, I want to discuss the real arts in New Spain, not the stuff they used as a cover for revolutionary activities.

The Spanish traditions represented a massive break with the ancient American ones. In music, for example, the Spanish no longer insisted upon executing performers that made mistakes. One would think the quality of concerts would suffer, but that did not happen. But the nature of the concerts sure did change. So did the art and the language… but not necessarily the symbolic nature of the American way of communication.

(Author’s photo of a very symbolic work from the viceregal

period that hangs on display at the National Museum in

good ol’ Mexico City. It’s an allegory of the apparition of the

Virgin of Guadalupe.) Oops. Looks like I did all of my

describing in the credit text. Oh well, live and learn…

American symbolism was particularly pronounced in the visual arts. At the time of the conquest, their written communication pretty much was all visual arts. Their pictures weren’t worth a thousand words: they were the words themselves.  When the Catholic Church arrived and began commissioning works for religious consumption, the Aztec emphasis on symbolism moved neatly over to the requirements of the Church.

At first, native artists were used to paint out codices that detailed how much tribute moved from each village to Mexico City and other bits of record-keeping. Later, churchmen like de Casas and Sahagun encouraged the natives to record their histories and legends on their papers made of beaten maguey fibers. All these works were done in a native style with Latin letters used to render the Nahuatl language legible to readers.

Once those things were done, interest in preserving the native visual art forms diminished. The Spanish demanded their artists learn the European way of doing things, which the natives readily embraced. But the drumming of the ancient world never really ceased: it simply slipped into the European style and insinuated itself in the form of a new sort of symbology that spoke to both the pre- and post-Columbian audiences. The chief symbol among the native repertoire was that of the Virgin Mary, and, after the mid-1600s, the Virgin of Guadalupe.

In a world defined by the Spanish and their ideas, the Virgin of Guadalupe was the mother of Mexican visual symbols. She belonged to Mexico, while the rest of the Catholic set of symbols originated from the other side of the Atlantic. The other saints and virgins were white: Our Lady of Guadalupe was dark, like her fellow Mexicans. With other forms of native worship under attack by the Church, the Virgin was a native element that the Church permitted and, as such, it held a disproportionate influence in their visual art vocabulary.

By the mid-1700s, the Virgin of Guadalupe was accepted as the center of the Mexican Catholic Church. Her visage was ubiquitous and only Mexico’s greatest painter, Miguel Cabrera, was allowed access to Juan Diego’s miraculous shawl to produce a set of copies, including one for the Pope.

Cabrera represented the pinnacle of what Mexican painters could aspire to: his fame was known around the world and he was sought after as a celebrated painter of portraits and casta paintings. I mentioned those casta paintings earlier… I should mention further that these paintings weren’t just to provide a guide to Spanish racial sensitivities. They were intended to illustrate the observable differences between cultural mixes (note that I’m avoiding the word “racial” because it’s a concept I totally reject) in a scientific manner, much like the illustrations of Audubon’s birds helped naturalists classify North American avians.

In the process of classifying the “races,” painters like Cabrera or his student José de Alcibar also showed landscapes and foods that were uniquely American. Cacti and chocolate popped up here, maguey and tobacco there. As Mexico developed into something more than merely “New Spain,” more and more indigenous elements appeared in what its native sons chose to paint.

Such elements, of course, were needed to identify the subjects of portraits. They had made their names and fortunes in the New World; they needed to distinguish themselves from the Old World somehow, but in an exalting way. After all, those peninsulares had to be taught a lesson… men appeared in portraits with symbols of their native wealth or from their contact with Asia and its vast trade with Mexico. When one realizes that the normally xenophobic Chinese set up an embassy in Acapulco to keep watch on their silver trade, one understands just how vital Mexico was to the world economy – and that knowledge had to factor into the calculations of the criollos when they measured themselves against the peninsulares.

Musically, the native forms were discarded wholly in favor of more structured and elaborate European models. The only way modern musical historians can try to piece together ancient Aztec music is to go to outlying tribes from Mexico’s desert north, where Spanish influence was minor or non-existent. As for the people of central Mexico, music now meant choirs, polyphony, violins, horns, and the whole range of late Renaissance and Baroque styles.

One of the first to pioneer European modes in Mexico was Father Pedro de Gante, who presented a native-born choir in the Mexico City cathedral in 1528 – and this choir was the equal of any choir in Europe, according to critical accounts of the day.  By 1559, when Mexico City observed exequies in honor of the passing of Charles V, the native musicians produced such an effective tribute that historians see that year as a watershed for Mexican music. After 1559, music more and more came to be used as a means to Hispanicize the native population and its success as a cultural converter was phenomenal.

(All of these are the author’s photos. Boo-yaa.) Welcome to the Zocalo! On the top left,one sees the biggest Mexican flag, fluttering proudly over the square. It’s gorgeous, I assure you. On the top right,you can feast your eyes on the imposing façade of the Metropolitan Cathedral. It’s massive, I assure you. On the bottom, you can see some of the amazing sights of the interior of the great cathedral. It’s moving, I assure you.

But always, there were the drums pounding away, off in the distance… popular songs known as character villancios portrayed native life in warm, humorous ways. They were sort of casta paintings set to music, when you think about them. Native words popped up in their lyrics, which added to their popularity. The villancios would creep into Church services and helped popularize the spread of the Catholic faith. While not ever officially part of the liturgy, they were so popular that many people went to church just to hear and participate in them.

European composers like Ignacio Jerusalem came to Mexico and composed masses and other religious works for their native choirs to perform. By 1745, a native-born musician ascended to the pre-eminent spot in the world of Mexican music: Manuel de Zumaya became the maestro de capilla for the Mexico City Cathedral.

By this time, the literary gems of Sor Juana made their way into villancios as a sort of trifecta for the golden age of New Spain: Sor Juana, Cabrera, and de Zumaya were all giants on the New Spain arts scene, pretty much the one after the other. Sor Juana was even more electric of a presence, given how she was a woman and all… women didn’t do things like write poetry or theological tracts back in that day…

The lives of all these artists, and many more like them, all revolved around the Church. The biggest physical aspect of that Church, where all the arts came together in celebration of the faith, would have to be the Metropolitan Cathedral of Mexico City.

(Author’s photo from National Museum of Anthropology)

A diorama presentation of what the Zocalo might

have looked like, back in them Aztec days…

After Cortes had cleared out the ancient city of Tenochtitlan, he set about a program of construction based upon Spanish sensibilities. But he never did get rid of the native influences, did he? Go to Mexico City today, and triangulate your way based upon your relation to the Zocalo, the center of the city. As you do so, keep in mind that “Zocalo” is a Nahuatl word meaning “base.”

Base?

Base as in the base of the great temple of the Aztecs. Just outside the great temple, the Aztecs met in a huge market, where just about anything in Mexico could be bought or sold. If the great temple was the religious center of the Aztec world, the Zocalo was the commercial center. Today, it’s a massive square where all kinds of things happen, from political protests to gay pride parades to Norteño groups playing tributes to Selena. And, yes, I saw all three of those within 24 hours of each other at the Zocalo.

Built atop where the great temple once stood is the massive Metropolitan Cathedral. Unlike the cathedrals of Northern Europe, this one is low to the ground and sprawls solidly over many city blocks. The reason for this is due to two considerations.

The first of this pair of worries is the possibility of earthquakes, always a danger in the geologically active Valley of Mexico. The Spanish didn’t have the architectural capabilities of making tall, earthquake-resistant buildings, so they kept things low to the ground. Nowadays, Mexico City knows the majesty of the modern skyscraper, but those bad boys are braced with all manner of supports – the rich men that own them don’t want to see their investments reduced to powder, like the poor areas of Mexico City in the ‘quake of 1985.

(Author’s photos of the interior, Metropolitan

Cathedral)

The second problem for builders originates in Mexico City’s origin as an island in a lake. A filled-in lake bed does not a steady foundation make and one need look only to the infamous Leaning Tower of Pisa to see what happens when one opts to build tall things on loose soil. The cathedral itself is slowly sinking as it is, so it’s for the best it’s not a monstrously tall building.

But don’t belittle the interior of the cathedral. Although shorter by European standards, it nevertheless swoops far overhead as the columns of all kinds – including the Baroque “Solomonic” columns that writhe around themselves – fly upward to the heavens. Angels decorate the niches and walls, peppered with saints and the omnipresent images of the Virgin Mary. The central pipe organ spills its notes out of pipes both vertical and horizontal as worshipers shuffle past the stations of the cross, clutching rosaries, drawing closer to the God they know…

… and I have to pause to respect the massive faith that led to the construction of the cathedral. Never mind the auto-da-fe ceremonies that happened in the wake of the Spanish conquest or anything cynical about the structure of the Church in Mexico – just as there are drums constantly beating just outside, there is a true undercurrent of devotion to a power greater than man or the world that lives inside the Mexican Church. It is genuine and I feel its presence still as I write this. Whatever the Catholic Church may be accused of robbing the people of Mexico, it gave them a deeper attachment to the Divine. Not everyone in the Church was a crass manipulator: most of the churchmen were dedicated to their ideals, and they built up this cathedral with love and devotion in mind, no matter how it might have expressed itself outside the building.

Inside, the place is covered with religion. In the chapels, there is hardly a square millimeter ungraced by some filigree or saint’s benevolent image. The richness of decoration is matched perhaps only by Diego Rivera’s well-stocked murals. It’s an amazing, overwhelming, humbling experience. And though names like Arciniega and Tolsá belong to the architects, the humble builders and artisans that made real the visions of the architects pass anonymously into the mists of history. Soriano made no bust of a poor stonecutter to accompany his bust of Tolsá that presides in a niche of the National Museum of Art. No matter: their spirit graces the walls of the cathedral. It’s palpable.

And as I stood in that marvelous cathedral, I heard the pounding of the drums outside… and then I was reminded of the ancient temple beneath the cathedral… the ancient place of religious power, reinterpreted for the Catholic Spaniards… The ancient reciprocity of the Aztec gods was not that far removed from the Catholic notions of works, faith, and salvation. Everywhere in Mexico, the Spanish built their chapels atop ancient religious sites, to let the natives know that there was a new power in the heavens.

To let the Indians know there was a new power on the ground, the Spanish built their palaces and government buildings on top of the ancient palaces. Just east of the Metropolitan Cathedral is the National Palace, built where Moctezuma once lived. Just as the Aztecs kept their centers of religious and worldly power adjacent to each other, the Spaniards showed the close harmony of their church and state by copying the Aztec urban layout.

The National Palace wasn’t originally called that, you know. It was the Viceregal Palace, on account of the fact that Mexico wasn’t a nationality of its own until 1821. The palace itself was built in a Renaissance style, on account of the fact that it was built during the Renaissance. I love how history sometimes just makes sense like that.

Anyway, Hernán Cortés’ son Martín had started building a palace atop Moctezuma’s home but gave the project over to the viceroy in 1562. Like the cathedral, it remained low to the ground. Much of it was destroyed in a 1692 riot, but clever architects found old drawings of the palace to rebuild it as closely as possible to the way it used to look. It’s a beautiful building today, but it didn’t get its current look until after another riot swept Mexico – the Revolution.

And that’s in the 20th Century, so I’ll have to put off further discussion of the National Palace for now, since I haven’t even begun to discuss Mexico’s 19th Century, which really began on the 16th of September in the year 1810…

III: 1810 to 1917

Most US historians would have put “1810 to 1910” on that title bar.We here in the States like round numbers, and both those years end in zero and they’re a cool 100 years apart. But Mexico doesn’t necessarily parse its history that way.

El Tesoro Nacional

(Author’s photo of the Mexico City subway. Be careful there…)

(Author’s photo of kindly musicians in a less-crowded subway.)

The center of the snail inside the reclining grasshopper holds the foundation of the cactus the eagle with a snake perches upon.

If you know your Mexico City landmarks, that’s an easy riddle to solve. If you don’t, or you’re Nicholas Cage playing Benjamin Franklin Gates, then you’ve got a bit of a stumper in front of you. So how about we approach solving it as an exercise in historical tourism?

To start with, we need to descend into the subways of Mexico City.

Make sure your trip starts and ends outside of the rush hours. During the day, the subway is busy and crowded. During rush hours, it’s a rolling can of sardines… with some very determined sardines among the crowds entering and exiting the subway. I almost got separated from my son during a rush hour press, and the thought of that still terrifies me. We had no plan for what would happen if we were separated on the subway: to be separated in a city of 16 million people is as close as I can get to a nightmare. Thank goodness I wasn’t afraid to shout with all my might and reach into the crowd to pull my son out from between the shoulders of the inbound gang, and that other people were able to remind them that people had to get out before they could get in…

Author’s photo of the reclining grasshopper of Chapultepec.

These symbols are all over the park. They’re really quite

cute. The park itself is magnificent. You HAVE to go!)

But on weekends and from about 10 AM to just before 3 PM, the subway is a great way to scoot around town. The crowds are lighter and every now and then, a guy that jumps into your car to advertise something actually has something worth advertising, like the Andean musicians that leaped into our car on a Sunday, after a day in Chapultepec Park. Just be careful in Mexico City, and it won’t kill you.

Once you’re in the subway system, take a train to the aforementioned Chapultepec Park. Yes, it’s a mouthful, but once you know to accent Pul and Pec, you’ll say it like a native. You’ll do well to notice the symbol for the Chapultepec station: a grasshopper. Specifically, it’s a reclining grasshopper, and with that clue, all the guys that look like John Voight are getting excited, as that brings you one step closer to the national treasure of Mexico.

The first thing you’ll encounter at Chapultepec is the entrance to the park. There, one can read a magnificent poem by the great philosopher-king, Nezahualcoyotl:

Er, uh…

This is embarrassing.

I took a photo of the poem, but now that I’m looking at it, I can’t read what it says in the photo. Wikipedia’s no help, either. You’d think an article on Chapultepec Park would include the poem from the entryway, but noooooooooooooo…

Anyway, it’s a really good poem about how cool a place Chapultepec is. You’ll have to trust me on that one.

The next thing you’ll see as you cross over from the entrance to the main park is the monument to Los Niños Heroes. They were six young men who attended the military academy at Chapultepec during the Mexican-American War. As the Americans stormed the fortress that served as their school, they realized they were going to lose. Rather than surrender their flag to the enemy, they struck the colors. Then, one of the cadets wrapped himself around the flag and leaped off the edge of the cliff that faced Mexico City. The others fought on to their deaths. Even though they knew they were going to lose, they fought on to the end for the cause they believed in.

(Author’s photo of the monument to Los Niños Heroes

in Chapultepec Park, Mexico City.)

(Author’s photo of the flowers one should stop and get a

good whiff of in Chapultepec Park, Mexico City.)

In Texas, we have the Alamo. In Mexico, they have Chapultepec and Los Niños Heroes. Every time I recall the story of those young men, I choke up with emotion. I have to respect the willingness to make ultimate sacrifices such as that, regardless of who it is that makes them.

But that monument is another guide along our path to the national treasure of Mexico. Head past it and take the trek up the side of Chapultepec Hill. There’s a trolley that runs up the side, but it only stops up at the top and down at the bottom. We need to take a detour from the main road about half-way up, which, according to the old song, is neither up nor down.

At that halfway point, there is a place where one can stop to smell the flowers. One should look into stopping to smell all manner of flowers, not just roses. The bushes of flowers for to sniff are along a side path that heads slightly downward… down to the Museo Caracol…

For those keeping score, “Caracol” is Spanish for… snail. I’ll wait a bit as you frantically glance back up at the opening line of this section.

The Museo Caracol is so named because it is arranged like a snail, kind of like a reverse Guggenheim as it spirals downward, with displays of Mexican History all along the way.

Like all fine museums, one pays to enter and one pays to use a video camera. I can’t remember if a still camera permit was required, but if it was, on 2 July 2008, I paid that, as well. That was the fateful day my son and I checked our bags and descended into Mexico’s past… to uncover the secrets of El Tesoro Nacional!

Aside from me looking nothing like Jon Voight and my son looking nothing like Nicholas Cage and nobody looking like Harvey Keitel hot on our case, it was pretty much like the movie. Except we didn’t have any fights, chase scenes, or commissions of criminal acts, either.

Previously on… Mexico: A Personal History…

The exhibits at the Caracol begin with a look at Mexico on the eve of independence. By 1810, New Spain was thinking of itself more and more as a place that not only could exist on its own, but as a place that should exist on its own.

Well, not all of New Spain was thinking that way. In fact, not even most of it. The peasants pretty much just thought peasanty things like “how’s the harvest looking this year?” and “oh no here comes the tax collector again.” The peninsulares in the government thought governmenty things like “it is good to be the viceroy” and “we need more cash… send out the tax collectors!” The pirates all up and down the coasts of Mexico thought piratey things like “Arrr! Shiver me timbers!” and “Let’s attack the tax collectors after they’ve collected the taxes!”

(Author’s photos of dioramas from Museo Caracol. The dioramas are behind glass and sunlight

pours in from outside, so that’s why you may see odd effects in the photos. So be it.) Top left:

peasants in the market. Top right: the church and nobles that ruled in the palace. Bottom

left: pirates plaguing the coasts. Bottom right: criollos plotting revolution.

The only people that thought Mexico should strike out on its own were the criollo liberal intelligentsia that thought liberal intelligentsia-y things like “liberty, equality, fraternity!” and “no taxation without representation!” Clearly, they were at odds with the system as it was.

The criollo groups plotted a revolution to not only toss the Spanish out of power, but transform the state into a republic along the lines of the USA or France. One of these groups near the city of Guanajuato, in the town of Dolores, planned to start a revolution in November or December of 1810. When the army apprehended one of their confederates in September of 1810, they had two choices: either disperse and call the whole thing off or move the date up.

(Author’s photo of Father Hidalgo getting a revolution

started. This will probably look crappy in black and white.)

One of the leaders of the group, a radical priest named Hidalgo, chose to bring the noise. On 16 September 1810, he rang the church bells and called his people to action. His call became known as El Grito de Dolores, and Dolores is now known as Dolores de Hidalgo, in honor of Father Hidalgo, who sounded the first call for revolution in Mexico.

Hidalgo’s revolution called upon two groups to rise up: disaffected criollos and downtrodden peasants. Since that combination made up about 90% of the population, they figured they’d have a pretty good shot at getting rid of the Spanish. What they didn’t count on happening was the way the downtrodden peasants would get out of hand once they were given the opportunity to start fighting for their freedom. While the middle classes just wanted to have independence from Spain and a republican form of government, they were almost totally unaware of how violently angry the peasants were. Centuries of rage had built up in their hearts: when that rage was tapped for the war of independence, it visited terrible revenge on the rich that had exploited them for so long.

Hidalgo and his officers were powerless to stop the mobs once they arrived in a town. They would plead for mercy, but the peasants would find the rich and slaughter them. In Guanajuato, the rich fled to a church for safety. The peasants barricaded it and burned it down.

This radical extremism turned many in the middle classes away from Hidalgo’s revolt and they sided with the Spanish government. Others looked to the south, where another priest named Morelos had started his revolt. Morelos’ forces had more discipline and were able to focus on actually changing the social order rather than violent payback.

It should be no surprise that the Spanish went after the more violent Hidalgo rebellion first. In 1811, the Spanish captured him. They handed him over to the Church, which defrocked him and handed him back to the Spanish so they could execute him as a lay person… there was a law in Spain that the government couldn’t execute priests, you see…

The dead Hidalgo served as a symbol to the bands rising up in the mountains and forests. These bands would pretty much find common cause with Morelos, but not all were led directly by him. These were peasant uprisings which, historically, remain on the fringes of success. There were lots of them, which meant the government in Mexico City was extremely busy trying to keep a lid on the situation.

(Author’s photo of Morelos’ capture. Well, not the *actual*

capture. More like the diorama of the capture…)

(Author’s photo of a really cool statue in Cuautla, just to

the south of Mexico City. It commemorates the people who

fought for independence. In this part of Mexico, that would

have been Morelos’ bunch. The mountains south of

Mexico City have been perennial hotbeds of insurrection:

In 1910, they would see another wave of revolution led by

Emiliano Zapata.)

After taking out Hidalgo, the Spanish worked to get Morelos. By going after the leaders of the revolt, the Spanish hoped to behead it and leave the peasants without any focus for their action. After a while without leaders, the whole thing would disperse… or so they thought. The Spanish did catch Morelos in 1815, all right, but his capture didn’t end the peasant rebellions. The fact that, in 1813, Morelos had managed to capture Oaxaca and the silver port of Acapulco may have had something to do with the staying power of the revolts. That Morelos also almost captured Puebla may have been an additional factor in contributing to the continuation of the rebellions. That Morelos came this close to capturing Mexico City and also issued a declaration of independence from Spain and had created a constitutional government for the areas of Mexico his forces controlled may have been one more thing that kept the rebellions from collapsing with his capture and execution. By 1815, the peasants were mad enough to keep rebelling on their own and engage in hit-and-run guerrilla tactics. Six years later, those rebellions were still going on.

All during the time from Hidalgo’s first rebellion and 1821, Spain and its oldest colonies of Mexico and Peru remained politically conservative. They wouldn’t hear of the liberal claptrap that was promoting the equality of man, the separation of church and state, and civil rights. That stuff might have played well in Colombia or Chile, but not in the heart of Spain’s empire. When the French under Napoleon invaded Spain in 1808, the conservatives in Mexico did not support the French, what with all their Frenchy Revolutionary stuff. The really really liberal Spanish constitution of 1812 didn’t win over any conservatives, either.

The conservatives hoped that when the regularly-scheduled Spanish monarchy returned to the throne in 1814 that things would get back to normal. They needed some kind of conservative backup in Spain, what with Morelos having set up a rival government in Oaxaca that espoused all the aforementioned pillars of liberal claptrap. Lucky for the conservatives, Fernando VII took the throne as an ultra-arch-conservative. He was so conservative, he made Mel Gibson’s father look like Leon Trotsky. He would never even use the word “liberal”, preferring instead to use the phrase “large amount”. VERY conservative, if you know what I mean and I think you do know what I mean.

Conservative as he was and as lucky as his regal number may be, Fernando VII couldn’t rule effectively in Spain. Bandits all over the mountains of the nation limited his reign to… well… the plain… I know, that’s a bad pun and all, but it’s the truth. His reign in Spain stayed mainly on the plain. I don’t make this stuff up, I just report it.

In the closing days of Spanish control of Mexico, it wasn’t really obvious that they were, in fact, the closing days. Sure, the Spanish were losing control in South America – big time. Mexico, though, seemed pretty stable, all things being considered. The mountain rebellions were bad, but seemed like they would die out. Everything else pretty much bumped along as usual. The University of Mexico graduated its 29,882nd bachelor’s degree in 1820, and I bet they were getting ready to celebrate New Spain’s 30,000th degree in 1821. The government in Mexico City, desperate to find some way to control the Comanches and Apaches in the northern part of Coahuila y Texas, had issued charters to settlers from the United States to settle along the frontier. Government carried on as usual in Mexico.

Government didn’t carry on as usual in Spain. The Liberals there got tired of Fernando VII’s conservatism. Once they realized they were in control of the armed forces, they decided to force the king to reinstate Spain’s very liberal 1812 constitution. That made the Liberals in Spain very, very happy.

(Iturbide on the right, Santa Anna in the center… oh

yeah, this is an author’s photo of the diorama in the

Caracol of the meeting between the two gentlemen.)

It made the Conservatives in Mexico very, very unhappy. Since the Conservatives in Mexico controlled the armed forces, they didn’t have to go along with the Liberals in Spain. One of these Conservatives, one Augustin Iturbide, conspired with a fellow army officer, Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. The result of their conspiracy was to overthrow the Spanish government in Mexico City and replace it with a criollo one. They had no intention of giving out any concessions to the rebel movements. Their vision of an independent Mexico was that of a traditional European state, with a very powerful central government and a docile peasant population.

Problem was, how were they going to have a properly docile peasant population after 11 years of rebellion? Iturbide’s gang focused first on taking over the reins of power and getting that strong central government going. With the army behind him, Iturbide effectively tossed the Spanish out of government and proclaimed a Mexican nation.

For better or worse, Iturbide became one of Mexico’s Founding Fathers. Unlike George Washington, who refused the offer of a crown, Iturbide gleefully accepted it. One should note that Iturbide also staged a demonstration of his supporters to clamor for him to be proclaimed emperor, so with that knowledge, it shouldn’t be surprising that he willingly became Augustin I, Emperor of Mexico.

Iturbide enters Mexico City in triumph, with a

reflection of a display screen just over his left

shoulder. Dang those lighting conditions…

Iturbide’s coronation in the Metropolitan

Cathedral. Truly a grand affair!

The Mexico of Augustin I was ultra-conservative. The government was firmly on the side of the rich landholders. The 1821 constitution explicitly stated that the Catholic Church was the only permissible church in Mexico – much in the style of a 16th Century Counter-Reformation Catholic state. But this wasn’t the 16th Century – it was the 19th. Iturbide tried hard to take Mexico back in time, but his efforts only served to alienate his criollo supporters. Many of them yearned for a federalist republic when confronted with the excesses of Iturbide’s imperium.

Santa Anna heard those yearnings. True, he had supported Iturbide back in 1821, but Santa Anna was never one to place loyalty ahead of his own interests. While Adam Smith tended to applaud men’s interests in a simple, economic context, I’m not so sure that he’d be so gung-ho about personal interests in the context of men like Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. The man tended to do the wrong things for the right reasons and the right things for the wrong reasons. Complicated guy…

But complicated or not, like the Titan Cronos, Santa Anna rose up to depose his political father. Like the primordial god Uranus, Iturbide tumbled from his seat of power, never to rule again. Santa Anna helped establish a liberal, federal republic for Mexico: the constitution of 1824 was a true, 19th-century, liberal document that, while it did not declare freedom of religion, did not establish the Catholic Church as the state religion of Mexico. The constitution of 1824 created the United States of Mexico and, yes, the similarity in name to the USA was because the structure of Mexico’s government was similar to that of the USA.

Although Santa Anna became incredibly popular because of he led the rebellion against Iturbide, he didn’t become the next Iturbide – not yet. He refused to serve as the first president of Mexico, leaving that role to the governor of the state of Veracruz. Santa Anna chose to retire to his country home in the mountains just west of Veracruz, near the town of Jalapa.

While everyone should have been living happily ever after, forces of history prevented that ending from materializing. Mexico never really stabilized enough for that. Conservatives resisted the liberal movements in Mexico while some liberals sought to radicalize the nation. Presidents of Mexico tried to steer a course between the two factions, but they often ran afoul of the designs of the “retired” Santa Anna.

Because the retirement… was a lie!

Rather than detail every single gyration of Mexican politics, it’s much more instructive to provide a summary of the cycle they followed.

1. Santa Anna was a dashing young man, once

upon a time… (From the Naval Academy

Museum, Veracruz)

Santa Anna saves the day.

2. Santa Anna serves as an interim president.

3. Santa Anna announces that everything is fine, goes into retirement.

4. Santa Anna’s successor finds out that Santa Anna got out just before all the crises were about to break.

5. Santa Anna’s successor struggles to deal with the shambles Santa Anna bailed out on.

6. Everyone in Mexico starts to hate Santa Anna’s successor. They call upon Santa Anna to come out of retirement and save them.

7. Santa Anna comes out of retirement to save the day and loot the treasury one more time: go back to #1.

This went on, over and over, from 1823 until 1848. No matter how badly Santa Anna screwed up as president, he always managed to somehow get back to the top – with nearly everyone in Mexico demanding his return. Although he fancied himself “The Napoleon of the West”, such a name really doesn’t do him justice. Santa Anna was an individual unlike any other I can think of, and I spent nearly two whole days pondering the issue, off and on. I simply couldn’t come up with a suitable doppelganger for him. Perennial loser? Nope. He went down a number of times, but he always seemed to find a way to ride back to the top of the pile, except for his last time. Absolute cad? Certainly not. He really did do things to benefit his nation from time to time. Military genius? Nope, not as such. But he was a skilled commander, albeit one centered upon European methods of fighting, which left him at a disadvantage in the evolving art of war in the Americas. Although he has his mythology surrounding him, the myths have failed to simplify the character of Santa Anna. He is a character like no other. Although he’s done things I find to be lacking in ethics and honor, I still admire him for his individuality and am fascinated by all the facets of his life. If I could sit down and have a lunch with him, I wouldn’t just pester him with questions about his past. I’d want to know what he’d have to say about the world today… and if he had a hope to ride once again to Mexico’s rescue…

… but only to plunge it once again into chaos. I have to face it, he didn’t have much staying power when in office. When I sum up reasons why Mexican democracy has always had a streak of violence and anarchy, I have to consider Santa Anna’s actions almost more than anything else. The USA had a bumpy ride at the beginning of its history, but 20 years after it officially acquired independence from England, it had a stable republican system that the majority of the people agreed was the right way to go. Even in the Civil War, both the North and the South had republican governments, with varying degrees of federalism. The arguments behind the Civil War may have been complicated, but they were not about the very nature of the system of government.

Mexico, on the other hand, spent roughly its first 50 years after independence in political turmoil, punctuated by coups, civil wars, and the occasional foreign invasion. Rather than practicing the art of peaceful transfer of government, Mexican presidents tended to leave office at gunpoint, often in rapid succession. The factions struggling for control were those that desired a strong, centralized government – the Centrists – and those that wanted a decentralized, federalist system – the Federalists. One can remember what each group stood for by remembering that the parties did not choose ironic names.

A bit more effort is required to keep track of which Masonic lodges the factions used to further their aims. Here’s where it gets more National Treasure-y. The Scottish Rite Masons were the Centrists. The York Rite Masons were the Federalists. Back in Europe, the Scottish Rite Masons were typically more conservative in their outlook while the York Rite Masons embraced much of the liberal thought that was emerging at the time. Heck, in France, the Masons there even allowed in members that did not believe in God – very liberal, indeed. Well, those differences carried over into Mexico and served as the basis for political parties in Mexico. Although there were no overt political parties there, soft public political identifications were hardened by lodge activity.

Santa Anna spent much of his early career in nation-wrecking as a Federalist partisan. As a Federalist president in 1833, he spent much of his time as a gentleman of leisure in his Jalapa home, leaving the very able Gomez Farías to run things. Gomez Farías did a lot of reforming, and that reforming annoyed the Centrists to the point where they requested that Santa Anna rise up to overthrow his own vice-president.

A nation has to be pretty messed up when a president has to overthrow his own vice-president, but that’s exactly what Santa Anna did. This time, instead of becoming president only to hand the job over to someone else, Santa Anna planned to stay on and amass as much power for himself as he could. He suspended the Constitution of 1824 and began to rule as a dictator. This move enraged the nation, and much of it went into open rebellion and several regions attempted to secede from what they saw as a failed Mexican state.

Unlike the Civil War in the USA, the crisis of 1835 was not a split between regional factions. Rather, it was disintegration of a state. Some states, like San Luis Potosí, Querétaro, Durango, Guanajuato, Michoacán, and Jalisco demanded a return to the Constitution of 1824. The state of Zacatecas declared its independence: the Yucatan territories followed suit. Along the Rio Grande, the states of Tamaulipas, Coahuila y Texas, and Nuevo Leon broke away to form the Republic of the Rio Grande. Coahuila y Texas further broke down: the Texas part declared its own independence, setting into motion a chain of events that would result in catastrophe for Mexico.

Can’t Get the Hell Out of Texas

One of the many great things about Texas: Bar-B-Q stands

that also sell gasoline. This one’s on US 59 between Victoria

and Houston. The food was GREAT here, partly because it

was Bar-B-Q and partly because it was in Texas.

You can’t get the hell out of Texas

No matter how hard you try

In Texas we raise hell, just like it was a crop

It started with the Alamo and it ain’t never gonna stop

Not as long as there’s Austin and Houston

Amarillo, Lubbock, Dallas, Fort Worth

You can’t get the hell out of Texas

‘Cause it’s the hell-raising center of the earth!

That about sums it all up. Yup. Texans – who also refer to themselves as Texians when they’re feeling particularly patriotic – can be really annoying to folks from other, less flamboyant states. We can’t help that we’ve got the most colorful history of any of the 50 United States of America. And Texas history owes its color and flash to Mexico and Santa Anna in particular.

But, as I mentioned above, that history seems to annoy the heck out of people from boring states. It especially annoys them when people from Texas tell them how awesome their state is and they really don’t care one way or another or – worse – they actually think their state is in some way better than Texas.

That last part made me laugh hard. A state better than Texas. Right. Like THAT could ever happen.

Still, folks get annoyed at how cool Texas is. Jealousy, I guess. But to understand Texas, one has to understand Texas pride. Some people call it “Texas crazy”, but pride is a much nicer word and, since I’m from Texas, I’ll use that word.

By the way, let me mention something I learned a while back that’s always helped me out: never ask anyone where they’re from. If they’re from Texas, they’ll tell you. If not, no need to embarrass them.

So, how to understand that Texas pride? How about a song from The Austin Lounge Lizards, Stupid Texas Song.

Texas is a big state, North and South and East and West

Alaska doesn’t really count, we’re bigger than the rest

You can waltz across it, though, so grab your Yellow Rose

We’ll sing another song of Texas, this is how it goes

One more stupid song about Texas

For miles and miles, it rambles on

Biggest egos, biggest hair

Biggest liars anywhere

Let’s sing another stupid Texas song

Dadgum, we’re so darn proud to be from Texas – yah-hoo!

Even of our pride, we’re proud, and we’re proud of that pride, too

Our pride about our home state is the proudest pride indeed

We’re proud to be American – until we can secede!

One more stupid song about Texas

You’ve heard it all before, so sing along

Biggest belt buckles and boasts

Love that big ol’ Texas toast

Let’s sing another stupid Texas song

Our accents are the drawliest, our howdies are the ya’ll-iest

Our Lone Star Flag’s the waviest, our fried steaks the cream graviest

Our rattlesnakes the coiliest, our beaches are the oiliest

Our politicians most corrupt, our stop signs most abrupt.

Our guitars are the twangiest, our guns are the kablangiest

Our cattle the longhorniest, our yodels the forlorniest

Our cook-offs are the chiliest, our Waylon is the Williest

Our sausage is the smokiest, our neighbors are the Okiest

Texarkana to El Paso, Dalhart down to Orange

Every spot in Texas has got what you’re looking for-aren’ you

Glad that Texas put the stars up in the sky

If heaven isn’t Texas, partner, I don’t wanna die!

One more stupid song about Texas

Just ‘cause we’re braggin’, that don’t mean it’s wrong

Biggest hands and biggest hearts

Biggest various body parts

Let’s sing another stupid Texas song

Toss your hats into the air

We’re obnoxious! We don’t care!

Let’s sing another stupid Texas song

One more blusterin’, bumptious, bald-faced, brazen, high-flown, high-toned, dander-up panderin’, pompous, puffed-up, snotty, swaggerin’, stupid Texas sooooooooooooooong!

Now, if you think that song was a satire of Texas attitudes, you’re only part right. It was written in the first person plural by Texans, for Texans, and it’s all true. And no matter how insulting some of those passages may seem, they’re really praises.

So what kind of people would think in that way? Well, Texans know already. For the non-Texans there should be some explaining, I reckon.

Way back in the 1700s, Spain had laid claim to a huge chunk of North America: from the Sabine River on out to California and as far north as the Oregon country. The land itself was mostly either arid stretches of land inhabited by vicious nomadic hunter-gatherer groups or semi-arid stretches of land inhabited by vicious nomadic hunter-gatherer groups. Here and there were actual well-watered stretches of land inhabited by vicious hunter-gatherer groups. Cabeza de Vaca and Coronado had surveyed the place in the early 1500s and hadn’t found any civilizations to rival the Aztecs, or to even come close to them, so the Spanish treated the lands north of the central Mexican heartland as a vast buffer zone. The land was good for keeping the French and English out of Mexico: the wild and impenetrable wastelands weren’t conducive for overland travel.

And if the wild and impenetrable wastelands weren’t enough to deter the occasional explorer from another empire, the Comanches and Apaches sure as heck were deterrents. Before the Spanish discovered Mexico and released horses to run wild there, the Comanches and Apaches were annoying bands of raiders. Once they got their hands on wild horses and learned to ride them, they became the North American version of Vikings. Nobody wanted to mess with them, and the Spanish were only too happy to stay well enough away from them.

Then, one day in the mid-1600s, they heard about a French settlement on the Texas coast, around Matagorda Bay. While the Comanches would occasionally venture down to the Gulf Coast, they didn’t go often enough to have a good chance of wiping out the French colony that La Salle had established there. So, the Spanish had to send a force up that way to wipe out the French. To avoid the hassle of having to do that again, the Spanish thought it best to try and settle the region to keep intruders from encroaching on Spanish territory, which if left unchecked could eventually threaten their valuable colonies in Mexico.

One of the Missions of San Antonio… part of the impact

of New Spain on the Texas landscape.

The first Spanish to go north of the Rio Grande for permanent settlement were Catholic missionaries. The Franciscans made the most missions and worked the hardest to bring God and Spanish civilization to the people there. As the Franciscans built missions, the soldiers with them built forts, or presidios, nearby.

The natives in Texas that weren’t Apaches or Comanches were actually glad to see the Spanish show up. Smallpox had just made its way up to Texas, and epidemics were devastating the population. The missionaries offered help not only with attempts to treat the epidemics, but to organize the remnants of the populations there into communities that could support themselves with agriculture. The missions also offered some degree of defense against raids from those Apaches and Comanches.

Missions of San Antonio… don’t see just the

Alamo there, all right? Promise me that.

The Spanish wanted missions along the border with Louisiana. To support them, they ordered missions built about halfway between the border and the settled areas of Northern Mexico – pretty much along the San Antonio River, both at the mouth of the river and further up, where modern-day San Antonio, Texas happens to be. Those were where the missions had to be to help secure the area. The Franciscans, however, chose to go into other areas to spread their religious message.

One time, the Franciscans went deep into Comanche country, around San Saba, Texas, to establish a mission. That mission ended when the Comanches burned it to the ground and massacred everyone there. The other missions, closer to the lines of communication with Mexico, fared better. Still, existence in South and East Texas in the 1700s had to have been a major trial of the soul, as well as the body and mind.

Go to San Antonio and take a look at the missions there. The Alamo, most famous of them all, is in the city center. But head south from there to find what it must have been like, 300 years ago. Emptiness surrounds the mission… the wind blows from the north… the sun beats down… the only reason to be there is to do something one’s soul does not request: it demands… one could be back in the markets of Mexico City or the crowded streets of Seville, but, instead… the bleak edges of the empire issued a call… and, on the edge of that empire, one can be closer to God than anywhere else, perhaps because there’s hardly anyone else to talk to out there…

More of the fantastic missions on San Antonio’s

south side. The middle picture is from the one

furthest south, and it really conveys a sense of

the remoteness of the Texas frontier.

As the USA moved closer to New Spain, the Spanish became even more concerned about settling the region to forestall any possible infiltration from the USA.

In 1820, Spain had already lost Florida to an expanding USA. People from the Southern US were looking around to try and find places to expand the institution of slavery to: Texas seemed a likely candidate for another adventure from the USA to carve a new slave state from the fringe of the Spanish Empire. To pre-empt the expected encroachment from the USA, Spain let it be known that it would begin admitting settlers to live in Eastern Texas and along the Gulf Coast. Moses Austin responded to that offer and had negotiated a land grant from the Spanish.

In 1821, as we noted, Iturbide severed ties with Spain. That put Moses Austin’s grant into a questionable state. Worse, Moses Austin passed away, leaving his son Stephen to go to Mexico City to try and see if the Spanish grant was still valid in independent Mexico.

Stephen Austin met with success: if he hadn’t, he wouldn’t be known now as “The Father of Texas”. Austin had to make many more trips to Mexico City whenever a president of the moment seemed like he might not support the legality of the land grants, but after 1821, families from the USA began to enter Texas to acquire farmland at prices that couldn’t be had back in the States. By acquiring lands in Mexico legally, the hope was that they wouldn’t try and do anything illegal that would violate the territorial integrity of Mexico.

These guys were loyal to Mexico. They took an oath and everything. Granted, the oath required that they support the Catholic faith and that was observed more in the breach than in the honoring, but the guys that came to Texas were there to settle down and be loyal to whatever nation they were part of, provided that nation gave them the same rights and privileges they had enjoyed back in the USA.

The Brazos River, home of the first Anglo

settlements in Texas. Beautiful country.

Marker noting where James Power made his

settlement in Aransas County, Texas – right

along TX Highway 35.

When adventurers from the USA tried to take over Texas, these Texians did not join in. They worked alongside, and even intermarried with, the Tejanos already there from Mexico proper. Texas is and always was a border region, with an intermingling of cultures and ideas. That’s why the food here is always exciting. But, yeah, the Texians… they were loyal to the United States of Mexico.

They were also a freewheeling sort, the kind of men that had the nerve to import slaves and keep them in a nation that had made slavery illegal. Independent-minded, if you will. Proud men, who were proud of their pride, and proud of the pride they had about their pride. Remember that song I quoted a few pages back? These guys were crazy enough to be willing to die for a cause, even if they didn’t yet know what that cause would be. They were willing to stand up and fight for… um… well, there wasn’t much reason to fight when things were good in that part of Northern Mexico. But the constant changes in the presidency had them all worried.

When Santa Anna took over, the folks in Texas finally had their cause. Santa Anna was now a Centrist, and these former citizens of the USA were anything but Centrists. These guys, mostly from the South, were Federalists that favored states’ rights, preferring a weak central government that would just leave them the heck alone and let them do whatever. We’re still like that, to a large degree, and in spite of all the Yankees that moved down here. (I should note that if anything I’ve said thus far is convincing you to never come to Texas, good. If you’re falling in love with the place and can’t wait to get here, good. But we Texans prefer you be either fer us or agin’ us.) Yankees are always shocked to discover that Texas has a governor that needs a constitutional amendment passed if he ever wants to have lunch and a legislature that meets for 180 days every two years. They ask aloud, “How do you Texans ever get anything done?” Texians would respond that we’d rather do without the governor entirely and have the legislature meet for 2 days every 180 years. Besides, the most powerful positions in Texas government are those of the Lieutenant Governor and the Railroad Commissioner. If we got good ol’ boys in there, we’ll be all right.

As I was saying, Texians were most assuredly not Centrists. As in:

37. Which of the following adjectives does NOT describe a Texian?

A. Obnoxious

B. Loud-mouthed

C. Overbearing

D. Centrist

E. Crazy

The correct answer is “D”. Santa Anna didn’t know that. In all fairness, the folks in Yucatan, Zacatecas, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, and the Coahuila part of Coahuila y Texas weren’t centrists, either, and if the Texians were settled in any of those places, they would have had pretty much the same set of events happen there as what happened here. But because they happened here is why the song isn’t “The Yellow Rose of Yucatan.”

As I write this, I reflect on how a Centrist government could probably have gotten a lot more soldiers up to Texas to control the ravaging bands of Comanches and Apaches and then worked with Texas to make it more economically prosperous by linking it to the interior. Then I reflect on how ruggedly individualistic the Texians were. They didn’t want a government to take on any sort of problem they could try and handle themselves, including fighting the Comanches and Apaches. That’s why they came here in the first place. That’s what made them tough, too. The Texas spirit is derived from the brand of men insane enough to want to fight Comanches on their own, thank you very much. In fact, I reflect further that it was a mistake to drive out the Comanches and Apaches. If we still had them here, the Yankees would never have come here in the 80s. When I think of building a wall along a river, I think of the Red River, not the Rio Grande.

Mission La Bahia in Goliad, Texas.

I seem to have digressed. I do that often when my writing takes me to Texas. My parents came from Arizona and California, but I was born here. I guess there’s something in the water or air. Or enchiladas. But one thing should be clear: if the Texians were anywhere near as passionate and loco as I am, then a whole bunch of them together, armed to the teeth, and as agitated as a hornet’s nest in a thunderstorm should be a rather vivid mental image. In late 1835, they weren’t just a mental image: they were on the march.

The chief settlements in Texas were San Antonio and Goliad. San Antonio you know as the home of the Alamo and loads of other fun tourist attractions. Goliad you may not know. It’s a tiny town along the San Antonio River, halfway between San Antonio and the Gulf of Mexico. Its name comes from a sort of anagram of “Hidalgo.” Lose the silent H, and there you go. Why Hidalgo? Well, did you read the first part of this section? Remember one Father Hidalgo? He’s only the guy that started the Mexican War of Independence. Goliad was once known as Presidio La Bahia, but after Mexico got its freedom, it got a name change. There were other settlements and forts in that region of Texas, including the town of Gonzales, where there was a cannon.

Fun with Gonzales. Top Left: The Gonzales Municipal Building, with the lovely portrait of the

“Come and Take It” cannon. Top Right: Take a side road, and you’ll see this monument to the

heroes of the Battle of Gonzales. This wasn’t the site of the battle, just the site of the memorial.

Bottom Left: 1.1 miles north of this sign is where you’ll find the battle site. Bottom Right: The

place of battle. It’s a boat ramp now, but in 1835, it was the site of some savage name-calling

between the Texians and the Mexicans and one fatality on the Mexican side.

The settlers in Goliad had driven off any loyalists that lived there and proceeded to plan a march up to Gonzales to get that cannon, a la the Minutemen of Lexington and Concord fame. At the same time, a Mexican force was moving there to try and secure the weapons in Gonzales. The Texians got there first and prepared to repulse the Mexicans.

They got their chance at a river crossing just outside of town. There was really only one way to get across that river anywhere near town, and it involved fording. “Fording” means to cross a river by wading across it at a shallow place where the current isn’t fast, usually by carrying one’s equipment above one’s head. It’s a tricky enough operation as is without making it more difficult with a band of raving lunatic Texians on the other shore, firing away, which is what the Mexicans had come up against.

The Mexican commander was under orders to not fire on anyone, if at all possible, so that’s probably why the Mexicans sustained the one lone casualty of the skirmish as the two forces faced off on opposite sides of the river. I’ve been to that spot. It’s not in the town of Gonzales, as I mentioned. Heck, the people in the town hall didn’t even know where it was when I asked. They had to go look up an old brochure to find the battle site. The brochure didn’t even take into account the new US 183 bypass that now skirts the town, which made for a bit of a trick in getting to the right farm road that ran past the marker commemorating the battle. North of that marker are two signs: “Gonzales battle site, 1.1 miles” and “Road ends 1 mile.”

The Alamo, used as a fort first by the Mexicans, then the Texians. It’s located in the heart of San

Antonio, and it’s considered a shrine of Texas Independence. Notice how I’m not making any

jokes about it. In Texas, we take the Alamo very seriously. Just ask Ozzy Osbourne.

Taking that road is an interesting little side trip. It ends at a roundabout beneath a massive shade tree and a public boat ramp cuts through the overgrown underbrush to the river’s edge. The road approaches the river from the south, which meant I stood where the Mexicans once faced off against the Texians, back in the late fall of 1835. I felt some sympathy for the Mexicans as I stood there, and admired how they had refused to fire upon their countrymen, no matter what language they spoke.

As the Mexicans withdrew at Goliad, the Texians marched up to San Antonio, where they fought a series of battles at the missions south of San Antonio, culminating in a siege of the city itself. The Texians remarked at how inaccurate the Mexican soldiers were: Mexican shots were more likely to hit the pecan trees the Texians stationed themselves under, and that meant a shower of pecans with almost every Mexican volley. The Texian fire was more accurate. That wasn’t because they were rugged frontiersmen and the Mexicans a bunch of fancy-dress freebooters. No, the Texians had rifled muskets for the most part and the Mexicans’ muskets were smoothbores. That meant the Texians could shoot straighter and further than the Mexicans.

More scenes from the Alamo. It’s interesting

that the distinctive stonework above the main

entrance was actually added after the famous

battles there.

Once the Mexicans fell back into the Alamo, they realized their position was untenable. Not only did they not really want to fight all that hard for a government they didn’t agree with, they didn’t want to see the town of San Antonio subjected to the terrors of war. I have to say that I admire this spirit of nobility in the way Mexicans wage war: although it does not show up all the time, it shows up with great frequency, even when faced with an enemy that chose to subject civilians to those very terrors.

By the start of 1836, the Texians were giddy with the realization that they were foundin’ fathers, just like them fellers from the American War of Independence and what-not. It was a nice feeling while it lasted, but their giddiness was short-lived. The buzzkill arrived in the form of a vengeful army making its way directly to Texas, led by none other than Santa Anna himself.

Santa Anna wasn’t coming that way only because of the Texan troubles. He’d just ripped through the state of Zacatecas, killing anyone that dared to oppose his rule, which meant death for scores of people. He allowed his soldiers to rape and pillage the city of Zacatecas and then split the state into two. Santa Anna chose Texas as his next target, as he hoped to play up the fact he was suppressing what he described as an attempt by the USA to cut away Texas and take it for themselves.

In front of Santa Anna’s force was a particularly adept squadron of cavalry, made up of Texan loyalists to Mexico. Many of them had been driven out of Goliad, but now they returned to fight for their nation. They were able to locate where the Texians were concentrated and keep them from getting too far away from those places by roving the country and threatening any movements with their raids.

Santa Anna split his forces into two groups. One, under General Urrea, headed towards Goliad. Santa Anna led the main column up the Camino Real to San Antonio.

The Texians stood firmly at the Alamo: this was in direct violation of the order that the commander-in-chief of the Texian forces, Sam Houston, had given to them to join with him and concentrate their fighting power. Instead, the forces at the Alamo led by the ailing Jim Bowie and his lieutenant, William Travis, chose to stay and fortify the mission they had taken from the Mexicans only a few months before.

The Caracol rendition of the assault on the Alamo. It’s not quite to scale, if you check closely.

After a short siege, Santa Anna ordered his men to storm the Alamo. Going in, they played the degüello, a military tune that signified no quarter would be asked and none offered. Santa Anna had ordered everyone in the Alamo to be massacred, using a Mexican anti-pirate law to justify the decision. Under Mexican law, any person that entered Mexico to try and steal its land for a foreign power was considered to be a pirate, and the law provided the death penalty for any pirate caught in the act of piracy. Santa Anna, therefore, was not only the general of the Mexican forces, but the judge, jury, and chief executioner for the Texians.

There is a great question in Texas history: did all the defenders of the Alamo fight on to the death, or did some surrender, only to be executed by Santa Anna? As a military historian, I have to accept the possibility of the latter and, in fact, there are documents which indicate that situation may have happened. Whatever the situation, it is clear that all the defenders of the Alamo that did not leave prior to its final storming died at the end of it all. They gave their lives for the ideal of freedom that they believed in.

The situation at Goliad was a bit more complicated and somewhat less satisfying, at least from a high drama point of view. Colonel Fannin, a man who had attended West Point, had been voted by the troops at Goliad to be their leader. Fannin wanted to help relieve the Alamo and had prepared to march there. His column had gotten only a few miles out of Goliad when their cannon fell off its mount and the wagons became bemired in the February mud. Since they couldn’t move the cannon, Fannin ordered it to be buried and the column to return to Goliad. As Urrea bore down on them at about the time the Alamo fell to Santa Anna, Fannin ordered his forces to fall back and attempt to join up with Sam Houston.

Fannin’s men got as far as a field ten miles northeast of Goliad, near Coleto Creek, when they found out that the Mexicans had not only caught up to them, but had surrounded them. Fannin tried to fight, but his forces soon ran out of water to keep their guns cool and despaired of being able to carry on the struggle any further than they already had. Fannin surrendered his men to Urrea and marched back to the presidio at Goliad as prisoners.

Left: The marker at the battlefield of Coleto Creek, where Fannin’s men were surrounded and

subdued by Urrea’s force. Right: The marker outside the presidio at Goliad, on the field where

Fannin’s men were massacred by Urrea’s force.

Urrea reported this to Santa Anna and Santa Anna responded with a message that all the Texian rebels be executed. Urrea did not want to carry out the order, but he did. How often I’ve wished for history to run differently: when I read of a person objecting to something criminal, but doing the act anyway, I can’t help but wish that, instead, the person realized something greater was at stake than obeying an order. Be that as it may, the Texians under Sam Houston, gathered near Washington-on-the-Brazos, soon learned of the twin massacres at the Alamo and Goliad.

They also learned that Santa Anna was coming directly for them and that he had every intention to kill every last one of the rebels. He’d been as ruthless in Zacatecas and his actions at San Antonio and Goliad showed that he was still in his “evil tyrant” frame of mind. The Texians headed east, towards the swamps near present-day Houston, which is where Santa Anna caught them.

And that was where Texas Crazy won the day.

By all accounts, running away from Santa Anna was the right thing to do. His army was bigger. He planned to kill everyone in his path, unless they got to the USA first. Louisiana wasn’t that much further away. The Texians might have made it to safety, but they didn’t. They stood on a mosquito-infested stretch of dry ground in the middle of a swamp and stared across a field at an army twice their size. Santa Anna planned to destroy them two days after catching up to the Texians, when Urrea’s army joined his for even greater superiority in numbers.

Left: the San Jacinto Monument with its reflecting pool. Another great shrine of Texas History.

Right: Move over, Lenin. That’s the ginormous statue of Sam Houston near Huntsville, Texas.

If you want to see it, it’s just off Interstate 45, but you can’t pull directly off the highway to get

to it: you’ll need to take an exit and pull ‘round to the back of the park and have a nice stroll.

The Texians took a vote on what they should do and they decided they’d rather die on the offense than the defense and resolved to attack Santa Anna the day before Urrea’s men showed up.

On the day of the battle, the Texians sent out some scouts to destroy the bridge behind the Mexican forces. When that was accomplished, they set out across the field to attack Santa Anna’s men. The Napoleon of the West did not anticipate an attack from the outnumbered Texians, so he didn’t post any sentries on his lines.

Big mistake.

When the Texians were within charging distance, they hollered out “REMEMBER GOLIAD! REMEMBER THE ALAMO!” and surged into the Mexican camp with the kind of ferocity that goes with knowing that one is going to die in combat, so one might as well die with glory, in one last ride.

Ironically, if they’d faced off against the Mexicans in a formal battle, they would have all been killed. The Mexican army was a trained, professional outfit that could master all the intricacies of a standard battlefield. In the close combat situation that the Texians gave them, they could not cope. Their morale broke, Santa Anna could not be found, and they tried to leave the field. When they ran out of field and got to the water’s edge, many chose to try and swim across – and many of them were killed in the water or drowned.

Amazingly, the Texians had won the day at the Battle of San Jacinto. Even more amazingly was what happened the next day. The Texians had killed many of the Mexicans, but not all. Their cavalry was out in the country, rounding up bands of Mexican soldiers here and there for proper disposition of captives. One of these captives, a private, caused a bit of a stir when he was brought back with all the other prisoners. Everyone kept saluting him and calling him “El Presidente” and “General”. This private did bear a resemblance to Santa Anna, but the final evidence proving he was the man himself was when they checked his underwear.

This is the spot where Sam Houston met Santa Anna,

but not the actual tree. That tree died long ago, but

the park keeps a tree like the original one near the

famous spot. Seriously, keeping the original foliage

at historical parks is not easy to do.

Trust me, dear readers. No private in the Mexican army could ever afford silk underwear.

Santa Anna was brought to see Sam Houston, who lay under a tree, recovering from his wounds he’d gotten the day before. Santa Anna congratulated Sam Houston for beating him and Sam Houston got down to his demands. Since Santa Anna was the head of state and head of government of Mexico, he had quite a lot of negotiating authority. Sam Houston got the concessions he wanted and Santa Anna could give his word that he’d honor them: Texas was a free and independent state and Mexico would not try to reconquer it.

And if the Texians had been hard to bear before this, independence made them dang near insufferable, and they’ve been that way ever since.

This marker in San Antonio marks where one of

the batteries on the outer wall used to be. The

Alamo proper is in the background. Just off to the

left is Ripley’s Odditorium.

Today, the Alamo is a major tourist destination in San Antonio. During the spring and fall, it has some lovely gardens in bloom on its grounds. The site itself has suffered over time. One cannot walk the ramparts of old: they’re now commercial developments in downtown San Antonio. One of the gun emplacements is now a Ripley’s Wax Museum, for instance. While the signs outside the Alamo request that patrons remain quiet during their visit there, it can still get rather noisy inside, especially considering the acoustic properties of the place – it used to be a chapel, after all, and had to be built so that words spoken at one end could be heard clear over on the other side. Put several hundred people into that place, and the echoes are going to be formidable, even if everyone minds himself.

Still, a visitor to San Antonio owes it to himself to park across the street from the Riverwalk Mall and hike on over to the shrine of Texas independence. After that, the same visitor has an equal self-debt to head down Alamo Street until it crosses the freeway and opens out to the San Antonio Missions National Park. Four other missions beckon the historical traveler, each one with its specialty. Although aspects of them are rough, there are beauties to be discovered there, especially in their arches and centuries-old frescoes.

Left: The battleship USS Texas. Tours cost $9.00, so budget accordingly if you like to visit big ol’

battleships. Right: The monument with the names of all the Masons involved in Texas Inde-

pendence. As noted below, Santa Anna’s name is missing from the list.

The mission in Goliad is built along the lines of the other missions in San Antonio and is much less crowded a place to visit. Inside is an excellent museum that deals with the lives of the missionaries and their charges, the Indians of the region. Ten miles northeast of Goliad, just off US 77 bound for Victoria, is the little town of Fannin, which was built around the monument of the battle of Coleto Creek. Should you ever go that way, heed well that you return to civilization by way of US 77 and not the farm road that takes the visitor from the highway to Coleto Creek. That road is not state-maintained after Fannin runs out, and it’s a long, bumpy hellride before one finds FM 239 on the other side. Trust me, it’s not a fun drive that way. Better to go back to Goliad to see the presidio.

The presidio in Goliad is across the street from the mission. It’s a fun fort to visit and to walk around on, but it’s only a stopover for the main destination: about a hundred yards off is the monument built to honor the fallen at Goliad, a common grave where Fannin’s men were placed after Urrea massacred them.

The final battle of Texas Independence is remembered well at San Jacinto, complete with a massive obelisk and reflecting pool. In addition to that, the battleship USS Texas, an old warhorse from World War Two, lies anchored in the bayou. Also at San Jacinto is a monument to the Freemasons involved in Texan Independence. Ironically, Santa Anna’s name is absent from the list. He was a Mason and he was involved in Texan Independence in a major way. All the same, it’s worth the drive out of Houston to go visit San Jacinto – just be sure to bring lots of mosquito repellent.

From San Jacinto to the Pastry War

The city of Corpus Christi, as seen from the north bank of the Nueces.

Had folks in Texas and the US not gotten greedy, Corpus Christi would

have been in Mexico.

As Santa Anna was busy fighting up in Texas, Federalists staged a coup back in Mexico City and restored order there. Of course, one of the first things they did was to strip Santa Anna of all his powers. Remember that treaty Santa Anna hammered out with Houston? Null and void. Mexico did not recognize the independence of Texas, or of the Republic of the Rio Grande or Yucatan, for that matter. Given the turmoil Mexico faced at the time, there wasn’t much it could do about re-integrating the outlying areas that had broken away.

They didn’t have to worry long about the Republic of the Rio Grande. That affair fell apart once the Constitution of 1824 was reinstated and the states there returned to Mexico. For its brief existence, the Republic of the Rio Grande did recognize the independence of Texas and had set its border with Texas as a line following the Nueces River and the Medina River. Everything south of those rivers wasn’t Texas. The western border of Texas was a little hard to define, but it seemed best to draw a line straight north of the source of the Medina until one hit the Red River and the territory of the USA.

Remember those lines. They become very important in 1845.

During the first few years of the Republic of Texas, much of the efforts of the government were focused on not doing anything at all. This meant it got along well with its neighbors and didn’t create much stir. But then, Mirabeau B. Lamar stepped into the presidency of Texas and really changed things around.

Lamar was a complicated guy. While he founded the great state university system of Texas, he also managed to wreck Texan relations with Mexico by claiming all land north and east of the Rio Grande as belonging to Texas and then sent armed expeditions into Mexico to enforce his grand claims. It’s in his capacity to do good and messed-up at the same time, coupled with his grand style, that I consider him to be “The Santa Anna of Texas.”

Santa Anna, meanwhile, had gone to Washington, D.C., where he worked on his plan to get back into power. He convinced Andrew Jackson that he could solve the whole Texas problem in a way that would benefit the USA if he were back in charge in Mexico City. Jackson agreed and the USA helped to finance Santa Anna’s return to Mexico.

When he got there, it wasn’t long before he was president again. How he managed to come back into power after losing Texas has to be one of the greatest stories of political survival. Back in power, Santa Anna attacked Texas in 1838, with indifferent results. But to Santa Anna’s credit, he did demonstrate that Mexico considered the status of Texas – let alone its outrageous border claims – to be in dispute.

Obviously, Santa Anna went back on his deals with both Houston and Jackson. This was to be expected. Soon after regaining power in 1838, Santa Anna found himself out of power. This was also to be expected. Santa Anna was President of Mexico, I think, 11 different times during his career, and that’s no exaggeration. If it’s wrong, it’s still an awfully close guess.

The fortress of San Juan de Ulua, Veracruz

But back to our story. In 1838, Santa Anna, being who he was, was back in power to deal with the Pastry War.

It seems as though a French citizen had a bakery in Mexico City once upon a time and that his bakery had been wrecked in the war of independence. The French had pressed their claim for damages, but the Mexicans refused to pay up. The various Mexican governments had run up debts with France, England, and Spain and then the successor government a few months later would either refuse to pay the debts of its predecessor or make token payments. The European nations wanted back their due. The French used the destroyed bakery as an excuse for taking over the port of Veracruz. As Mexico’s chief port, the French figured they’d collect tariffs on trade coming in and out of the city until they had been paid in full.

This constituted an invasion of Mexico’s territory, and the nation prepared to fight back. When Santa Anna offered his services as a general, of course the Mexican nation took him up on the offer. It didn’t matter if they loved him or despised him, he was the only guy around that could handle the job of running an army big enough to drive off the French.

Santa Anna faced down the French outside of Veracruz and fought them to a draw. In the battle, Santa Anna’s leg was wounded and had to be amputated. Santa Anna would later see to it that the leg be buried with full military honors in Mexico City. After the battle, the French agreed to settle their bill for the cost of the bakery and then dropped their other claims.

Santa Anna was the hero of The Pastry War, and had the big painting to prove it.

Technically, Santa Anna had repulsed the invaders. The crowds went wild. I can’t remember if he stayed in power or was in and out of power, but Santa Anna was in charge again in 1842 and launched another attack on Texas. Clearly, the hero of The Pastry War was not going away.

Just kidding. Of course he went away. By 1845, Santa Anna had managed to make everyone in Mexico mad at him again and he had to flee the capital. On his way to Veracruz, some Indians captured him and discussed what they should do to him. One faction was in favor of wrapping up Santa Anna in a bunch of corn husks, then stuffing him into their biggest tamale pot… Only the impassioned pleadings of a local priest saved Santa Anna from becoming the world’s largest human tamale. After his narrow escape, Santa Anna managed to get his skin on a boat to Havana and left Mexican politics for… well, certainly not long.

La Invasión Estadounidense

That’s Spanish for “The Invasion of the United States”, which is their term for what people in the USA call the Mexican-American War. Another name for it is The War of 1847, since pretty much all the fighting went on during that year and that year alone.

Texas didn’t really flourish as an independent republic. It had debt problems and an unresolved border dispute with Mexico. The citizens of Texas that had once been part of the USA felt that being part of that nation again could help resolve those big issues. Southerners in the USA were particularly keen upon integrating Texas into the Union so that it might exist as another slave state to counteract the growing pressure from the non-slave states. The debates for and against annexation dragged on until President John Tyler annexed Texas with a backhanded political maneuver in the closing days of his presidency in 1845.

This act infuriated Mexico. Remember, the Mexicans didn’t even recognize the independence of Texas, so how could the USA annex part of Mexico? Even so, the Mexicans began to negotiate with the USA. While they did not legally recognize Texan independence, the Mexicans weren’t ignorant to the facts on the ground: Texas wasn’t about to integrate with Mexico any time soon, and it was likely that they would have to concede somewhat in the matter of annexation.

Mexico was prepared to give up the lands north of the Nueces and Medina Rivers. The USA pressed for Mirabeau B. Lamar’s outrageous claims to the lands north and east of the Rio Grande, which included the cities of Albuquerque and Santa Fe, which were most assuredly part of a Mexican region that had never, ever been part of Texas. Given that Tyler had gotten annexation by way of a majority vote on a resolution and not a 2/3rds vote in the Senate to approve a formal treaty on the matter, this was extremely brazen on the part of the USA.

In the negotiations to settle the Texas border, the USA also put on the table an offer to buy up Mexican territory all the way up to and including California. This was also offensive to the Mexicans, and any government that favored selling off half of Mexico didn’t remain in power very long. Heck, no government in Mexico remained in power very long, which proved highly frustrating to the USA’s team of negotiators.

The US sent an army under General Zachary Taylor into the disputed region. How this was supposed to help with the negotiations is a mystery to me. When the Mexicans insisted Taylor withdraw to north of the Nueces, Taylor ordered his men to construct a fort just north of the Rio Grande.

Building a fort in a disputed region is passive-aggressive behavior. It’s an enticement to draw an attack from the other side. Although no blood was shed by the US in building the fort, it constituted an attack on the territory of Mexico. Of course, when the Mexicans responded with an effort to drive the US from their territory in May of 1846, the pro-war guys in the US claimed that was an attack against US troops on US soil.

This wasn’t just a spin job – President Polk told Congress that the USA had been attacked north of the Nueces, and that it had been invaded. Under the Constitution, whenever one state of the USA is attacked, all are attacked, and that was the grounds used to declare war on Mexico. When Congress later discovered that the attack was on US forces in a disputed region, many spoke out vehemently against the war. President Grant later condemned the war as a great evil that the USA had done, and that the Civil War was God’s judgment against the USA for having waged a war of aggression against Mexico.

Or it could have been judgment against the USA for cutting another deal with Santa Anna. Somehow, the USA found the former dictator, this time in exile in Cuba and asked if he could help out in Mexico. Santa Anna promised to take over in Mexico and then sell California and the rest of the territory the USA wanted. This plan worked out as well as the last time the USA collaborated with Santa Anna. He got to Mexico in August 1846, assumed command of its armies, and prepared to fight the USA, tooth and nail.

Up north along the Rio Grande, General Zachary Taylor was busy breaking promises of his own. He’d fought the Mexicans at Palo Alto and had beaten them back to the city of Monterey. He could not take the city by force so he convinced the Mexican commander to withdraw during a cease-fire, then violated the cease-fire to attack and take the city. Zachary Taylor had “won” the day!

An interesting aspect regarding the battle of Monterey was the appearance of the San Patricio battalion in the Mexican army. San Patricio is Spanish for Saint Patrick. As in the St. Patrick’s Day Saint Patrick. The Irish guy. As in, not at all Spanish or Mexican or even Mediterranean. So why would the Mexican army have a unit named after the patron saint of Ireland? Well, it would if it had enough Irish deserters from the US army to justify creation of a special unit. Once the truth about the war was known, a number of Irish Catholics in the US army refused to fight an unjust war against a predominantly Catholic nation and went over to the Mexican side. This made them traitors in the eyes of the USA and every one of the San Patricio soldiers the US captured would face the death penalty.

In spite of Taylor’s “victory” at Monterey and the fall of California to the Bear Flag Revolt and the Mormon Battalion, the generals running the USA’s war effort knew that Mexico still had plenty of fight left in it and would not likely agree to a peace deal. General Winfield Scott, “Old Fuss and Feathers”, offered a plan to end the war with a decisive stroke. His plan was to land at Veracruz, take the port, then march on to Mexico City, essentially repeating Cortes’ plan of invasion. Scott’s plan was approved and he began preparations for executing the first amphibious invasion conducted by US forces.

Zachary Taylor found out about the invasion when some of his forces were withdrawn from his command to go over to Scott. Angered, he decided to get off one more victory before Scott stole the stage. Both men had presidential aspirations and Taylor was going to be damned before he let Scott get the Whig nomination in 1848. I know that seems silly now, but the Whig party was a pretty important bunch back in the 1840s. In February of 1847, Taylor fought Santa Anna at the town of Buena Vista. The battle itself was inconclusive – both sides had fought hard, but neither drove the other from the field. Although Santa Anna had to leave once he got word that folks back in Mexico City had couped his government, he had effectively stopped Taylor from being able to make any further moves, which meant that, strategically, he had won. Taylor had the press on his side, so he was able to “win” one more battle in the war, courtesy of favorable news reporting.

Santa Anna made it back to the capital in time to put down the coup and return to power just ahead of the US invasion in March 1847. Although Veracruz had some formidable fortifications, the US was able to take the city by subjecting its population to direct bombardment. After a couple of weeks of this, Scott then informed the Mexicans that he planned to assault the city without first allowing the women and children to leave. The Mexican commander there refused to be responsible for allowing the people of the town to be raped and pillaged and arranged to surrender the city after 15 days of shelling and civilian casualties. The USA had fought dirty, and it paid off.

Diorama of the harbor of Veracruz at the Naval Academy

Museum. The white-and-yellow building on the right

side of the waterfront is now a Holiday Inn, and is where

I stayed while in Veracruz. The channel between the city

and the fort in the foreground is now built up for the

most part. This is the layout of the city in the 1840s, when

Scott attacked it.

While US combat casualties had been low, Scott was terrified to learn that fully a third of his force was down due to el vomito, the Mexican catch-all term for the various diseases of la tierra caliente, the hot tropical jungle country in and around Veracruz. Scott had to get his forces up to the high country, and quick, before he lost everyone to disease.

Santa Anna knew the US soldiers were suffering among the mosquitoes, and he had a simple plan to keep them there: block the road at the edge of the lowlands. The USA could march all over the lowlands: they’d only get sicker and weaker. They only had to be stopped from getting to the relatively disease-free highlands just beyond the passes of the Sierra Madre Oriental.

Santa Anna’s men dug in just outside the small town of Cerro Gordo, and had everything that could go “bang” pointed down the road the USA would be marching up. Unfortunately for the Mexicans, US cavalry scouts had found a way around their positions. When the US attacked, therefore, it was a flanking move instead of a frontal assault. The Mexicans were routed and, in the commotion of retreat, Santa Anna lost one of his wooden legs.

By May, Scott’s forces had reached Puebla. The people there didn’t care much for Santa Anna, so they didn’t oppose the US forces. This worked out well for the US, since most of its army was either sick or about to go home. A large part of Scott’s force was made up of 90-day volunteers, and their 90 days was set to run out. Scott tried to get them to stay, but nearly all of them had had enough and elected to go home. Back in the States, a new batch of volunteers was being raised to fight for the duration of the war, and they were on their way to Puebla as soon as their units could be put together.

During this vulnerable time, Santa Anna couldn’t attack because he had to rebuild the Mexican army after the reversal at Cerro Gordo. For the next phase of the war, Santa Anna chose to have his men hunker down in the fortifications around the edge of Mexico City. That would give them the best possible edge against the US forces.

In August 1847, Scott’s army was on the move again. He marched his men into the Valley of Mexico and began attacking along the south of the city, starting at Contreras. There, the Mexican forces suffered from commanders that refused to work with each other. In their uncoordination, the Mexicans were vulnerable and the US drove them from that position. Scott then moved against the Mexicans at Churubusco.

The Mexicans should have won the battle of Churubusco. They had everything going for them, save one thing: some goofball in charge of supplying the army had shipped the wrong caliber of ammunition to the forces at Churubusco. They fought as hard as they could, but eventually surrendered to the US forces. The US officer that received the surrender demanded the Mexicans hand over their ammunition: the Mexican commander, General Anaya, replied, “If I had any ammunition, you would not be here.”

The US victory at Churubusco had been costly enough that Scott agreed to a cease-fire after it and started negotiating with the Mexicans to try and end the war.

Caracol displays of the surrender at Churubusco and the storming of Chapultepec.

In September, the negotiations fell apart and Scott resumed the offensive. He defeated the Mexicans at Molino del Rey and then stormed the fortress of Chapultepec, which served as a military academy. I told the story of the cadets of Chapultepec at the start of this section, but the time has come to revisit it.

There they were, in the face of an overwhelming US force that had invaded their nation without just cause, faced with a choice to surrender or die. They were young. None would have faulted them for surrendering. They were outnumbered, surrounded, out of ammunition, without hope. Nothing they could have done would even have forestalled the eventual victory of the USA. And yet, they chose victory in defiance over all their other choices. There may be some question about what finally happened at the Alamo, but there is no question what happened to Los Niños Heroes. Some men die for freedom: those young men died because they could not be free.

After the fall of Chapultepec, Scott ordered that the captured members of the San Patricio battalion be hung in full view of the US colors that had been hoisted above the fortress. Scott then turned his guns upon the city and opened fire on the population at large. Unable to defend the city, the Mexicans withdrew and Scott moved into the National Palace to rule as a military governor.

Santa Anna resigned from the presidency but stayed on as a general, laying siege to the city of Puebla to try and take that vital link on the US supply route. Santa Anna failed to take Puebla. In October 1847, the Mexican government requested that he resign his command and to please stop offering his services to the country.

In February 1848, the Mexicans signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which handed over about half their total nation to the USA. The USA had essentially invaded Mexico to take by force what Mexico was unwilling to sell.

Sadly, Mexico did not catch a break in its political turmoil. It only worsened.

The War of Reform

After the USA left Mexico in 1848, the nation remained a mess. Nothing had changed to cause Mexico to suddenly stop being a place where four presidents could serve in the course of a year. In 1853, Santa Anna somehow wound up as President of Mexico AGAIN, this time at the head of a Conservative coup.

During his time in office, Santa Anna managed to sell off another chunk of Mexico (the Gadsden Purchase), embezzle millions from the government, and enrage everyone in Mexico. Pretty much par for the course in a Santa Anna presidency. And for those who were counting, my guess earlier was right. This was his 11th and final stint in that office. In 1854, the Liberals launched a coup against Santa Anna and in 1855, the Conservatives launched their own coup against Santa Anna and sent him into exile. Everybody was launching coups, left and right.

The Constitution of 1857 in the National Palace

In all the coups, only the Liberals had a plan. The Plan de Ayutla, to be exact. Supporters of the Plan de Ayutla – which declared an intention to overthrow Santa Anna and institute a federal, liberalist government – included military officers, government officials, and a certain exiled former governor of Oaxaca named Benito Juárez.

When Juárez returned from Cuba, that signaled a sea change in Mexican politics. The chaos of the Santa Anna years would give way to the directed efforts of Juarez and the Liberals to try and bring political stability to Mexico. Santa Anna would return to Mexico in the 1870s, but only as a retired old man, ignored by the government because of his irrelevance. He had his day in the sun from 1821 to 1855: From 1855 to 1872, Juárez would be the dominating factor in Mexican politics.

I wonder what Mexico would have been like if all it took to stabilize it was simply getting Santa Anna out of the way. They missed out on the early part of the Industrial Revolution because of his shenanigans, but they could have recovered and still have kept pace with the West, like Japan did. Instead, the reality for Mexico was much more convulsed and violent.

Caracol diorama of the signing of the 1857

Constitution

The Liberals managed to hold on to power, in some form or fashion, for the next few years and produced the Constitution of 1857. The Constitution of 1857 represented a truly revolutionary document for Mexico. It specifically outlined a separation of church and state and placed severe limitations on the power of the Catholic Church: this was a stark contrast to Iturbide’s constitution of 1821 that placed the Catholic Church in a supreme position. The Liberal hostility to the Catholic Church had little to do with the Catholic part and a lot to do with the Church part.

As an institution, the Catholic Church had a massive impact on Mexico, particularly because of its institutional connection with all levels of government there. In its capacity as an arm of the government, the Church acquired a great deal of power, which it used to amass a great deal of land and the wealth that went with it. It became the single largest landholder in Mexico and, as such, deeply involved with first the Centrists, then the Conservatives. The Liberals hoped to reduce its control of property along with the power it held over the people. The Church’s response was to court prominent Conservatives to try and find some way to give the old heave-ho to the Liberals.

In 1858, the Conservative counter-counter-coup started. The Liberals could have exercised their option to have a counter-counter-counter-coup, but wisely chose instead to make the whole affair a civil war, now known as the War of Reform. The War of Reform lasted for three years, with the Conservatives not losing so much as deciding to let the Liberals run the government for a while as they prepared to have another attempt at bashing them into submission. Somewhere in the revolving-door series of governments, the USA tried to buy more Mexican territory, but there never was a government in power long enough to conduct proper negotiations. By the time the War of Reform had run its course, the Civil War in the USA was getting underway, so it was the US’ turn to fail to make it to negotiations in good order.

As the USA was distracted with its own political convulsions, the Conservative faction decided to look to foreign powers for its salvation. It found an ally in the France of Napoleon III. Napoleon III was related to the first Napoleon, but nowhere near as short as his namesake. He came into power in 1852 and if Santa Anna was the “Napoleon of the West”, Napoleon III was the Santa Anna of the Old World. He managed to wreck the politics of not only his own nation for about 20 years, but managed to export his brand of chaos to Mexico.

In 1862, the French under Napoleon III cooked up a wild scheme. Looking to rebuild their empire in America, they targeted Mexico. The Mexican government du jour during the War of Reform kept defaulting on paying interest on the debts it owed to France, Spain, and England. After the war, the government of Benito Juárez couldn’t afford to make those payments, what with the economy in a total wreck at the time. The French then decided it would be a good idea to use the pretext of debt collection to lead them into taking over Mexico.

A multi-national force of French, British, and Spanish troops moved into Veracruz and assumed control of the customs there. The Spanish and British were comfortable with that role, but became suspicious when the rest of the French Foreign Legion showed up with provisions necessary for a long-term campaign in Mexico. The Spanish and British withdrew, but the French pressed on to Mexico City, duplicating the invasion route taken by Scott in 1847.

While Puebla was a refuge of sorts for Scott, it was a redoubt of resistance against the French. The Mexican forces there were ready for a fight, under the command of General Ignacio Zaragoza.

Oh No, Not Again

Birthplace of General Ignacio Zaragoza at the Presidio in

Goliad, Texas. Not a shrine of Texas Independence, but

of Mexican resistance. And a cool Texan.

I should mention at this point that General Zaragoza was born in Goliad, Texas, back when it was part of Mexico. His father was stationed at the presidio there and his family returned to Mexico proper, where he embarked upon a military career. During the War of Reform, he led the Liberals alongside Juárez and helped them come out on top. But he made his undying name for himself at the Battle of Puebla, fought on the Fifth of May, 1862.

And he was a Texan. I cannot stress that enough. Actually, it’s quite likely that non-Texans are thinking there is a way to stress that enough, and that I did that plenty enough a couple pages ago. For Texans, however, I cannot stress things related to Texas enough. Being a Texan, I’m of that opinion, myself. So, Texas Texas Texas Texas Texas Texas. Zaragoza, hero of all Mexico, was a Texan. Great general, man of the people, lots of good things – and why? He was a TEXAN. Yee-haw! Time to sing another stupid Texas song… hehehe…

OK, time to get back to the Mexico part of this book, it being Mexico: A Personal History, after all.

Cinco de Mayo

There’s a reason why “Cinco de Mayo” is a holiday celebrated by Mexican communities around the world. What’s unusual to me is that it’s only recently caught on as a celebration inside Mexico. Go figure, huh?

Cinco de Mayo, of course, is the day on which General Zaragoza (a Texan, by the way) won his last victory. In his favor, the French were really really sick after coming up from Veracruz, and weren’t at their fighting best. Well, too bad for them: Zaragoza went ahead and beat them down, Texas-style, as the French assaulted his hillside position at Puebla.

Caracol diorama of the Battle of Puebla, 1862. It’s

hard to see, but the French are losing the battle.

Zaragoza, contrary to popular misconception, did not die at the battle, but got sick and died a short while after the battle. His dying words were an exhortation to his countrymen to fight on for their freedom and to never, ever give up. This Texan was a real inspiration to his nation, and I can’t help but admire him.

The 5th of May itself became used as a reason to celebrate in Mexican-American neighborhoods in the 1900s. It never was a holiday inside of Mexico until after it arrived there courtesy of links with the communities back in the USA. Not everyone celebrating Cinco de Mayo knows what happened on the day, but they celebrate Mexican culture all the same. Of those that do know what happened on that day, not all know that the battle only slowed down the French advance. After their defeat at Puebla, the French sent over more troops and managed to win their day at the Second Battle of Puebla in 1863. From that victory, the French went on to occupy Mexico City.

Once the French took over the capital, Juárez took his fight to the hills. The French could hold down the cities and patrolled the important roads between Mexico City and the coast, but the Liberal resistance lived on in the rough back country, where it increased in strength over the years. The Conservatives in the cities pushed to have some form of indigenous government so they could charge the Liberals with treason. After all, if the French were in charge, then the Liberals basically made up the legitimate resistance and the Conservatives made up the collaborators.

In 1864, the Conservatives rejoiced to hear that Napoleon III had found an emperor for them. They hoped that their new emperor would champion the Catholic Church and rich folks everywhere as Iturbide had done. What they got was not at all what they wanted. It wasn’t what the Liberals wanted, either.

Poor Emperor Maximilian.  He really wanted to be a good monarch. He learned some Spanish before going over to Mexico and he hoped to be a leader for all of Mexico. Heck, he even told Napoleon III that he wouldn’t go over there if the people weren’t ready to receive him. Napoleon III lied and Maximilian packed his bags.

Equestrian portrait of Maximilian, from the museum in

Chapultepec Castle. The thing is life-size… HUUUGE…

When Maximilian arrived in Mexico, he noticed that the only people that came out to greet him with enthusiasm were the French soldiers, high society swells, and fancy-dress churchmen. Right away, he knew he was going to be in for a rough ride. When he let the Church know that he wasn’t going to undo all the provisions of the 1857 constitution, his ride got rougher. When he tried to rein in the excesses of the upper classes, that made his experience rougher still. When Maximilian showed more resolve as a ruler than Napoleon III had hoped for and proved not to be a puppet of the French, Maximilian’s ride not only got as rough as it could be, but got to where one could start a dead pool on when it would end.

Maximilian ruled from Chapultepec Fortress, which he converted into a vast palace. He lived in a grand style that stood out in stark contrast to the poverty in the city below his royal perch. He tried to rule benevolently, but could not be as kind as he wished to be due to the constant unrest from the Liberal partisans. He passed a law that condemned all rebels to death as traitors, but that only stiffened the resolve of the Liberals to fight on even harder than before.

Benito Juárez promised that when the Liberals won, they would execute Maximilian and his top advisors for having passed the death sentence against his movement. With the military leadership of one Porfirio Diaz, the Liberal victory seemed much more likely. Diaz did a great job of beating down the French armies and became hugely popular among the people.

As if Maximilian didn’t already have enough on his plate, the US Civil War ended in 1865 and the government of the USA started shipping war surplus arms and equipment to the Liberals. Then, in 1866, the Prussians clobbered the Austrians. Napoleon III took that war as an opportunity to make a grand gesture on the world stage: he mediated the peace agreement between Austria and Prussia. In the course of his mediation, he managed to make Prussia the most powerful state on continental Europe. Apparently, in his zeal to look dashing and magnificent, Napoleon III forgot that Prussia shared a border with the French and that they were a highly militaristic nation, prone to invade just about anyone at the drop of a hat.

Once he finished the negotiations, Napoleon III realized his goof and started pulling French troops out of Mexico to fortify the border with Prussia. As the situation for Maximilian deteriorated in 1867, Napoleon III offered him a stay in France as his guest. Maximilian refused: he chose to die in his adopted Mexico.

Caracol dioramas of Diaz’ forces scoring a victory against the French and the execution of

Maximilian. In the Maximilian diorama, there are gun barrels pointed at him from where the

viewer stands: one could hunker down and stare across a barrel at Maximilian and get an idea

of what it would be like to be in his firing squad. Kinda eerie, if you ask me…

Juárez’ forces caught Maximilian outside of Querétaro in 1867 and made good on Juárez’ promise. The Catholic Church pled for mercy, but Juárez responded that Maximilian – and his supporters in the Catholic Church – should have shown mercy to the many, many Liberals that were executed as traitors. The Mexicans executed Maximilian and while they do not revile him, they do not lionize him, either. Maximilian is viewed with pity in Mexican history, as the weak-chinned son of a dying European monarchy who tried to hide his inadequacies behind a massive set of red sideburns that came to a forked beard. In the end, the beard was insufficient to cover up all of Maximilian’s shortcomings.

¡Sufragio Efectivo! ¡No Reelección!

The Constitution of 1857 stipulated that the President of Mexico could not stand for re-election. In 1867, many in Mexico felt that Juárez didn’t really serve a term as President, what with the French occupation and all, and that he should be able to stand for election in 1867. However, and if it wasn’t for that however, there wouldn’t be a need for this section, certain members of the Liberal movement felt that any re-election was a betrayal of their principles. Two Liberals stepped up to oppose Juárez’ re-election bid: Sebastian Lerdo de Tejada and Porfirio Diaz. Of the two, Diaz was the strongest opponent of re-election.

Juárez managed to fend off criticism handily and won a full term of office in 1867. He would serve his entire term, without interruption, making him the first ever Mexican president to do so. What a difference made by not having a foreign invasion or Santa Anna around, eh?

Shortly after Juárez’ re-election, a certain Gabino Barreda opened up a school in Mexico. Barreda’s school focused on the teaching of Comtian Positivism, named for its originator, the French philosopher Comte. Comte taught that everything had a hierarchy: in the sciences, Physics served as the base of everything, with Chemistry and Biology added on top of Physics as special, more elaborate cases of the sciences beneath. Ultimately, Comte postulated, society could be governed by science and that the social sciences of Psychology and Sociology would serve as the greatest of all sciences in their effect upon humanity.

Therefore, thanks to Comte, we have sociologists. My beef with sociology is that it quite frequently involves bad science and its conclusions are injurious to society, not beneficial. In physics, chemistry, and biology, experiments can be conducted that limit variables so that a single phenomenon can be observed. Most of the time. There are cases in those sciences when no experiment or model can be constructed to properly replicate or test a given phenomenon. Take the case of gravitational attraction between three or more bodies of significant masses: can’t be done. We simply don’t have the math necessary to handle that crazy of a situation. Now consider a crowd made up of human individuals: human free will is one hellacious statistical variable, as Jim Dunnigan once said, and those guys can really surprise someone trying to predict their behavior.

I’m not going to knock all of sociology or psychology. I teach, and some of what those fields have to offer is useful in the classroom as far as knowing my enemy (the students) and dispatching their challenges. But there’s no way I can count on any particular day being predictable along lines drawn out by some scholar somewhere. Those scholars simply haven’t yet accounted for all possible variables in their calculations about how humans roll.

I’m a 21st-Century cynic, though. The Comtians I’m writing about were 19th-Century scientific enthusiasts. These guys tended to be biased in their interpretations of society in favor of the rich and powerful. That makes sense to me. I mean, when was the last time the poor and powerless ever started dishing out research grants? When was the last time the rich and powerful sponsored the research of someone that undermined their position? The Comtians grabbed hold of notions that justified a more authoritarian structure in society. Social Darwinism was a popular idea for them: people rise to positions of power based upon their fitness – if someone’s in power, then he must be fit. They also liked elitist models of society in which the people at the top had to be at the top for society to work.

Basically, the Comtians wanted humanity to be more like an ant colony than a collection of individuals. Just about any authoritarian wants those beneath him to be like an ant colony, bereft of ambition and determined to work hard until death. The authoritarian employs advisors and security forces that help maintain that order, even if it means killing off those among the powerless that are not yet bereft of ambition or possessed of a mind to work hard until death. So it goes, and the Comtians were partial to such arrangements. Barreda’s school made such partiality popular in Mexico.

One could see this move away from Liberalism as Juárez’ presidency continued. Juárez began to sponsor projects to build railroads and improve the ports of Mexico, while consolidating power at the presidency. He started slowly, as he still had to put Mexico’s finances into order.

By 1870, Juárez did not feel that his work was done and decided to run for re-election after serving a full term. Again, this was too much for the Liberals. Lerdo de Tejada and Diaz opposed Juárez in the 1871 election. Juárez won the election and invited Lerdo de Tejada to join his government. Diaz started an armed rebellion. Diaz eventually came to heel, but never whole-heartedly supported Juárez’ last term in office.

It was Juárez’ last term because he died in 1872. In the election that followed Juárez’ death, Lerdo de Tejada rigged the results and won handily. Lerdo de Tejada continued to advance Comtian policies in Mexico during his term in office. Diaz remained in abeyance to Lerdo de Tejada until 1876, when Lerdo de Tejada attempted to run for re-election. Diaz rose up and, with the rallying cry of “¡Sufragio efectivo! ¡No reelección!” (Effective suffrage! No re-election!), managed to lose the election.

A portrait of Diaz as a younger officer, from the

Museum of the Revolution in Mexico City. It’s a

brief walk from Alameda Central, located in the

Plaza de la Republica.

Seems as though Lerdo de Tejada had rigged the 1876 election, as well. Diaz started another revolt. Because Lerdo de Tejada wasn’t a man with the stature of Juárez, Diaz’ revolt succeeded in overthrowing him. Who became president after Lerdo de Tejada? Why, the self-appointed champion of the people himself, Porfirio Diaz!

Diaz may have been a general with an opportunistic eye for the presidency, but he was no Santa Anna. He took his presidency seriously and worked to improve the economy of Mexico, as had his predecessors, but to a much greater extent: in 1880, the Ministry of Development got a bigger budget than the army. He patched up relations with the USA and stood strong for Mexican territorial sovereignty by insisting that the USA not cross the Mexican border when pursuing Indians. Diaz also kept his promise to not run for re-election, and Manuel Gonzalez became President of Mexico in 1880, in the first peaceful transfer of power Mexico had in a very very long time.

Sufragio Efectivo, No. Reelección.

The transfer of power to Gonzalez went so peacefully because Diaz kept a firm hand on the real power in Mexico – Gonzalez was his puppet. Diaz later returned to the presidency and held on to it until 1910. Thus, the period from 1876 to 1910 is known as the Porfiriato, the time Porfirio Diaz ruled Mexico as its maximum president for life.

These times were not all hardness and suffering: Mexicans grew in pride for their nation and continued to celebrate their unique heritage, as they had been doing more and more since 1821. Landscape painters took a page from the Hudson River School in the USA and went out to show what made Mexico so Mexican. Sculptors and historical painters began to show more of the beauty of the people and their Indian ancestors. Authors wrote up the foundation of a Mexican body of literature. No time in Mexico is uniformly good or bad. All times there are complicated, to one extent or another.

Close-up of the railroads Diaz had built in

Mexico. Most linked the outlying areas with

Mexico City itself. One could control Mexico

by occupying the key railroad centers, which

is what forces in the Revolution would do.

(Display from the Museum of the Revolution.)

Back to the Caracol and a view of a scene in

Posada’s print shop when he  ran a broad

sheet that didn’t please Diaz’ government…

Stop the presses, nothing! They’re gonna

SMASH them!

The Porfiriato definitely took after the motto of Comte: “Order and progress.” Things such as rights and liberties were secondary to the increase of law and order and the development of industry in Mexico. Diaz reorganized the police forces of Mexico and brought the bandits that had plagued the land under control – they could either join the police or hang from a high branch. The same police force often acted with a heavy and corrupt hand where it had power, but overall they kept the peace. Diaz sold off “unused” public lands in 1883 and created a mining law in 1884 that allowed outsiders to run the mineral interests of Mexico for fun and profit. Such measures were necessary for the greater progress of Mexico, displaced peasants and abused workers aside.

So, yes, the railroads went into places they’d never been to before and the ports were opened up to handle more commerce than ever before, but…

Politically, people really did want those rights and liberties, even if it meant a harder life. In 1888, the same year that the Minister of the Treasury Dublán refinanced the debts of Mexico so it could borrow tons more money for infrastructure projects, José Guadalupe Posada started printing off little broadsheet commentaries in Mexico City. Posada’s one-pagers covered sensational executions of Diaz’ political opponents and made scathing social commentary by way of his “calavera” figures. Posada never got rich off his broadsheets, but he made a living of sorts. I mean, there was the odd time or two that Diaz’ boys would swoop in and bust up his shop because Posada’s veiled commentary wasn’t veiled enough, but on the whole, Posada made it through the Porfiriato in one piece.

Porfirio Diaz made it through the Porfiriato in one piece, as well. A rather nice-sized piece, if I should say so myself. He moved into the Chapultepec palace that Maximilian had used and then proceeded to live in Maximilian’s style. Diaz made sure that he never lost an election, which meant he was the de facto emperor of Mexico. No real rebellion rose up to topple him, not like the one that took down Maximilian. I suppose it’s because Diaz was an emperor from Mexico itself, rather than some foreigner imposed upon Mexico by an outside power. People seem to have more tolerance for home-grown tyrants for some reason, and I’ll never really understand why.

Porfirio Diaz’ dining room at Chapultepec Castle.

“Prices and Salaries in the Porfiriato” – from the

Museum of the Revolution. Looking these over, it’s

easy to see how hard times could be in Mexico, with

prices and wages where they were. A soldier, for

example, got the big salary of .38 pesos per day: beans

were .14 pesos per kg and corn .07. So, sure, he could

afford to buy food, but what else? The biggest wages

went to those who worked for the gringos…

Meanwhile, the folks beneath the palace tended to suffer. Because of the way Mexico borrowed money during the Porfiriato, it had to mint a lot more silver pesos to back up its money supply. That meant a lot more inflation for the people of Mexico. I have a picture around here to demonstrate the rocketing prices from 1876-1910… let me get it… there it is, in a caption box off on the side. Look it over.

But, yeah… inflation… ouch… there was also the matter of preferential wages for foreigners. Norteamericanos and Europeans were paid way more than their Mexican counterparts for the same labor. In the mining industry, where this was most prevalent, the Mexican workers really grated under such conditions and became increasingly more agitated and organized in their resistance to the scheme of things.

The occasional execution didn’t silence all of Diaz’ opponents. A number of them fled to the USA, where they would publish books and magazines critical of the Diaz regime. Diaz would use his connections in US politics – by way of his connections in US business – and have his critics shut down by being declared dangerous Socialist agitators. Republican presidencies were especially friendly to Diaz’ requests, and Taft the friendliest of them all.

As for the Church, Diaz never suspended the anti-clerical provisions of the Constitution of 1857, but he did opt for a policy of non-enforcement. In 1895, he participated in a ceremonial crowning of the Virgin of Guadalupe, something Juárez would never have done. Diaz cozied up to the Church and, in return, the Church warmed to Diaz and his regime. Diaz also made nice with Protestant denominations in Mexico, just to remind the Catholic Church that it wasn’t the only religious game in town. It was the biggest, sure, but not the only one…

Perhaps the most important arrangement to come out of the Porfiriato was Mexico’s oil concession. Diaz handed over control of Mexico’s oil fields to British and US interests in exchange for some rather nice, uh… finder’s fees, we’ll call them. Because Diaz would never have accepted a bribe. Ever. Got that? Good. I wouldn’t want anyone thinking that Diaz was some kind of crook, because he was not a crook. Whenever the president does anything, it’s not illegal. I think.

(Author’s photo from the National Museum of Art, Mexico City) One of Posada’s more sensationalist

broadsheets, depicting “The Execution of the Day.” Notice how the poor soul being shot is not

only in a tragic pose, but is clutching a cross as he is cruelly slain by the grimacing soldiers.

Anyway, the city of Tampico practically became a suburb of Houston – which is a Texas city, I should note.

Do We REALLY Need Another Section for This? No, We Do Not

In Tampico, as well as the rest of urban Mexico, foreigners enjoyed a sort of “wink and a nod” type of extraterritoriality. Mexicans had one kind of law – harsh – and gringos had another, thanks to their special relationship with Mexican industry. In the countryside, gringos enjoyed similar exemption from Mexican laws, along with the rich landholders.

Speaking of the landholders, they got away with all kinds of evil deeds, up to and including murder. Most of them would constantly redraw the boundaries of their estates to encroach upon the village holdings of the peasants. The village holdings themselves were constitutionally suspect, thanks to provisions in the 1857 constitution to combat the corporate holdings of the Church. Those laws got turned on the village holdings to the economic benefit of the big sugar planters and coffee growers.

(Author’s photo from the National Museum of Art, Mexico City) During the Porfiriato, painters like

Velasco painted grand landscapes of Mexico. At first, they would give an idea of scale by having

several human figures in the foreground, but as Diaz built rails across Mexico, they painted the

trains into their pictures to capture the novelty of the development.

The poor became not only poorer, thanks to the inflation, but increasingly marginalized and disenfranchised. About all they had left was their pent-up rage and wry political satire, courtesy of a crazy man.

Nicholás Zuñiga y Miranda was a former professional earthquake predictor who ran against Porfirio Diaz starting in 1892. Diaz would win about 95-99% of the vote and Zuñiga y Miranda would lose the election. Of course, whenever someone wins an election with over 80% of the popular vote, he rigged the election. That means Diaz did some majorly aggressive rigging in his elections. Zuñiga y Miranda declared the official results to be a fraud and would announce that he was the only legitimate president.

Now, any sane person in Mexico that tried to point out how badly Diaz rigged his elections would have wound up in prison, dead, or both. No sane person ever declared himself the legitimate president instead of Diaz – Diaz’ opponents were either carefully-chosen ringers or they got whacked, mid-campaign. Zuñiga y Miranda, however, was as nutty as a fruitcake. He dressed up in his hat and tails and presidential sash and denounced Diaz all day and all through the night, and no harm ever came to him. Zuñiga y Miranda was the toast of the town in Mexico City and often dined for free at fine restaurants.

That’s what happens if you go over-the-top in your craziness. Up in San Francisco, Emperor Norton had the same deal going for him: he dressed up fancy and proclaimed himself to be the Emperor of the United States. Both Norton and Zuñiga y Miranda believed in themselves. Not in the pep talk kind of “believe in yourself” kind of way, but in the delusional maniac sort of way. If you really and truly believe in yourself and have a snappy way of dressing, you’ll go far in life.

Porfirio Diaz in his later years. This painting is life-

size. Diaz remained a fit and active man during his

rule over Mexico. (Author’s photo of the big ol’ paint-

ing in Chapultepec Castle.)

Every time Diaz ran for re-election and beat Zuñiga y Miranda, the people of Mexico had one more joke besides the election. They could take Diaz’ old slogan: “¡Sufragio efectivo! ¡No reelección!” (Effective suffrage! No re-election!), and change it to “Sufragio efectivo, no. Reelección.” (Effective suffrage… no… Re-election.). All that was needed for the whole place to go up in flames was the right kind of spark.

La Sucesión Presidencial en 1910

In 1899, Dublán restructured Mexico’s debts again and kept the financial ship sailing along smoothly. Major nations like France, Germany, the UK, and the USA maintained full embassies in Mexico City as they did with the other major nations of the world – less important nations rated mere consulates. Foreign businesses made comfortable profits in Mexico and never had to worry about legal hassles: for a fee, anything in Mexico could be “arranged.”

1900 came and went with Mexico looking as stable as ever.

In 1901, Porfirio Diaz got sick.

He got better again, but his illness sent a shock throughout Mexico. What would happen when Diaz died, as all men must one day do? Suddenly, everyone in Mexican politics began to ask for the constitution to be amended to create the office of a vice-president. Diaz became wary of any potential successor that looked too eager to handle the awful responsibility of serving after a deceased president. When Mexico added a vice-president in 1904, Diaz pulled a Dick Cheney. He made sure to choose a running mate that NOBODY wanted to see become president. Diaz then became the best-protected national leader in the world.

At the top levels, Mexican politics seemed pretty well set for the short term. Underneath that surface, things started to bubble and boil. Mexico began to wake up in the early 1900s, in many ways.

Two views of Mexico from Dr. Atl. The top is a land-

scape that hangs in the National Museum of Art and

the second is his conception of what ancient Tenoch-

titlan must have looked like before the Spanish got

there. His colors are bold and saturated, making a

clear break with the earlier landscape artists like

Velasco. Works like these would influence the next

generation of Mexican artists.

Artistically, Mexico had already been exploring native themes during the Porfiriato. In 1902, an instructor at the Academy of San Carlos – a premier art school in Mexico – one Gerardo Murillo, changed his name to “Dr. Atl.” Atl is the Nahuatl word for “water.” Dr. Atl then encouraged Mexican artists to reject using the European vocabulary for their art and to seek out an indigenous way of representing indigenous subjects. He favored murals as a medium of presentation for two reasons: one, they were reminiscent of the massive murals of ancient Mexico, and; two, they were so massive that they practically had to be displayed in public for everyone to see and enjoy – they could not be kept in private hands, not easily at any rate.

Dr. Atl painted massive landscapes of ancient Mexico, including a view of Tenochtitlan as it was before the Spanish conquest. His works were more important for who they inspired than they were for their own artistic merits. I like them well enough, but when I see the murals of Rivera, Siqueiros, Orozco, and Tamayo, I realize that Dr. Atl didn’t just inspire the new generation of Mexican artists to paint a bunch of murals: he showed them the way to break into the Modern era, no longer dependent on Europe or the United States as the only sources of inspiration.

(Author’s photo from the National Museum of Art)

During the latter part of the Porfiriato and the

early years of the Revolution, Diego Rivera

studied abroad and painted works such as

this. While he flirts with Cubism in this port-

rait, it is nothing like the works he would later

do during the Revolution itself. During these

early years, he had yet to break completely

free from the European way of painting.

As the art scene warmed up, politicians with an eye toward a post-Diaz future increased the number and intensity of their calls for a change in the status quo in Mexico. They called for democracy. They called for more of Mexico’s wealth to go to its people, not just wealthy foreigners. They called for, in a word, revolution.

Through the last part of the 19th Century, the world stirred with unrest: nationalist movements gained traction in the far-flung European empires and factory workers fought for the right to be treated as humans and not natural resources by factory owners. In the early part of the 20th Century, those movements threatened a violent upheaval. Proponents of those movements saw that violence as necessary: the old order would have to be destroyed for a new one to emerge, they reasoned. Moderates in the movements tried non-violent approaches, but with no real success. Oppression claimed the lives of many a moderate, leading their fellow-travelers to shift their views to support more radical positions.

The Mexican experience serves as an example of this pattern. Early pioneers for liberalization such as the Magón brothers found themselves in prison soon after publishing influential papers. Even if they were in the USA, Diaz managed to use his contacts there to silence his opponents. Francisco Madero managed to escape imprisonment, but his writings from the underground became more and more violent in response to Diaz’ increased pressure on him.

Interestingly enough, Madero didn’t start out with the intention to overthrow Diaz. Initially, he only wanted to succeed Diaz, and the idea for that came from Diaz himself, courtesy of a 1908 interview with James Creelman.

Interview with a Dictator

How about that interview, then? It’s considered to be the document that started the Mexican Revolution. I did a quick search on Google and found the text. The first four paragraphs are a description of Diaz, making him out to be larger than life with particular emphasis on his eyes and nostrils. That’s pretty clever, really, describing someone by the expressiveness of his nostrils. Then comes this nice summary: “For twenty-seven years he has governed the Mexican Republic with such power that national elections have become mere formalities. He might easily have set a crown upon his head.”

The Palacio de Bellas Artes, Porfirio Diaz’ massive Art Deco edifice. It was built to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Father Hidalgo’s rebellion, but soon after it was built, Diaz himself had to deal with the outbreak of rebellion against his rule.

Creelman then moves into discussing Diaz’ plans for the future, with a quote from El Presidente himself: “It is a mistake to suppose that the future of democracy in Mexico has been endangered by the long continuance in office of one President… I believe democracy to be the one true, just principle of government, although in practice it is possible only to highly developed peoples.”

Was Mexico ready for democracy at the time? In the interview, Diaz explained that Mexico wasn’t ready when he came into power, but that he had an election, all the same. Diaz acknowledged that he certainly did win many elections, but that was only because the people of Mexico loved him: “I have tried to leave the Presidency several times, but it has been pressed upon me and I remained in office for the sake of the nation which trusted me.”

Diaz went on to say that Mexico didn’t have much of a middle class and the rural Indian population had no clue about politics beyond being told by their supervisors what to do. All the same, he felt there were enough folks in Mexico with sense enough to vote to try and get some democracy going: “Yet I firmly believe that the principles of democracy have grown and will grow in Mexico.”

Creelman asked Diaz where the necessary opposition party was to keep the party in power in check. Diaz responded: “It is true there is no opposition party. I have so many friends in the republic that my enemies seem unwilling to identify themselves with so small a minority.” But, Diaz had to do what he had to do. Someone would have to form some kind of opposition party when he retired. Diaz said he’d help whoever was running the government, but that it’d have to be someone else. Not him.

Diaz bragged about all the progress during his reign, all the rail lines built, the expansion of a reliable postal service, Mexico’s new telegraph system. Sure, it all came at a cost of great cruelty, but that cruelty was necessary to save the nation, according to Diaz. The article went on to discuss how much foreign capital was in Mexico and how smooth everything seemed to be, closing with a gushing endorsement from the US Secretary of State Elihu Root – really, a quite flattering article for Diaz. Who knew that such a puff piece would make things explode all over Mexico?

From the Museum of the Revolution: my son

Calvin is on the left, Madero is on the right.

Politically, Madero was more to

the left. They are both about 5’6” tall at the

time of this photo in July 2008.

The dynamite was in the early part, when Diaz said Mexico was ready for democracy. Nobody saw that coming, but once Diaz said it, the proverbial cat was out of the proverbial bag. Most scholars of Mexican History agree that Diaz intended his comments for US consumption, but that they leaked back into Mexico and created a political firestorm. Most of Mexico’s upper classes scoffed at the idea of peasants taking up ballots and actually voting, but leaders among Mexico’s peasantry saw that if they could take up ballots, they could also demand limits on upper-class excesses. If the upper-class didn’t reel itself in, some of the peasant leaders talked about turning to violence to solve their problems.

Were these guys Marxists? No. They were not. While Marxist thought had a certain appeal to people that wanted to smash the state and line the rich up against the wall, Mexicans had been thinking along those lines for centuries and had actually had some degree of success with social revolutions in both the War for Independence and the War of Reform. The leaders of the peasant movements leading up to 1910 were the children of Juárez and the grandchildren of Hidalgo, psychologically speaking.

Diaz became so worried about the stir he’d created about democracy that he sent his most likely political rival, Bernardo Reyes, on a diplomatic mission so that he’d be out of the country and unable to organize an effective opposition. No matter: there were plenty more Mexicans that wanted a chance to either run as Diaz’ extremely eager vice-president or in opposition to him as an actual presidential candidate.

One of those guys was Francisco Madero. Madero came from a very wealthy family with political aspirations, kind of like the Kennedys. Also like the Kennedys, Madero and his brother, Gustavo, were politically active. Also also like the Kennedys, Madero became president of his nation. Also also also like the Kennedys, Madero and his brother, Gustavo, were murdered. Unlike the Kennedys, everyone knows that the Madero brothers were killed because of a vast right-wing conspiracy against them.

Of course, they had to get into power first. They started their political careers in 1904 after the aforementioned Reyes, then the governor of Nuevo Leon, used some pretty frightening ultraviolence to suppress an anti-government demonstration. Francisco Madero ran for local office and lost. He started casting around for solutions to his problems and found his answers in Benito Juárez.

“But Juárez was dead!” I hear you say. Well, I don’t really hear you saying that, as you’re reading this book long after I’ve written it. I just thought it would be a clever rhetorical device. Now that I think about it, yes, I agree it was wrong for me to presume that you’d say such a thing. All the same, the rhetorical device stands: I rhetorically hear you say that, OK? But being dead worked just fine for Madero, as he was into spiritualism: he believed that he could channel the spirit of the dead Juárez and use that to guide Mexico into a wonderful, democratic destiny.

(Author’s photo from the Museum of the Revolution)

Madero used Diaz’ old slogan against him in

his political propaganda.

Madero started a political newspaper in 1905. He also started a satirical magazine, El Mosco, in the same year. As he faced increased persecution and opposition, he started to heed the advice of more radical spirits, chief among them one named José. I don’t know who José was. Madero just started listening to him around 1907, that’s all. José advocated more radical measures. José and his buddies also told Madero to become a vegetarian and to give up alcohol. Madero was able to launch several more opposition newspapers with the money he used to spend on pork chops and tequila.

When Madero and his spirit posse got wind of the Creelman article, the spirits encouraged Madero to write a book. Juárez’ spirit was in agreement with the others, so Madero went all-out in his efforts to break into publishing. He was already rich, which is a decided advantage in gaining recognition for one’s creative arts. He published The Presidential Succession of 1910 in late 1908 and the book became a bestseller in Mexico. Sales were no doubt aided by his decision to publish it in Spanish and to title it La sucesión presidencial en 1910.

In his book, Madero praised Diaz for stabilizing the politics of Mexico and bringing economic development to the country, but criticized Diaz for being too heavy-handed in his rule and too cozy with foreign interests. An example of Diaz’ heavy-handed coziness was apparent in the Cananea strike of 1906.

Caracol diorama of the Arizona Rangers firing

upon the Cananea strikers in 1906.

Cananea is a Mexican city near the border with Arizona. In 1906, the Mexican workers in the mines there demanded better working conditions and more pay. The owners of the mine, Americans, refused, and the miners responded by setting the owners on fire. The strikers then marched on the municipal government and met a hail of bullets from the Arizona Rangers. Yes, sports fans, Diaz had allowed US soldiers to be used in suppressing a domestic matter. That was a very bad no-no in Mexican politics.

Madero’s book went through several editions in 1909, with each edition taking on a stronger editorial line. Through his popularity, he managed to form an opposition party to Diaz and stood to challenge him in the 1910 election, accepting his party’s nomination in April 1910. Of course, Madero expected fraud from Diaz’ people and stated “Force shall be met by force!”

Two months after his nomination, Madero found himself in a Monterey jail, courtesy of Diaz’ goon squad. While in jail, Madero learned that Diaz “won” the “election”. Madero’s father managed to use his influence with the local politicos to get Madero released on bail. Madero then decided to skip bail and fled to the USA in October 1910, where he called for a revolution against Diaz to start promptly at 6 PM on 20 November 1910.

I submit that as proof that Madero was, at best, totally out of touch with the people of Mexico and, at worst, a loony. Nothing happens in Mexico on time. The Aztec calendar predicted total destruction for their empire in 1519, remember? That took two whole years to happen. Heck, I was supposed to have finished with this book months ago. I blame Mexican concepts of deadlines for my lateness. As for Madero, really, he should have known better. He planned to ride to the border to meet up with his uncle and 400 armed horsemen at that time. His uncle was a little late and only had 10 men with him. Madero then postponed his revolution and wandered off to New Orleans.

This being Mexico, the revolution had already started up in Chihuahua and down in Morelos. In Chihuahua, Pascual Orozco started his revolution on 31 October 1910 and managed to take over that state by the end of the year. In Morelos, years of frustration in dealing with local authorities finally resulted in violent uprising, led by Emiliano Zapata. After Madero’s due date, other revolts kicked off in the north and south. Northern rebels tended to be centered around charismatic leaders with no particularly well-defined set of post-revolutionary goals – Pancho Villa was the most well-known of this bunch. Southern rebels followed Zapata’s methods and joined him in his broad calls for land reform and social re-ordering. Both the northern and southern movements supported Madero, who they saw as the best guy to run Mexico once Diaz got the heave-ho.

Madero himself re-entered Mexico in February 1911, arriving in Orozco’s Chihuahua in time to lead the revolution at a time when Diaz’ forces were clearly on the run. In a few short months, the massive popular uprising had left Diaz without any solid base of support. Diaz made a few cosmetic changes in April 1911, but Madero demanded his resignation. Madero got his wish after Orozco (along with his sub-commander Villa) defeated government forces at the Battle of Ciudad Juárez in May 1911.

(Author’s photos from the Museum of the Revolution.) The first revolutionaries: Pascual Orozco on the left and Emiliano Zapata on the right. Yes, they’re all about the same height as my son. Everyone in Mexican history is the same height as my son, it seems, except for Vicente Fox, who is 6’5”. That’s one inch taller than me. Anyway, these leaders were able to mold effective fighting forces out of the peasants and workers in their areas and defeat many a federal army.

Madero had called for a cease fire in May and, this being Mexico, the forces directly under his command carried on fighting, resulting in a great victory for their leader. Then they could have the cease fire. Better late than never, right? Timing’s such a subjective consideration, anyway.

In the Treaty of Ciudad Juárez, Diaz agreed to step down and leave Mexico. An interim president would have the sole job of issuing a writ for new elections later in the year. Madero entered Mexico City in triumph on 7 June 1911, with the city celebrating his arrival in a huge way.

Epic Fail and Loathing in Mexico City

The same guy who thought he could coordinate revolutionary action all across Mexico also thought he could run the place with most of Diaz’ hand-picked henchmen still running Congress and the bureaucracy. I know we often encourage people with the phrase, “dare to dream,” but someone really should have applied the brakes to Madero’s dreamworks. For starters, he worked on writing a book on spiritualism during the interim between kicking Diaz out and the November election. The whole country was in chaos, and he decided that it would be a great time to write a book? Not even George “Dubya” Bush would do that. To be fair, one could question if Dubya would ever write a book, regardless of the overall political circumstances.

Caracol diorama of Madero’s entry into Mexico

City. The shell of steel girders behind him is the

Arch of the Republic, which Diaz hadn’t yet fin-

ished.

Meanwhile, in Morelos, Zapata was keeping an

eye on things… he didn’t entirely trust Madero.

Madero also fell for the conservatives’ ploy to characterize Zapata as “The Attila of the South.” Yes, Zapata was an amazing commander but, no, his forces did not commit atrocities on the scale the conservatives hollered about. Heck, he wasn’t even as bad as Pancho Villa, even though his followers had every right to do to the landowners what had been done to them for generations. Madero tried to get Zapata to disarm his followers by promising land reform. Zapata then asked what his disarmed followers were supposed to do when the government army under Victoriano Huerta got to Morelos.

Madero had no clue that the interim president Diaz had appointed had also ordered Huerta to move against Zapata. Madero wrote a letter of complaint which had zero effect. Zapata’s men remained armed and active in fighting Huerta – and were now also very wary of any promises made by the out-of-touch and ineffective Madero.

Madero felt like Zapata was the one who was out-of-touch. In November, evidence emerged to support the view that Zapata was the one with his head screwed on straight and Madero the one with no idea what to do with a presidency he’d stumbled his way into. Madero won the presidential election and chose to rule as a leader of national unity, which meant he kept a lot of Diaz supporters in his cabinet. He proposed sweeping reforms to the Congress and the Senate shot them down – the Senators were mostly Diaz men, after all. Madero’s supporters criticized him openly for not getting his legislative program off the ground.

Zapata had his own protest – The Plan of Ayala. The Plan of Ayala, written not only in Spanish but also Nahuatl, called for extensive land reform and dismantlement of government along the lines of something the anarchist Peter Kropotkin would have suggested. Kropotkin defined “Anarchism” in the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica:

ANARCHISM (from the Gr. an and archos, contrary to authority), the name given to a principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government - harmony in such a society being obtained, not by submission to law, or by obedience to any authority, but by free agreements concluded between the various groups, territorial and professional, freely constituted for the sake of production and consumption, as also for the satisfaction of the infinite variety of needs and aspirations of a civilized being. In a society developed on these lines, the voluntary associations which already now begin to cover all the fields of human activity would take a still greater extension so as to substitute themselves for the state in all its functions. They would represent an interwoven network, composed of an infinite variety of groups and federations of all sizes and degrees, local, regional, national and international temporary or more or less permanent - for all possible purposes: production, consumption and exchange, communications, sanitary arrangements, education, mutual protection, defence of the territory, and so on; and, on the other side, for the satisfaction of an ever-increasing number of scientific, artistic, literary and sociable needs. Moreover, such a society would represent nothing immutable. On the contrary - as is seen in organic life at large - harmony would (it is contended) result from an ever-changing adjustment and readjustment of equilibrium between the multitudes of forces and influences, and this adjustment would be the easier to obtain as none of the forces would enjoy a special protection from the state.

(Author’s photo of Madero as President from the

Museum of the Revolution.)

Basically, that’s what Zapata wanted for his followers and all the peasantry of Mexico: a federation of peasant collectives, as what existed prior to the Spanish conquest of Mexico. Zapata called for “Reforma, Libertad, Ley y Justicia” (Reform, Freedom, Law and Justice) in his plan and remained in armed opposition to Madero’s government.

When Madero lifted restrictions on the press, their criticism of his administration’s ineffectiveness was so severe that his brother commented, “the newspapers bite the hand that took off their muzzle.” Then again, it wasn’t like Madero was doing a lot to bring the chaos of post-Diaz Mexico under control. Inflation remained a problem and Madero’s limited successes in rolling back some of the excesses of the Porfiriato didn’t reduce the public level of misery enough for the people to be satisfied with his stint at the helm.

In December 1911, that Reyes fellow Diaz had sent out of the country somehow got back into Mexico and started a rebellion in Nuevo Leon. His rebellion wasn’t very well organized and Madero’s men were able to beat it down and take Reyes into custody, imprisoning him in Mexico City. Soon after that revolt, in March 1912, Pascual Orozco broke with Madero and started his rebellion anew. Orozco enjoyed support from Chihuahua’s biggest landowner – the guy literally owned nearly the entire state – and felt confident he could repulse any government army. Orozco did send the first federal force packing, but Madero ordered Huerta to fight Orozco, and Huerta delivered the goods, crushing the rebellion and forcing Orozco into exile.

During that fight against Orozco, Pancho Villa defected from Orozco’s army to Huerta’s, but then disobeyed Huerta’s orders. Huerta ordered Villa’s execution, but Madero issued a last-minute pardon. Emasculated and deprived of the fun normally associated with killing a rival, Huerta got drunk and then rambled on about how he could patch things up with Orozco and turn on Madero. Yes, I know Huerta had just bashed Orozco’s army into submission… but this is Mexico… Anyway, Madero’s minister of war heard of Huerta’s plot and stripped him of command. Madero then countermanded his minister of war and restored Huerta to command.

In the Museum of the Revolution, there’s this

cut-out photograph of Huerta, with his buttons,

watch chain, and glasses mounted on it. It has to

have been one of the most chilling things to see,

as if the dead tyrant’s spirit projected itself out

from behind his glasses.

That last paragraph is full of all kinds of crazy. In Mexico, as in much of the world, one shoots one’s opponents, especially during times of rebellion and revolution. It’s just the way it’s done. It’s not a proper revolution without a series of executions. Put another way, failure to execute one’s opponents means they’ll have ample time to plot one’s demise.

Later on in 1912, Porfirio Diaz’ nephew Felix rose up in rebellion. Madero managed to quash Felix’ rebellion rather quickly and even went so far as to order his execution, but the Mexican Supreme Court commuted his sentence to imprisonment, thereby depriving Madero of a much-needed execution. That particular Supreme Court had a high percentage of men serving on it that owed their appointments to Don Porfirio…

I’m sure some of my younger readers, being dear tender-hearted folk, are by now outraged at my support of extrajudicial killings and public executions. These younger readers illustrate the concept that youth and skill is no match for old age and treachery. Every one of the generals mentioned in this section with the exception of Zapata rose up against Madero in spite of the mercy he’d shown them – and the only reason Zapata never betrayed Madero is because he never supported him as president. You can’t betray someone you never supported.

While Orozco and Villa had supported Madero at first and betrayed him with rebellion or insubordination, Huerta cooked up a plan to get as close as possible to Madero, so he could stab him in the back.

(Author’s photo from the Museum of the Revolution)

Inflation was terrible during the Revolution. For

example, bread in 1911 was 2 centavos for a roll.

In 1915, it was up to 25, over 1200% inflation.

Huerta knew he had control of the army. With that control, he hoped to topple Madero in a very careful way. Simply rising in rebellion would not make him a legitimate leader of Mexico. That was something Santa Anna would do, and it never worked out for him in the long run. Instead, Huerta had to find a way to force Madero to resign and then designate Huerta as president. Huerta enlisted the aid of the imprisoned generals Reyes and Felix Diaz and the American Ambassador to Mexico, Henry Lane Wilson.

Reyes’ and Felix Diaz’ support of Huerta’s plan was obvious: he would get them out of jail and into a place of power in exchange for their support. Ambassador Wilson supported Huerta because Huerta promised to secure Mexico for US business interests – probably by getting rid of Madero’s tax on oil production, for starters. With his support in place, Huerta could begin execution of his plan.

Basically, Huerta wanted to use Reyes and Felix Diaz to create a crisis that would force Madero to rely upon him for protection. Then, he would have the US Ambassador and others pressure Madero to resign, which would open up a constitutionally legitimate path for Huerta to ascend to the presidency.

As I reflect on that plan, I realize it’s a lot like Emperor Palpitane’s plan in the Star Wars cycle of movies. Madero would be like Jar-Jar Binks, so, unfortunately, I can’t write that character out of my analogy here. No Death Star, either. Or Wookies. Thankfully, I can’t think of any group that would be represented by the Ewoks, so I can keep them out. The US oil companies would be Jabba the Hutt. If you want an Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke Skywalker, I’d assign those roles to Venustiano Carranza and Lázaro Cárdenas, respectively. Carranza was Madero’s Minister of War – the guy that sacked Huerta for threatening to overthrow Madero – and one who was committed to the idea of reforming Mexican politics. We’ll meet Cárdenas later on, along with Álvaro Obregón. Obregón, by the way, would kinda be the Darth Vader of the story. Not entirely, but close.

If you haven’t seen the Star Wars cycle, now might be a good time to read a summary of it. Your understanding of Mexican history is at stake.

On 9 February 1913, two Porfirian generals in charge of the Tacubaya military academy got their soldiers to riot and set generals Reyes and Felix Diaz free. They then marched on the National Palace, where Madero was living. The guards there used machine-guns to keep the attackers away and killed Reyes in the process. So I guess Reyes is the Count Dooku of this tale – again I encourage my readers to review the plot summaries of the Star Wars movies. Anyway, the cadets retreated and holed themselves up in a fortified building near the National Palace. Huerta convinced Madero to call in the armed forces from surrounding garrisons and to place him in charge of defending the National Palace.

Caracol diorama of the street fighting during

the “Ten Tragic Days” in February 1913.

For the next eight days, Huerta kept up a running gun battle in the streets of Mexico City between forces directly under his command and forces indirectly under his command. During this “crisis”, the press went silent and the general population in Mexico began to recognize Huerta as protector of Mexico. Also during this time, Ambassador Wilson made thinly-veiled threats that the US would intervene militarily if Madero did not step down.

On February 17, Huerta ordered the arrest of Madero and his vice-president. Madero’s brother Gustavo, meanwhile, was negotiating with Felix Diaz to try and end the “crisis”. On the 17th, the “rebels” blinded Gustavo Madero and then dragged him outside where they beat him to death. Huerta then met with Ambassador Wilson and worked out “The Embassy Pact”, an agreement that Huerta would take over in Mexico within 72 hours and get rid of all of Madero’s supporters. In exchange for that, Wilson promised to recognize Huerta as Mexico’s legitimate ruler.

Huerta took the document to Madero and his vice-president. They signed it under duress, but Huerta did promise them safe passage to their exile in Cuba. Huerta then had the Attorney General of Mexico, next in line for the presidency, assume office and appoint Huerta as Minister of the Interior, making him next in line, should anything happen to the Attorney General.

About 15 minutes later, the Attorney General resigned and, what luck! Huerta became the next President of Mexico after he got an emergency midnight session of Congress to approve of the chain of events. I’m sure his troops surrounding the legislature had no impact on their decision.

So ended the “Ten Tragic Days”. Huerta still had to dispose of Madero. He consulted with Ambassador Wilson. Wilson told Huerta he “ought to do what is best for the country.” That was US Ambassador Secret Code for “It’s cool with me if you have to execute them, even though I can’t say that directly.” Had Wilson advised Huerta to “consider your decision’s impact on foreign relations,” then Madero would have lived.

But Wilson didn’t say those words. Huerta had a free hand.

On the night of 22 February 1913, Huerta ordered Madero and his former vice-president to be moved to another jail. Madero and his former vice-president wound up dead. The official story was that the prisoners died in a scuffle that happened because of a botched rescue attempt. Ambassador Wilson, who entertained Huerta at a reception honoring George Washington’s birthday when this all went down, endorsed the official version and the rest of the world, although shocked, went along with the USA’s endorsement.

What really happened was that plainclothes policemen working for Huerta intercepted the prisoner exchange and shot the prisoners. This version came out a month later when Venustiano Carranza published the Plan of Guadalupe, in which he said Huerta “committed the crime of treason to scale in power.” Zapata, Villa, and others agreed with this plan and thus began the counter-counter-revolution to stop Huerta’s counter-revolution.

The Plan of Guadalupe surprised the newly-inaugurated US President, Woodrow Wilson – no relation to the Ambassador Wilson in Mexico City. President Wilson reacted with shock and horror when he discovered that Ambassador Wilson had conspired with Huerta to eliminate Madero. President Wilson refused to recognize Huerta as the legitimate ruler of Mexico and recalled Ambassador Wilson. As a historian, I’m glad that he did recall Ambassador Wilson, as it would be cumbersome to have to constantly make the distinction between which Wilson I was talking about. From this point forward, when I say “Wilson”, I mean the President and not the disgraced ambassador.

The Last Steps to the National Treasure

Caracol diorama of Villa’s boys giving Huerta’s

forces a good pounding.

Museum of the Revolution representation of

Pancho Villa with the tools of his trade.

Once I’d gotten to the Plan de Guadalupe exhibit in the Caracol, I was almost overwhelmed by my descent into history. I was certainly humbled by the long series of events from 1810 forward: all those sacrifices and struggles… and the spirit of the Mexican people refused to compromise, through them all. While I had already been critical of the US’ role in Mexican history, when I learned of how the US ambassador helped Huerta, I had to hang my head in shame for a while as I took that in.

President Wilson wasn’t going to make any significant changes in the US’ negative impact on Mexico. The “why” behind that has a lot to do with Pancho Villa.

Pancho Villa was already in opposition to Huerta – the guy had ordered his execution, after all – and gleefully supported Carranza’s Constitutionalist faction. At times, Villa’s gleeful support became over-enthusiastic, particularly when he ordered the murders of rich landowners that stood in his path. The US didn’t care all that much when Villa’s boys killed Mexicans, but drew the line in the sand when Villa killed a British landowner, one Mr. Benton. Villa had to watch himself after that incident, which is now known as The Benton Incident. Villa wasn’t very good at watching himself, which led to further

Portrait of Venustiano Carranza in the Museum

of the Revolution. Is it just me or does that beard

make him look a little like Santa Claus?

deterioration in relations between the US and Mexico, already sour over Wilson’s refusal to deal with Huerta’s “government of butchers.”

Ironically, the general that once fought against both Villa and Huerta, Orozco, returned to serve Huerta after his 1913 coup. Orozco fought hard against Villa, his former subordinate.

While Villa fought well enough to hold his own in Chihuahua, Carranza’s stand in Coahuila and Sonora ended in disaster, and he had to leave the country. In early 1914, he returned, this time working from territory held by Pancho Villa. He had more success that time around and formally moved his capital to Ciudad Juárez, just across the Rio Grande from the Texas town of El Paso.

In the north, centered around Ciudad Juárez, Carranza organized his army and began his struggle against Huerta. Carranza depended upon his top general, Álvaro Obregón, to eventually win the day against Huerta and to keep Villa in line. Although Carranza got Villa to accept his overall leadership, he failed to get Zapata to integrate his command with the Constitutionalists. Zapata always kept his distance from the other major leaders in the Revolution, not trusting them to honor their promises of land reform. Even so, Zapata’s men fought on against Huerta’s, effectively sandwiching Huerta in Mexico City with Villa and Obregón on the north and Zapata in the south.

That, and a lack of foreign recognition, really hampered Huerta’s ability to rule all of Mexico, as was his original plan. Maybe people would have been more loyal to him if he actually included his friends in government. Instead, Huerta liked to send his close associates to distant embassies. For example, Huerta shipped one of his right-hand men, Felix Diaz, off to Japan after taking over. If he wasn’t going to trust one of his right-hand henchmen, who was he gonna trust?

At least Huerta’s forces were able to wreck relations between the US and Carranza. They were already strained because of Villa’s barbarities, but Huerta’s stunts managed to make for a messy breakup.

Of course, that says a lot about US foreign policy if it wasn’t able to distinguish between factions in Mexico…

In April 1914, Carranza’s forces were about to take the port of Tampico. It was a major port in Mexico’s oil trade, and a fairly large number of US citizens lived there. So many, in fact, that Wilson had sent a flotilla of gunboats to keep an eye on things there. One day, some US sailors went to a dock where they were supposed to pick up a shipment of oil. Huerta’s soldiers there were already jumpy because of a few skirmishes they’d had with Carranza’s troops, so they were in no mood to deal with anyone on their dock that wasn’t supposed to be there. They didn’t know the US sailors were supposed to pick up the oil, so they arrested them all at gunpoint and marched them off to jail. Once the Mexicans understood what really was going on, the local commander apologized. The US demanded that the Mexicans hoist the US flag over the port and give it a 21-gun salute. The Mexicans refused and the US escalated the matter by requesting permission from Congress to send US forces into Mexico, ostensibly to look after US interests there. The translation of that phrase is “to make the place safe for US business interests to continue ripping off the locals.”

In Veracruz, there’s a statue honoring Lt. Jose

Azueta. While manning a machine-gun to fight

off the US Marines, he took a bullet. When the

US commander offered medical aid, he refused

to accept aid from an invader. The Mexican

doctors there could not properly treat his infec-

tion, and he died from his wound, a martyr to

the spirit of resistance in Mexico.

As Congress debated Wilson’s request, Wilson learned that a shipment of weapons was on its way from Germany to Veracruz. Wilson ordered US forces to seize the port and stop the weapons from going on to Huerta. Wilson had ordered an arms embargo against Huerta’s government and he wasn’t about to let the Kaiser get away with circumventing it.

Except… well… this is embarrassing… the shipment was actually from Remington Arms in the USA. Remington had shipped it to Hamburg as a way of getting around the blockade… corporations are sociopathic like that…

On 21 April 1914, prior to Congress’ approval of military action, the US Marines landed at Veracruz. They did not encounter any initial resistance because Huerta’s commander there withdrew his garrison to avoid turning the town into a free-fire zone. A group of about 50 military cadets and a handful of soldiers stayed behind and joined the people of the city in resisting the US invaders.

The people of Veracruz didn’t have any real military training, so they were unfamiliar with their weapons. The Marines, on the other hand, well… they were Marines. They know how to fight. In spite of the mismatch of skill levels, the people of Veracruz fought as best they could against the Marines. By the end of the day, the Marines had taken their objectives and wanted to discuss a cease-fire. They couldn’t because the defenders had no real central organization. Reluctantly, the commanders on the scene decided that they would have to take the whole city if they couldn’t negotiate a cease-fire.

The next day, the US forces hit some hard resistance at the Naval Academy, so they opened fire on the city with their naval guns. Under fire from the US Navy, resistance in Veracruz ended after a few more days. Over 3000 US soldiers moved in to the city, which they held until November 1914. After the action, the US Secretary of the Navy ordered 56 Medals of Honor – the highest US military decoration – to be given to the troops that participated in the occupation of Veracruz. By comparison, that’s just under half the number awarded for actions in the whole of World War I. One of the recipients, US Marine officer Smedley Butler, would get a second Medal of Honor for his participation in the US occupation of Haiti a year later. Butler tried to return his Veracruz Medal of Honor, saying he hadn’t done anything to earn it. In fact, the Veracruz Medals of Honor were awarded by lottery drawing, so it’s likely none of the recipients had done anything really Medal-of-Honor-worthy. The US Navy responded to Butler’s action by not only ordering him to keep the medal, but to wear it, as well. Butler went on to write a book titled War is a Racket and became a popular speaker at gatherings of both pacifists and veterans. He later went on to say:

“I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”

As you can see, little changed in the way the US used its military since 1846…

Museum of the Revolution depiction of

Villa’s night attack on Torreón. At the

time, a US film crew was recording his

campaign in Mexico and was able to

get him to re-enact the attack in daylight

so they’d have a good print of the action.

While Wilson hoped that the seizure of Veracruz would further destabilize Huerta’s regime, it had the added, unintended consequence of infuriating Carranza. Outright war existed as a possibility until several Latin American nations negotiated an end to the US occupation of Veracruz.

Meanwhile, Villa’s men raged southward along the rail lines Diaz had built during his administration. In the rugged mountains and deserts of Mexico’s arid north, the only reasonable way to move from city to city was by rail. Villa’s armored train, therefore, had awesome potential to it. It carried not only his troops, but his mobile hospital, artillery, and provisions. Using this organization meant his forces could move rapidly and with great effect, which gave him victories at Torreón, Saltillo, and Zacatecas.

I should note that after Villa took Torreón, he wanted to go on to take Mexico City itself, but Carranza ordered Villa to take Saltillo, which would mean Obregón’s force would take Mexico City. Villa balked, Carranza threatened to cut off his coal supply – which would have left him without the ability to move that very important train of his – and Villa considered resigning.

Villa’s commanders encouraged him to not resign, but to take Saltillo and then move on to Zacatecas. Carranza hadn’t ordered that last action, but Villa’s supporters felt it was a worthy target. They felt that way because Zacatecas was home to Mexico’s largest silver mines and taking it would make sure that everyone in Villa’s army would be paid in hard coin. Villa’s army was very enthusiastic about the getting paid aspect of the venture.

One of the photos of Villa and Zapata meeting in Mexico City at the National Palace. This one

hangs in the Museum of the Revolution.

Interestingly enough, the seizure of Zacatecas had a negative effect on Huerta’s forces: they now despaired of being paid. Huerta’s position crumbled and he agreed to surrender to the Constitutionalists, resigning his presidency on 15 July 1914 and going into exile. Villa and Zapata entered Mexico City peacefully, met at the National Palace, took some photos, then went back to their bases.

While in exile, Huerta eventually wound up in the USA in 1915, where he hooked up with Orozco and the pair started planning how to take over Mexico with German assistance. Both were arrested: Orozco escaped but Huerta remained in jail. Orozco managed to find another band of supporters in Mexico, but died while raiding cattle in Texas. Let it be said that it’s a real dumb idea to raid cattle in Texas. I won’t make a whole section on that, but should it become a problem in the future, I would write more on that topic at the request of my fanbase. Because he stayed in jail, Huerta’s demise was far less violent: he died of cirrhosis of the liver in January 1916.

After Huerta left, Carranza convened the Convention of Aguascalientes. In order to get Villa’s support, Carranza agreed to have 150 generals meet to discuss the future of Mexico. At the convention, José Vasconcelos proposed that, under the Constitution of 1857, the revolutionaries were now the government of Mexico and that Carranza should resign. Carranza agreed to resign if both Villa and Zapata agreed to exile – both leaders had chosen to boycott the convention, although they had sent representatives. Villa and Zapata refused to step down, so Carranza refused to resign. The convention fell apart and fighting began among the Constitutionalists and the forces of Villa and Zapata.

Caracol diorama of the Battle of Celaya: Villa’s Dorado cavalry was normally the terror of the

battlefield, but Obregón used trenches, machine-guns, and artillery effectively to not only halt

Villa’s cavalry, but destroy it as a fighting force. This battle, while not the last in the Revolution,

certainly was the one that marked the beginning of the end. From this battle forward, no armed

force would be able to prosper against Obregón and his successors.

Zapata could not be budged from his mountainous bases, but Villa had to fall back, time and again, in the face of Obregón’s forces. Villa’s celebrated Dorados, his crack cavalry unit, broke itself on the Constitutionalist lines at the Battle of Celaya in July 1915. Unlike the European generals that still tried to fight World War I with Napoleonic tactics, Obregón realized the importance of the tactical defense and let Villa’s forces come to him, to be shredded by his artillery and machine-guns. With Villa on the run and Zapata contained in Morelos, Carranza moved into Mexico City in August 1915 and received recognition from the US government in October.

Although Carranza now occupied the presidency, he did not control all of Mexico. Villa still raised Cain up in Chihuahua, Zapata made Morelos uncomfortable for federal forces, and various other generals had their way with the provinces they held. Because many foreign businesses paid off the local generals, Carranza could not make good on his promise to reclaim Mexico’s resources for Mexico. Carranza had made a promise to introduce land reform, but only made token efforts in that regard. Carranza did allow workers to form unions and engage in strikes and collective bargaining, but soon soured on his relationship with them, eventually restoring the law that made striking a capital offense in August 1916. About the only promise Carranza kept was to reform the judiciary, which he made more independent. For a guy that looked something like Santa Claus, it would seem he had very few presents for Mexico.

Well, there was one more thing that he did, and it turned out to be his biggest contribution: he convened a Constitutional Convention in Querétaro to produce a new highest law of the land that would take the 1857 Constitution and make the changes necessary to fix it where it fell short.

Caracol diorama of the signing of the Constitution of 1917. The Constitution of 1917 stands as

Mexico’s current constitution and has given Mexico its longest stretch of stable politics. Carranza’s lookin’ sharp in his uniform.

To Carranza’s credit, it must be said that he respected the Constitution that emerged from Querétaro even though the 85 delegates partial to his views were often outvoted by the 132 radicals that wanted to make much more sweeping changes than he was willing to make.

When I look at the text of the Constitution of 1917, I am amazed. Rights are specifically identified and spelled out: the vague language of the US Constitution was not used at Querétaro. I mean, compare the Mexican freedom of religion – Article 24 of the Constitution of 1917 – with the sparse words in the US’ 1st Amendment:

Every man is free to pursue the religious belief that best suits him, and to practice its ceremonies, devotions or cults, as long as they do not constitute a crime. Congress cannot dictate laws that establish or abolish any given religion. Ordinarily, all religious acts will be practiced in temples, and those that extraordinarily are practiced outside temples must adhere to law.

Specific. Detailed. Very little wiggle room. I love it.

The Constitution of 1917. Not a diorama. This is the real McCoy.

Article 27 stuck it to The Man by saying all property in Mexico could only be owned by Mexicans. Foreigners could work out some arrangements to do stuff on Mexican territory, but Mexicans would always ultimately own their own country. Article 27 also provided a mechanism to allow land taken from peasants to be returned to them. Article 123 capped the work week at 6 days and the work day at 8 hours and gave workers the right to strike – and abolished child labor. Some article, I tell ya! This stuff is in their Constitution!

What else did they have in it? Let me see… it whacked the power of the Catholic Church and declared all Church property to be state property, recognized that indigenous tribes made up an important part of Mexican culture and society, banned specific cruel and unusual punishments (including the death penalty), banned monopolies, limited the influence foreigners could have on Mexican business and government, and set up a National Bank. Lots of good stuff.

Which is why, at the end of the Caracol Museum, there is one final exhibit. It is not a diorama. It is el tesoro nacional itself: the Constitution of 1917, displayed under a massive eagle in whose feathers can be seen the faces of the people of Mexico. Seeing that exhibit was one of my most awesome moments in Mexico.

And that national treasure is why Mexican historians punctuate their eras with 1917, not 1910. The center of the snail inside the reclining grasshopper holds the foundation of the cactus the eagle with a snake perches upon.

IV: Modern Mexico

The Constitution of 1917 did not end the violence in Mexico.

There were still years of fighting and turmoil in front of the nation…

The End of the Beginning

But the Constitution of 1917 did lay a new foundation for Mexican government and served to usher in the most stable period of Mexican politics without a dictatorship. But before that could begin, there had to be more instability, like what resulted when Carranza assumed the presidency constitutionally in May 1917.

Siqueiros painted a number of works commemorating the people’s struggle in the Mexican Revolution. This one is installed in the Museum of the Revolution. Note the sweep of the figure from the left to the center and the mass of peasant troops, depicting the people of Mexico moving into a revolutionary future.

Villa had managed to cross the border into the USA and massacred a bunch of citizens north of the border, causing the US to send General Pershing after him. Pershing had left Mexico in February 1917, but border clashes continued until 1919. Carranza briefly flirted with the idea of supporting Germany in World War I, but the general he assigned to study the matter concluded Mexico was in no state to fight the US. It had plenty of armed men, but they weren’t all under Carranza’s command. The US almost went to war with Mexico for its own reasons during this time, but cooler heads prevailed. Even so, a mini-war broke out in southern Texas as Hispanics there objected violently to the oppression they faced at the hands of the Texas Rangers and other law enforcement groups. Wilson was also maneuvering to get the US involved in Europe on the side of England and France – a war with Mexico would preclude being able to make a grand entry into the European conflict and earn the right to have a spot at the table for the peace treaty negotiations.

For the record, maybe the world as a whole would have been better off if the US had gone to war with Mexico. The French leader, Clemenceau, planned to do to Germany in 1919 what the Allies did to it in 1945: partition it and set up a permanent military occupation. That arrangement could have kept Germany from starting World War II in Europe. Just something to think about…

Back to Mexico: Carranza dealt with Zapata by setting a trap for him. Carranza’s forces ambushed and killed Zapata in April 1919. After Zapata died, his forces dissolved and Morelos came under Carranza’s control. Villa’s influence in Chihuahua waned as his forces were whittled away in constant action with those of the government. As for the other regional warlords, Carranza could not deal effectively with them, and corruption crept into his administration in a big way.

Carranza decided against running for reelection in 1920. He chose an obscure civilian to be his successor. That decision really ticked off Obregón, who felt he was the guy that should take over as president after Carranza. Obregón had support of the army, and, well… you should be able to see where this is about to go.

Obregón and ón and ón…

Obregón announced his obligatory Plan and moved his men towards Mexico City. Carranza realized they were coming for him and tried to get to Veracruz in time to catch the next slow boat to Havana. Pro-Obregón forces ambushed his train halfway to Veracruz and killed him in the action. After Carranza died, Obregón seemed set to win the 1920 election, hands down. In the interim, Villa decided it would be best for him if he retired. Obregón agreed to pay Villa and his army a stipend equal to one years’ pay and that was the end of Villa’s rebellion.

Three years later, a gang of assassins with tommy-guns murdered Villa in a drive-by killing. Everyone suspected Obregón had something to do with it, especially when none of the killers were ever brought to justice.

Obregón took care of the rest of the rebel factions, defeating some here and paying some off there. He was able to pay off rebels thanks to the fact that he was able to get Mexico’s mines and oil fields producing again in quantities sufficient to earn substantial export dollars. And while the 1917 Constitution required that the government return land to the peasants, Obregón managed to stall that development by creating a vast bureaucracy to handle the peasants’ claims. All in all, Obregón brought stability to Mexico, if at a social cost.

Mexican arts entered a new, revolutionary period during Obregón’s administration. His education minister, José Vasconcelos – the guy that had demanded Carranza’s resignation – commissioned massive arts projects all over Mexico and especially in Mexico City. Vasconcelos’ commissions went out to a group of artists that were destined to become giants in the Mexican art scene: David Siqueiros, Diego Rivera, and José Clemente Orozco. These three formed the Union of Technical Workers, Painters, and Sculptors in 1922 with the intent of radicalizing Mexican art. Both Siqueiros and Rivera were communists, so their vision of radicalization included politics with the changes in technique. They wanted to create works of art that could not possibly be owned by any one person, but would be held in common by all the people: in a word, murals. They also strove to take some of the revisionism of the late 19th century and amplify it in an outright condemnation of the Spanish conquistadors and a celebration of pre-Columbian cultures.

Their legacy is impressive: one has to be in the presence of their vast murals to even begin to get a feel for what they are. I’m not even convinced that a single visit is sufficient to take them all in, and neither do I believe that they can be studied as a set of details: they have to be appreciated in their totality, a daunting task to say the least.

Diego Rivera’s Man, Controller of the Universe at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. This is only part of the massive installation, which towers in larger-than-life proportions over its viewers. An earlier version of this work for the Rockefellers was canceled when the Rockefellers objected to the inclusion of a portrait of Lenin in it. Rivera went back to Mexico and painted the version shown here, Lenin portrait and all. The mural is packed with intense concentrations of images and symbolism to the point that it is truly overwhelming.

Their works went into the places once formally associated with the rich and powerful: Cortes’ palace in Cuernavaca, government buildings, Porfirio Diaz’ ambitious Palacio de Bellas Artes, and the National Palace. The National Palace is free to all every day; every Sunday, the museums are also free, and are packed with visitors. Truly, the Union of Technical Workers, Painters, and Sculptors gave Mexico a sense of accessible public arts that I find highly enviable.

Siqueiros’ portrait of Cuauhtémoc making a final stand against his foes. (Installed in the Palacio de Bellas Artes) He wears Spanish armor not for protection, but because it was the Aztec custom to wear the skins of one’s fallen enemies. Like Rivera, Siqueiros insisted upon a radical political meaning in his works and emphasized the indigenous heritage of Mexico as being more important than European influences.

This Pieta by Rufino Tamayo (in the Palacio de Bellas Artes… this is a pretty dang important museum) showcases his austere style and how, unlike Siqueiros and Rivera, he chose to consider non-political subjects in his work. When the others criticized him for not being realistic, he responded that realism is subjective and that art does not always have to crusade for a cause.

Back to politics: Obregón’s term ended in 1924 and the Constitution prevented him from serving a second term. He still wanted to keep a handle on the running of the nation, so he chose Plutarco Elías Calles to succeed him. Calles won the election of 1924 handily, dispatching Nicolás Zúñiga y Miranda in his final bid to win the presidency – and, of course, Zúñiga y Miranda claimed the results were rigged… even if they were, most Mexicans were happy with the outcome. Heck, it was the first peaceful transfer of power since Diaz was last elected, whenever that was. 1884? Something like that. After the revolution, it seemed like a LONG time in coming.

Calles was a tough politician that supported radical measures. He advanced the cause of labor unions, using the national union CROM to intimidate his political rivals. That’s pronounced “krom”, not C-ROM.

The Demon in the Church by Siqueiros, installed in

the Museum of Modern Art, Chapultepec Park.

Note the circles that bind the rich in the top tier to

the demon at the top and the masses at the base to

the spiritual presence just above them. The shapes

in this painting are very deliberately chosen.

He threatened to use Article 27 of the Mexican Constitution to seize foreign-owned oil fields, which resulted in the foreign oil companies negotiating a better deal for Mexico. Calles also made a very interesting move in 1926: he amended the constitution so that presidents were only barred from serving consecutive terms. Everyone saw Obregón’s hand in that measure, but Calles’ firm grip on the unions and peasant organizations kept them from rising up.

No, the uprising Calles would have to  put down would come from the strong Catholic community in Mexico.

The Cristero War

Calles was well-known as being anti-Catholic. As a governor of Sonora, he had banished all Catholic priests. While that went against the 1917 Constitution, one must understand that without effective judicial oversight, the executive branch of government can engage in creative interpretations of its own – and get away with them. One must also understand that effective judicial oversight is difficult to establish with bullets still flying.

As president of Mexico, he used Article 130 of the Constitution in a very creative way. In 1926, he sponsored a law that effectively shut down the Catholic Church in Mexico. Priests were forbidden to criticize the government and a large amount of church property fell into the hands of the state. He ordered the expulsion of all foreign-born priests, and required all priests to be licensed by the federal government, which left some Mexican states without any authorized clergymen in them. Of 4500 priests in Mexico in 1926, only 334 remained in 1934.

Although Jose Clemente Orozco painted pro-revolutionary works at the start of his career, he broke with Rivera and Siqueiros early on over the question of how best to present the Revolution. Orozco became disillusioned with political overtones that masked the human suffering that accompanied the changes going on in Mexico. While some accused him of betraying the ideals of the Revolution, his heartfelt paintings of loss and anguish portray a reality that perhaps runs deeper than the overt messages in Rivera’s and Siqueiros’ murals. (This painting is installed in the Museum of Modern Art, Chapultepec Park)

Calles made a full-out assault on the Catholic Church. In addition to the law described above, he enlisted the pro-communist CROM union to break up services and attack chapels and created the Mexican Apostolic Church to form a schism within Mexican Catholicism. At first, the Catholic clergy responded by refusing to conduct any services within Mexico, which really scared the Catholic rank and file, which depended upon the Church to provide them with what they believed were essential religious services – rites associated with birth, death, and marriage – without which, they’d all be helpless and hell-bound. In 1927, Catholic frustration with Calles matured into an open rebellion, which came to be known as the Cristero War.

In the first months of 1927, public sympathy lay with the Cristeros, who were able to defeat federal forces in a few engagements. At the end of February, a Cristero force massacred the civilians on board a train – that turned the public away from the Cristeros. Calles was able to successfully police the rural areas that had supported the Cristero rebels and ended the open rebellion by the summer.

Rufino Tamayo, like Orozco, chose to take a hard look at the loss and consequences of Revolution. In works such as this, he questions if the sacrifices of the Revolution were truly worth it all. (Painting installed in the Museum of Modern Art, Chapultepec Park)

Unfortunately for Calles, not all the Cristeros got the memo that they were supposed to stop resisting his administration. An illiterate leader, “El Catorce,” reorganized resistance and hired a mercenary general to train the Cristero troops. The general they hired demanded double the salary of a federal general and happened to be an atheist that made fun of his troops’ religion to their faces, but he also did his job effectively and managed to create a force that could take the field against the federal troops. By the time the federales hunted down and killed that mercenary general, he had gotten 50,000 troops out there to fight a proper sort of counter-revolution.

All during the Cristero War, oil supplies to the US were disrupted. This gave the US deep and profound concerns, so the US Ambassador to Mexico, Dwight Whitney Morrow, started having breakfast meetings with Calles to try and negotiate an end to the anti-Church campaign. He had made some small progress when a very terrible thing happened.

Obregón ran again for the presidency as Calles’ term expired and he faced a massive battle against his opponent, who insisted that there should be no re-election of presidents in Mexico. Obregón won the 1928 election, barely, and celebrated with a fancy dinner party. One of the waiters at that party walked right up to him, pulled out a gun, and fired.

The waiter was a Cristero and that move set Morrow’s negotiations back substantially, to say the least. Both sides in the war were engaging in horrible atrocities against each other – the assassination of Obregón merely served as the centerpiece of the war of terror.

Calles continued his harsh oppression of Catholicism, but faced a political crisis. He could not succeed himself to the presidency, so he declared himself to be Jefe Máximo – Maximum Boss – and installed a puppet, Emilio Portes Gil, as an interim president. Calles himself served as Gil’s Minister of War and carried on the Cristero War in that capacity. Gil, however, was a more moderate voice and helped smooth the way to Morrow’s goal of a negotiated peace.

In 1929, the Cristeros signed a truce and agreed to lay down their weapons. The government agreed to a more lenient interpretation of Calles’ law and the Catholics agreed that the government owned their land, but that they also had permission to use it for religious purposes. Once signed, Calles violated the truce by sending troops to the homes of about 5500 prominent Cristeros and shooting them, often in front of their families. Fearing further persecution, strong Catholics – perhaps as much as 5% of Mexico’s population – fled to the United States, mostly settling around Los Angeles.

For those that like to trot the USA’s status as a home for religious freedom, I’ll ask that you not forget the Mexican Catholics as you talk about the English Pilgrims and Puritans. Not all of the USA’s religious refugees were WASPs…

Just a small part of Rivera’s mural on the west wall of the National Palace stairwell. In the bottom right is a group of conquistadors firing on the Aztecs: above them is a depiction of an army from the resistance against Maximilian firing in the opposite direction. There are images of clerical abuses, exploitation by the Spaniards, and revolutionary ideals in the domes of the alcoves. Just above and to the left of the center is a grossly fat priest standing next to a crusty-looking Santa Anna: Benito Juarez is above Santa Anna, with a much more dignified look.

The turmoil of the Cristero War and the continued persecution of Catholics during the 1930s is evident in Rivera’s murals on the walls of the National Palace. In 1929, Gil commissioned Rivera to paint a mural series on the walls of the main stairwell in the National Palace. Rivera chose to depict the history of Mexico from ancient days to 1930 from wall to wall to wall. On the north wall, Rivera painted a scene of life in ancient Mexico, with Quetzalcoatl holding court over a mostly peaceful scene. On the west wall, Rivera covered the five alcoves with scenes from the conquest of Mexico, the War of Independence, the Mexican-American War, the War of Reform, the rebellion against Maximilian, the Porfiriato, and the Revolution. It is a violent array of scenes, including executions, an auto-da-fe, and images of slavery and oppression. On the southern wall, Rivera painted a scene of workers building a sealed enclosure around fascists and decadent businessmen as Marx points the way to the future, mirroring the vision of Quetzalcoatl on the opposite wall.

Rivera’s mural on the north wall of the stairwell in the National Palace. While there is some violence on the left side, with a battle and sacrifice, the rest of the panel is quiet and peaceful.

Rivera’s vision of history shows highly unflattering views of men in power and obscures the details of the faces of the common people. The idea behind obscured or detail-free commoners was that the viewer would project his own features into the commoners and have a greater sympathy for them in the vast work, as opposed to the clearly defined, distinctive features of the power brokers he disapproved of. It’s a common and effective psychological technique used in the arts.

The south wall of the National Palace stairwell. Sorry this pic came out kinda grainy. In this, Rivera shows Marx pointing the way to the future – to the left, no less – and the bunker holding in the businessmen and fascists is getting closed up by the workers in the foreground. A Revolutionary mob surges all around the reactionary forces, whose symbols combine elements of a swastika and cross.

El Maximato

Another important event that took place during Gil’s 2-year presidency was Calles’ formal organization of his political party. He created the PNR, or Partido Nacional Revolucionario. With this party, Calles could dominate Mexican politics without having to be president himself. A cadre of men would rotate between the presidency and other government roles, with the party leader calling all the major shots. With the party in place, Calles could also dispose of the need for support from CROM and other organizations and his policies became increasingly anti-labor. He banned the Communist Party in 1930 and as he selected a successor for Gil, people began calling his rule the Maximato.

In 1930, Calles’ new proxy president was Pascual Ortiz Rubio. Gil served as Interior Minister for Rubio, who won against former Minister of Education José Vasconcelos – who carried on the proud tradition of Nicolás Zúñiga y Miranda by declaring the election results to have been rigged. Rubio didn’t do a whole lot in his presidency except dodge an assassination attempt, get bossed around by party boss Calles, and resign in 1932. During this time, Calles suppressed another rebellion and set up a radio station XE-PNR to spread PNR propaganda across the nation. With heavy influence in the press and airwaves, the power of the PNR became much more pervasive. Calles also put a statute of limitations on peasant land claims under Article 27, which moved the government further away from the radical spirit of the 1917 Constitution.

Abelardo L. Rodríguez succeeded Rubio and in the two years remaining in the term, managed to do some good work with public education and lengthened the presidential term to six years. He worked at building up his own political base independent of Calles’, but was otherwise a good party man.

In the 1934 election, PNR was the only party in Mexico with any chance of winning. Calles knew that the real power was in the party leadership and was content to run another patsy for president, knowing that he could pull all the strings from behind the scenes. Ironically enough for a man with increasingly conservative tendencies, Calles chose a more radical candidate for the presidency in 1934: Lázaro Cárdenas.

Lázaro Cárdenas, arguably Mexico’s most

honest president. If not the most honest, he

doesn’t have much competition for the title.

The people were asking for a bit more revolution, and Calles thought he’d throw them a bone. What really happened was that he threw a stick of dynamite into his own house. Cárdenas campaigned all over Mexico – literally. He went to the remotest villages, alone, to seek out votes and to hear the concerns of the people. This should have been a red flag to a fat cat like Calles. Anyone that makes that much effort to win a rigged election has got to be sincere, and therefore dangerous to those that want to control him.

After “winning” the election, Cárdenas butted heads with Calles time and again. Because Cárdenas did not believe in the death penalty, he had Calles’ subordinates exiled for their crimes, one by one, finally culminating in the exile of Calles himself in 1936. With Calles and his cronies out of the way, Cárdenas cleaned up the corruption in Mexican government, replaced the crime-ridden CROM union with the better-run CTM union, and converted Chapultepec Castle from being the presidential residence to a museum.

Cárdenas and the Conclusion of the Revolution

Cárdenas opened the doors of Mexico to political refugees, particularly those fleeing the violence from the Spanish Civil War. A notable refugee was Leon Trotsky, who was encouraged to come to Mexico by Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo. Cárdenas was not as radical in his leftism as Trotsky, but he knew that having Trotsky in Mexico would go down well with the labor unions, whose support he relied upon to keep his reforms going.

Lázaro Cárdenas announces the nationalization

of foreign oil holdings in Mexico and the cre-

ation of PEMEX. It was Cárdenas’ finest hour.

Among Cárdenas’ reforms was a rejuvenation of the intent of Article 27 to give land back to the poor of Mexico. Cárdenas took that seriously and handed over millions of acres to the peasants. He also gave many more benefits to workers and nationalized the trains in Mexico, putting their administration in the hands of their workers. All this really spooked anti-communist foreigners, particularly among the major oil companies.

They were right to quake in their boots: Cárdenas targeted them in 1938. At that time, Mexico was the world’s second-largest oil producer and supplied 20% of the USA’s imported oil. Cárdenas wanted to see more of the profits of the oil trade going into Mexican pockets, but the big oil companies would not budge in their demands at the negotiating table. So, on 18 March 1938, Cárdenas got on the radio and announced that he was using Article 27 to nationalize the oil industry in Mexico. He said he’d compensate the companies for their losses, but they were no longer going to exploit the oil fields of Mexico. The Petroleum Company of Mexico – PEMEX – would now take care of Mexico’s oil industry, from drilling to refining.

In Mexico City, news of Cárdenas’ nationalization of the oil industry sparked a massive, six-hour parade through the streets of the city. The people were delirious with joy. Here was a president that wasn’t somehow in the back pockets of the USA! Huzzah and hooray! While there were no parades on Wall Street, neither were there any plans to invade Mexico to get the oil fields back – the Great Depression had its hold on the US economy and they were in no state to fight a modern war without the oil they needed to keep both their war machine and economic engines running.

The British government announced a boycott of Mexican oil and technical experts in the US and UK both refused to cooperate with PEMEX. Their hope was that Mexico would not be able to produce the chemical needed to convert oil to gasoline and would have to come back to them, hat in hand and ready to deal. Cárdenas organized a team to work out a process to make that chemical. They were on the verge of completing their work when an explosion occurred in their lab that killed them all.

Was the explosion an accident? The big oil companies insist it was. Then again, the same big oil companies have been responsible for organizing wars and massacres of civilians to protect their interests, so I’m not so inclined to believe it was an accident. If I’m falsely accusing a big oil company here and there, I’m not off-base in my other concerns. They have a pattern of violent activity, so they should always be considered as a suspect whenever anything unsavory happens in an oil-producing nation.

After the blast, Cárdenas assembled a second team. A few days later, he was able to send a small vial of that vital chemical to the presidents of the big oil companies. Stamped on the side of those vials were the proud words, Hecho en Mexico: Made in Mexico.

Sample of anti-fascist art from around WW2.

With Calles out of the country, Mexico was

very much in sympathy with the Allies during

the war.

Another anti-fascist piece. Ironically, it depicts

fascism as the enemy of religion when the

government of Mexico itself had engaged in a

massive anti-Catholic campaign from 1926 to

1934, and did not work to naturalize relations

with the Church until 1940.

It seems anticlimactic to say that, in 1938, Cárdenas changed the name of the PNR to PRM, Partido Revolucionario Mexicano. For the 1940 election, Cárdenas refused to endorse the PRM candidate, Manuel Ávila Camacho. Cárdenas wanted to see Ávila Camacho stand on his own feet, as Cárdenas had no intention to be a shadow president like Calles. The 1940 election was very close and there was election-related violence, but it did not result in the loser starting an armed revolt. Mexico truly was on the path of a peaceful transfer of power through elections.

1940-2000: 60 Years of PRI Hegemony

Ávila Camacho had some concerns about a new political party, PAN, Partido Accion Nacional, which had formed in 1939. PAN drew much of its support from the middle-class, upper-class, and Catholics. When Ávila Camacho assumed office in 1940, he moderated the government’s stance on religious matters considerably. Ávila Camacho himself was a practicing Catholic, but it also made good political sense to steal the thunder from one’s rivals.

Ávila Camacho had to face the difficulties of the Second World War, choosing to join the Allied side after the USA declared war on Japan. In the war, Mexico contributed 15,000 troops to the war effort and 300,000 farm workers, known as braceros, to the US production efforts. The braceros made for good PR, but were often subject to physical and economic abuse. The program ended in 1964 after much criticism in both the US and Mexico at the way the program exploited the Mexican laborers to the benefit of the US farm owners.

Ávila Camacho led Mexico to join the UN in 1944 and changed the name of his party one last time, giving it its current name, PRI - Partido Revolucionario Institucional – in 1946. But it wasn’t all anticlimactic stuff in Ávila Camacho’s presidency. He created a social security system, the IMSS, in 1943and got PEMEX to work out a sweet deal with Standard Oil. His presidency is seen as a prosperous one for Mexico, in which many of the gains of the revolution were consolidated and institutionalized. Also, in 1945, Ávila Camacho authorized Rivera to begin work on his second series of murals for the second floor of the National Palace, a cycle Rivera would work on until 1951.

Pro-labor poster from the Alemán era. It shows

the children in front of a May Day poster and

the text expresses CTM’s support for Alemán.

In 1946, PRI chose Miguel Alemán Valdés as its candidate – the first civilian to serve as president without getting assassinated, couped, or invaded by a foreign power since Benito Juárez. Unfortunately for Mexico, Alemán’s presidency was a corrupt one, and that corruption has continued into the administrations which followed his. For his credit, Alemán did encourage the development of Acapulco as a vacation spot: by 1950, it was considered a trendy destination for jet-setters that wanted to make a big splash on pristine beaches.

Mexico City began to become a megalopolis during Alemán’s presidency. It had always been a big city, but now it would become a super-city, experiencing what’s known as hyper-urbanization. Urbanization is the natural growth of a city as an economic hub, attracting rural people to the city with the promise of existing jobs. Hyper-urbanization is the extreme growth of a city, with rural people showing up in the hope of finding a job, any job. The slums of Mexico City began to spread out to cover the whole of the Valley of Mexico and today are being created in the hollows of mountain caves. Alemán worked to help provide sufficient fresh water for Mexico City, but his provisions are now inadequate for the uncounted millions of people that make Mexico City and its surrounding area their home.

On a happier note, Rivera worked on his whimsical A Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park from 1947-1948. It’s one of my favorite works. It covers Mexican history as in his National Palace cycle, but far less judgmentally so. He does include religious and political oppression, but also takes time to show the lighter side of life, depicting himself as an impish boy holding the hand of one of Posada’s grand calavera ladies with a feathered boa around her neck – with the feathered boa being an actual snake, a reference to Quetzalcoatl. The mural is a celebration of Mexico and all it has to offer, the good with the violent.

The best I could do at getting a picture of Rivera’s entire A Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park was to take a picture of this model of the mural, conveniently located across from the real thing. The museum where you can find the mural is at the west end of the Alameda Park and has a number of really comfy chairs to sit in and contemplate the whimsical work. I went there on a Sunday afternoon and I can say that, yes, that’s what Alameda Park is like around that time. Well, almost like it is in the mural: Rivera left out the bagpipe players.

The Alemán presidency signaled the beginning of a quiet time for Mexican politics, relative to the storms that had gone on before. Quiet did not mean the end to change, for there was much to do in Mexican politics. Adolfo Ruiz Cortines served from 1952 to 1958 and worked to reverse much of the corruption from the administration of his predecessor. Ruiz had to preside over the 1954 devaluation of the peso, in which it lost a sizeable amount of its value. Happily, Ruiz also got to be the man that pressed for full voting rights for women in Mexico. Like Cárdenas, Ruiz is seen as a man without corruption in Mexican politics, truly a miracle of miracles in that land.

Adolfo López Mateos served as PRI’s president from 1958 to 1964. He had the distinction of running against the first-ever PAN presidential candidate. After winning the election, López Mateos worked to improve Mexico’s archaeological treasures, doing much to promote museums and maintenance of archaeological sites. His term was also the one in which Mexico ended the bracero program and began the building of maquiladoras along the border with the US, both happening in 1964.

The maquiladoras were the first signs of the current form of globalization, in which labor is no longer a static natural resource, but a commodity that can be accessed across borders. While labor is now truly global, proximity to communications from the US was an important concern in 1964, which meant Mexico was an ideal site for receiving plants from the US where its workers would do the same jobs as US employees for much less cost. One should also note that plants in Mexico did not have to abide by US anti-pollution ordinances, making production there much less costly and much more damaging to the environment.

The next president of Mexico, serving from 1964 to 1970, was Gustavo Díaz Ordaz. Díaz Ordaz ruled in a very authoritarian manner, which put him at odds with unions and student groups. He will always be remembered – negatively – for his role in ordering federal police to fire point-blank on unarmed student protesters in Tlatelolco Square in 1968. To this day, the government disputes any casualty figures higher than its own low-ball estimate. Although Díaz Ordaz claims he saved Mexico with his actions, those who remember how the soldiers broke into the homes of people that offered shelter to fleeing students, killing everyone inside, would certainly debate that claim.

From the 1950s forward, Rufino Tamayo adopted a much more subdued and abstract style, marking a further departure from Rivera and Siqueiros. This painting, Two Musicians, shows his embrace of a style free even of indigenous influences: Tamayo shows that he feels free to be Tamayo in this work from the Museum of Modern Art in Chapultepec Park.

Díaz Ordaz’ successor, Luis Echeverría Álvarez, who served from 1970 to 1976, was Minister of the Interior in 1968 and also shared in the guilt for the student massacre. Echeverría also used federal troops to suppress an agrarian revolt in the southern state of Guerrero. During his campaign, though, Echeverría showed what seemed to be contrition and at one campaign stop he asked for a moment of silence to commemorate the slain students. That nearly got him pulled off the campaign trail, but he persevered and went on to become president.

Echeverría nationalized the mining industry and electrical utilities and worked to continue the work of land reform. Before any leftists out there jump up and down with joy at hearing that news, keep in mind that Echeverría also initiated a plan to destroy all of Mexico’s forests and convert them into agricultural land. Hardly politically correct environmentalism these days, eh?

Economic matters were worse. Echeverría’s rule was corrupt and spendthrifty: he devalued the peso from its 1954 value at 12.50 to the dollar to 20 to the dollar in 1976. This devaluation happened overnight and people literally woke up the next day with almost half as much worth as they had the day before. His administration racked up huge debts and lost the confidence it had gained in early years with its land reform program and other popular measures.

Worse still, Echeverría pulled a Calles and stayed on to influence the presidency after he left office in 1976. Echeverría’s power came from his control of a number of special police forces, the PRI old guard, and contacts among Mexico’s drug cartels. In the 1970s, the cartels were involved mostly in marijuana smuggling, but they have since become much more powerful due to their involvement in heroin and cocaine trafficking.

Since leaving office, Echeverría has been accused of engineering the murder of PRI’s 1994 presidential candidate, Luis Donaldo Colosio; of being involved in the drugs trade directly with his brother-in-law; of being responsible in some part for the escape of “El Chapo”, a major figure in the Sinaloa cartel; and has been charged with genocide for his role in the Tlatelolco Massacre of 1968 and the Corpus Christi Massacre of 1971. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire, I tell ya…

José López Portillo y Pacheco became president in 1976, and continued his predecessor’s profligate ways. Although Mexico received a boost to its fortunes with the discovery of new oil fields in the Gulf of Mexico in 1978 and the spike in oil prices that went up with the 1979 oil panic, López Portillo nevertheless found a way to squander that wealth and left Mexico in the unenviable position of having to again devalue its currency three times in 1982. And that from a man that said in 1981, “¡Defenderé el peso como un perro!” – “I will defend the peso like a dog!” When he devalued, people made barking noises whenever they saw him.

López Portillo sure did try to defend the peso. He nationalized Mexico’s banks and suspended payments on its external debt, to the infuriation of those that had lent it money. Never mind that governments always default on their debts: it’s just a matter of time. Those governments whose default seems to still be far off enjoy lower interest rates than those that have recently defaulted or that are in shaky financial situations.

The next president, Miguel de la Madrid Hurtado, was a former banker and wanted to see less state involvement in the economy, believing that a freer market with less regulation would help Mexico in its currency crisis and in dealing with its runaway inflation. While opening up the market was supposed to help with those problems, it left Mexico vulnerable to the same kind of exploitation it knew during the Porfiriato, and political voices in Mexico emerged to denounce that course of action.

de la Madrid’s market reforms did not bear immediate fruit: inflation shot up during his presidency, hitting 159% (ouch!) in 1987. Unemployment in Mexico went to 25% during the de la Madrid years. Those two factors led to a third issue, massive economic migration from Mexico to the USA during the 1980s. Anti-immigration groups in the USA emerged to speak out against the flow of migrants across the southern border and it became a major issue in US politics up to 2008. As I write this, I’m aware that the economic collapse in the US building industry has resulted in a reverse flow of people back to Mexico and, if the US economy worsens, immigration will be much less of an issue unless Mexico’s economy wipes out worse than the US one.

de la Madrid did not cease in his fight against inflation. He engineered a series of pacts between different economic groups in Mexico in 1987 and, by 1988, inflation was at last under control. de la Madrid’s legacy, however, remained sullied due to the government’s slow response to the disastrous 1985 Mexico City earthquake, in which over 10,000 people died. de la Madrid also refused international offers of aid, which damaged his reputation even further. By the next election in 1988, PRI had to face additional opposition.

In 1988, Lázaro Cárdenas’ grandson, Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, ran as the candidate of the Partido Revolucionario Democratico (PRD) as a liberal alternative to the conservative PRI and the even more conservative PAN. The PRD emerged because of the string of failures rung up by PRI presidents over the preceding two decades. Cárdenas resigned from PRI and carried much of its support with him. He knew he would have to campaign heavily against the PRI candidate, Carlos Salinas de Gortari, but was confident he had the votes to pull it off.

Some artists chose to take a look at Mexico’s expanding urbanization. In this work at the Museum of Modern Art, one sees the big blue runways of an airport next to the colorful spaghetti gridwork of Mexico City’s major roads. Why is the airport so huge? Well, there was a proposal once upon a time to build a new airport east of Mexico City that would require the displacement of several thousand families. The people of the area objected and marched in protest to shut the proposal down.

The 1988 election results at first showed a substantial lead for Cárdenas. Then, the Minister of the Interior announced there was a problem with the tabulation system. When he brought it back online, Salinas was in the lead. The PRD cried foul, as this election seemed so obviously stolen, thanks to the PRI man “counting” the ballots. The PRD became even more suspicious when the PRI members of Congress voted along with the PAN members to destroy the electoral documentation without opening it. In 2005, de la Madrid actually said on television that PRI lost the 1988 elections. PRI followed up with a massive propaganda offensive to try and explain away de la Madrid’s comment.

Salinas assumed the presidency in 1988 in spite of the protests and set about de-nationalizing Mexico’s banks, which he finally achieved in 1992. In 1993, he made the Bank of Mexico politically independent, like the US’ Federal Reserve. By 1994, Salinas had also gotten inflation down to 7% and had renegotiated Mexico’s foreign debt. Salinas was even more of a free-trade and capitalism poster boy with his successful negotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the privatization of Mexican industries, including the national telephone system, TELMEX. Towards the end of his administration, world leaders remarked on how Salinas seemed to have prepared Mexico to be every bit a developed, first-world nation, alongside the USA, Japan, Germany, Canada, France, and England.

Could Salinas do any wrong? Well, yes, as it turned out…

For starters, his policies resulted in a large overvaluation for the peso, setting it up for yet another devaluation. Like his counterparts in the USA, Reagan and Bush, Salinas ran up massive public deficits while masquerading as a proponent of limited government. Salinas’ privatizations were tainted by revelations that they, like the 1988 elections, were rigged in favor of his supporters.

Street vendors such as this woman don’t pay taxes. While they’re a great convenience for people around town, they’re a pain in the neck for government officials that are trying to find ways to boost revenue. They’re an important, if underreported, part of the Mexican economy.

During the election campaign of 1994, the PRI candidate Colosio was murdered in Tijuana, forcing Salinas and the PRI to find a new successor-designate. A few months after Colosio’s murder, Salinas’ biggest political rival – who also happened to be his former brother-in-law – was murdered and the case went unsolved, even though Salinas’ Attorney General happened to be the guy’s brother. The PRI settled on Ernesto Zedillo, Salinas’ Minister of Education, and hoped he wasn’t on someone’s hit list.

One more item to punctuate the darker side of Salinas’ administration was the outbreak of the Zapatista rebellion in Chiapas state on 1 January 1994, the same day NAFTA went into effect. The rebels basically demanded control over their own resources, in accordance with Article 27 of the Constitution of 1917, which Salinas had to remove as part of the preconditions of signing NAFTA. The Zapatista violence subsided quickly, but the Zapatistas themselves could not be budged from Chiapas. Today, they have effectively formed self-governing municipalities, but in 1994, the threat of a national revolution hung like a cloud over Mexico.

The political instability, combined with the shaky financial situation, was starting to spook investors. Salinas took the measure of having the Mexican government and businesses borrow debt denominated in dollars. These dollar-denominated bonds, called tesobonos, were the Mexican government’s assurance that investors would be paid back what they were properly owed, even if Mexico had to devalue its currency, which was right around 3.3 pesos to the dollar in 1994. Economists say that Salinas should have raised interest rates to defend the peso, but 1994 was an election year, and Salinas wanted the Mexican economy to hum along smoothly to keep PRI’s chances of winning good.

Even after Zedillo won the election, Salinas kept up the economic scam that everything was all right in Mexico. Critics contend that he was trying to show off so he’d be nominated as the next director general of the World Trade Organization after leaving office.

The Rufino Tamayo Museum, Chapultepec

Park. It’s the one with the giant Rubik’s

Cube-lookin’ thingy in front of it. Mexico

City has more museums per person than any

other city in the world. With over 16 million

people, that’s a LOT of museums.

On 1 December 1994, Zedillo took the oath of office to serve as president of Mexico. 22 days later, he announced that he would have to let the peso float against the dollar. While the government hoped it would only go to 4 pesos per dollar, it plummeted to 7.2 pesos per dollar by the end of the year. Because of Salinas’ brilliant idea to have Mexican debt denominated in dollars, Mexican businesses effectively saw their debt burdens more than double within the last days of December 1994. Businessmen close to Zedillo were informed that the change would happen and were able to renegotiate their debt into pesos before the bottom fell out from under the peso.

Worse, Zedillo announced his devaluation on a Wednesday, so investors – actually, institutional gamblers is a better term when you look at what they do to markets – were able to wreak all manner of chaos on the Mexican economy before markets closed for the week on Friday, with Zedillo’s government doing nothing to staunch the fiscal bloodshed.

Salinas then called the situation the “December Mistake” and blamed Zedillo for everything.

Everybody looked at Salinas with that “Are you serious?” sort of look people have when they wonder if a guy really means the outrageous thing he just said. If he didn’t believe it, it was totally in bad taste. And if he did? Well… get a rope…

Salinas left the country and settled in Ireland. In the meantime, one of his brothers was convicted of the murder of Salinas’ political rival, that inconvenient brother-in-law. Salinas’ younger brother was murdered under mysterious circumstances and rumors flew about possible entanglements Salinas and his family may have had with the Mexican drug cartels.

Zedillo did everything he could to distance himself from the self-destructing Salinas and actually did a pretty good job of seeing his nation recover from the 1994 crash. One big help was being able to get $50 billion in loans from the Clinton administration to help keep his nation above water after the banking system collapsed in 1995. By 1996, the Mexican recession was over and Mexico repaid its loans borrowed from the US Treasury ahead of schedule in 1997.

It’s just not Mexico City without the little

green VW bug taxicabs. They’re everywhere.

Zedillo initiated a number of programs to address poverty in Mexico, collectively known as Progresa. Even so, he was still associated with the December Mistake and Salinas, which hurt PRI’s chances in the 2000 election. Zedillo himself had won the 1994 election – actually considered the cleanest in Mexican history – with just over 48% of the vote, so electoral margins were slim going into the 2000 race.

Salinas didn’t help out any when he returned to Mexico to promote sales of his book in which he went to extensive and footnoted lengths to blame all the problems of his presidency on Zedillo. People got that “Are you serious?” look again and a group of bankers that were ruined by the December Mistake transcribed his book and made it available online for free, so that Salinas wouldn’t get profits from it.

The Man from PAN

As you can tell by the new section title, PAN won the 2000 election. There’s an interesting story about how that happened. The PAN candidate, Vicente Fox, was sort of a right-wing version of Barack Obama. He offered hope, had catchy slogans, and became famous when an argument between the three candidates about when they should air a debate made it to television. Fox was shouting, “¡Hoy! ¡Hoy! ¡Hoy!” That’s Spanish for “Today! Today! Today!” but it sounds better with only one syllable and that upside-down exclamation point. It became a slogan for his campaign, like the “Yes we can!” mantra of the Obama campaign.

His biggest support came from northern and central Mexico and Fox was able to deliver the first presidential electoral defeat for PRI, ever. He had 43% of the vote, with PRI coming in second and PRD in a distant third. When he took office on 1 December 2000, it was a truly historic day in Mexico: a rival political party had gained control of the presidency by way of a peaceful election.

Who’d-a-thunk-it? While some die-hards in PRI criticized Zedillo for conceding defeat when they were only 11 points behind in the polls and could easily win on a “recount”, nearly everyone else appreciated the difference a peaceful transition meant. For one thing, PRI kept its hold on the Congress. If PAN had won in a violent rebellion, all those PRI guys would have been forced into exile or shot. With a peaceful transfer, they could stay on to make Fox’ administration loads of fun for everyone.

Another thing that had to soften the edge of defeat for PRI was in the way that Fox selected a number of Echeverría supporters for his cabinet. Critics pointed to this as proof of a conspiracy between Echeverría’s hardline PRI members and PAN, which served to tarnish Fox’ reputation. Heck, mentioning Echeverría in the same sentence as someone else is enough to tarnish a reputation in Mexico.

While Fox didn’t have a major financial crisis during his presidency, Mexican growth languished as cheaper labor came online in India and China. The slow growth in Mexico meant immigration to the USA continued at a huge pace. Fox justified the immigration movement by saying the Mexicans were willing to do jobs that “not even blacks are willing to do.”

That statement was a brilliant political move, as one might surmise. In it, he managed to insult just about everyone in North America except the Canadians.

Fox’ relations with Congress didn’t fare much better. In 2006, Congress refused to hear his state of the union address in their chambers, so Fox had to deliver it as a televised speech, without any applause from his supporters. Fox also managed to tick off the rest of Latin America’s leaders when it was revealed that he had asked Fidel Castro to leave a summit of American leaders before George Bush arrived. Way to go, Fox…

But before you think he was all buddy-buddy with Bush, Fox insulted Bush in his autobiography, expressing astonishment that the people of the USA actually elected Bush and accusing him of being a “windshield cowboy” for refusing to ride a horse on Fox’ ranch. Politically, Fox opposed the US’ invasion of Iraq and supported “soft” US immigration policies. Critics pointed to the number one source of Mexican income – remittances from migrant laborers – and how the drop in Mexico’s population reduced the burden on the state for providing services. Fox’ administration didn’t win any fans in the US with its 2004 publication of a guide on how to get into the USA illegally. The guide is online and it’s a rather interesting read, to say the least.

As Fox’ term wound down in 2006, PAN announced that Felipe Calderón would be their candidate. Calderón had been Fox’ Minister of Energy, but had been critical of Fox and had resigned from his post in 2004. Even so, Fox openly supported Calderón and PAN was hopeful about retaining the presidency in the 2006 election.

Calderón’s most significant opponent was the PRD populist Andrés Manuel López Obrador, former Mayor of Mexico City. Well, that’s not the official title he had, but it’s what he did for a living prior to running for president. During his time running Mexico City, López Obrador was wildly popular. The PAN and PRI tried to make him ineligible to run for office by stripping him of his governmental immunity and prosecuting him for a misdemeanor. Huge demonstrations in Mexico City supported López Obrador, and believe me, Mexico City can put on a huge demonstration for López Obrador. I saw one in July 2008, supporting his position that the Mexican oil industry should stay nationalized. It shut down traffic all over the center of town for almost an entire day. Although Congress stripped López Obrador’s immunity, Fox realized it would be political suicide to prosecute him, and ordered the matter pending against López Obrador to be dropped.

This is a shot from the July 2008 rally. López Obrador looks like a Mexican Bill Clinton in that poster. This group was part of the mob that was assembling in the Zocalo to support keeping PEMEX nationalized.

The PRI candidate, Roberto Madrazo, didn’t have a hope in the election. PRI had declined massively in significance since 2000, and Madrazo was only able to get 22% of the popular vote. The contest came down to López Obrador and Calderón, with the race as close as baby’s breath.

On 6 July 2006, the Mexican electoral commission declared Calderón the winner, by 0.58% of the vote. The PRD cried foul, citing irregularities at 30% of Mexico’s polling stations and insisting upon a more proper count of the votes. After two months of haggling, the Federal Electoral Court declared Calderón to be the winner.

This did not sit well with López Obrador, who had already been camped on the streets of Mexico City in a protest with the rest of his supporters. He set up a protest government and cited election observers from Global Exchange that had found irregularities at 60 polling places they had observed, and had called for a full recount. PAN responded that the EU observers had said the election was clean and fair. PRD then said Calderón’s brother-in-law had benefited from contracts he had with the Department of Energy when Calderón ran it. PAN asked to see the documents. PRD showed up at PAN headquarters with them, but refused to open the filing boxes in front of the media. PAN got hold of them in a scuffle, opened them, and revealed the boxes were mostly empty. PRD retreated and tried to find a better way of challenging the election… basically, all the garbage the US went through in the 2000 election happened in Mexico in 2006. ALL of it.

And then some. Gore never set up a tent city in Washington, DC, that shut down traffic around the city center for weeks. López Obrador did that. López Obrador also sent his guys into the Congress to prevent Fox from addressing it. PAN observers said López Obrador had, at most, 300,000 supporters with him. PRD supporters put the numbers around 3-4,000,000. Even so, nobody fired a shot and, eventually, López Obrador and his supporters accepted the results and went home. The episode did bring up the issue of election reform, and there are hopes the 2012 election will run much more smoothly – Mexico City traffic is bad enough without massive street protests for weeks on end.

The PRD tried one more move on 1 December 2006. The Mexican Constitution stipulates that if the president-elect does not show up to take the oath of office on that day, the presidency is declared vacant and an interim president has to fill that slot. On that day, some desperate Congressmen started a melee in the chambers to try and keep Calderón from taking his oath of office. As the fighting continued, Calderón snuck in by a back door and took the oath and then got the heck out of there. He was in and out in five minutes flat. He didn’t even deliver his inaugural address to the Congress, choosing to do it in an auditorium with only his supporters in attendance.

Ironically, in the 2008 elections for PRD leadership, the two PRD factions accused each other of fraud and corruption. Hardly proper form for a party that was trying to pin that label on its opposition.

While fighting drug dealers is one thing, facing down massive traffic snarls is a daily challenge for the police of Mexico. Seriously, these are some of the bravest guys in the world.

Calderón’s administration started with that huge election controversy, along with his rival declaring that he was the legitimate president of Mexico, but with perhaps more evidence to back up his claim than old Nicholás Zuñiga y Miranda. Some of Calderón’s first measures were taken directly from the PRD platform: a price ceiling on tortillas and a reduction or limitation on bureaucratic salaries. Those moves were huge concessions for Calderón, who wanted to promote free-market policies in his administration. The closeness of the election has likely caused him to see the need to move carefully without straining his limited political capital.

The memorial of the fallen at the Naval Academy in Veracruz. The 21st Century list is already longer than the 20th Century one.

Perhaps the most controversial measure taken by Calderón has been his all-out assault on the drugs trade in Mexico. In 2008, the murder rate in Mexico increased astronomically due to the government’s pressure on the gangs. By arresting their leaders and disrupting the flow of drugs, the government has triggered wars of succession and turf wars. The drug rings have used their control of local police forces to fight both each other and the federal government. Groups of federal Special Forces soldiers have defected to one of the drug cartels – the Gulf Cartel – and, known as Los Zetas, they kill opponents with a ruthlessness previously unknown in the already ruthless world of the drugs trade.

Los Zetas present an interesting twist in the drug war. Many of them have been trained at the School of the Americas, which is a US facility that trains Latin American soldiers in the fine arts of becoming right-wing death squads. Fully skilled in counterinsurgency methods, Los Zetas know exactly how their clandestine activities will be tracked and dealt with, making them particularly effective at evading capture and resisting interrogation. When they try to assassinate someone, they use no half measures: one recent assassination in Nuevo Laredo lasted 40 minutes and involved grenade launchers and other crew-served weapons normally associated with military units. These guys even have helicopters for air support. They’ve been known to tap phones, land lines as well as wireless, and to go to cellular providers to get access to the phones of their intended victims.

In spite of their succession and turf wars, the drug cartels in Mexico are nowhere near being on the run. They have targeted all manner of government officials and their families and analysts fear that Mexico is not far from becoming the next Afghanistan, with the central government controlling little more than the capital and regional warlords using the drugs trade to finance their positions.

For their part, the good men and women in Mexico’s government have every determination to fight their very real War on Drugs. The memorial of the fallen at the Naval Academy in Veracruz lists all the names of those in the Mexican Navy that have died in the line of duty: the list of names from 1973 forward gets longer with each year and dwarfs the lists from the wars that went on before. In spite of corruption and fear, there are Mexicans that have that spirit of Zapata, Morelos, Hidalgo, Cuauhtémoc, and Los Niños Heroes: to fight on for what is right even if it seems that the valiant fight will end in defeat. In Mexico, one fights for what is right because it is what is right.

You Are Here

Adios, Mexico

Adios, Mexico

How I got along without you, I’ll never know

Adios, Mexico

- The Texas Tornados, “Adios, Mexico”

I sit here at the end of 2008 writing this last page of my History of Mexico. I look back on all the years of its past and marvel at the vast spectacle of it all. It’s definitely a place worth visiting, and if one stays clear of illegal activities, one can have an amazing time there. It is a magical land, and if one pauses a moment to listen to the land, one can learn how the magic there works and how to understand its influence on the land and people. It’s a thoroughly modern nation, sure, but always, always, just outside one can hear the beat of primordial drums… always the drums are beating…

For the last few months, I’ve been wanting to finish writing this book, and now I don’t want it to end. It’s my connection with the tacos al pastor at the Taco Inn next to the National Museum of Art… the cup of Mexican hot chocolate and churros south of the Zocalo… the helpful woman in Veracruz that showed me how to get to my hotel there… the eager museum attendants that showed me around perfectly well in their museums, even though some of them didn’t speak a word of English… the monuments at Chapultepec… the masked wrestlers… the hushed reverence of the Metropolitan Cathedral… the sweet taste of apple soda… Diego Rivera murals… if I stop typing, I have to step away from those memories, and I really don’t want to.

I must, though. Nothing lasts forever. With luck, I’ll have at least one more chance to see the great nation of Mexico.

Appendix A: The Timeline

When Everything Happened… mas o menos…

Unless otherwise noted, all dates are CE. CE is the same as AD, in case you aren’t familiar with CE. BCE is the same as BC, in case you’re not that familiar with BCE, which would be the case if you also weren’t familiar with CE.

- 40,000 BCE: Some human leaves footprints in the Valley of Mexico. Maybe. Maybe it was later than that.

- 1200 BCE – 100 CE: The Olmecs rock out in Southern Veracruz and Tabasco. That’s the area just south of the Gulf of Mexico for those of you that don’t know your Mexican states. San Lorenzo is the first center. La Venta is the next important one until it’s knocked out around 500-400 BCE. The last Olmec center is Tres Zapotes, which carries on until 100 CE.

- 100-750: Teotihuacán DOMINATES!!!

By the way, when Teotihuacán falls to

invaders, Spain is also falling to invaders.

100-750: Teotihuacán dominates the culture and politics of Mexico. Well, it doesn’t dominate at the very beginning or very end of this period. It’s influential at those times. But in the middle of this period, say starting around 200? Oh yeah, it’s quite the dominant civilization.

- 250-900: The Maya have their Classic period and do some amazing stuff and things with their civilization.

- 650-900: Classic Veracruz civilization does its thing in Veracruz… uh… classically?

- 711: The Moors invade Spain. This triggers off a massive Spanish military resistance to the Moorish invasion that lasts for over 700 years. Militarism that ingrained is hard to shake off, let me tell you… when the Spanish ever get the Moors out of Spain, they’ll still be looking for someone to fight.

- 9th Century: The Toltecs wander in from the north and pick up where Teotihuacán left off.

- 968: Toltecs set up their capital at Tula, where they develop the religion of Quetzalcoatl. Since every Toltec king took the name “Quetzalcoatl”, we historians figure that Quetzalcoatl must have been their #1 god in terms of popularity.

- 1253: The Mexica, who will be later known as the Aztecs, arrive in the Valley of Mexico. They are uncivilized barbarians compared to the other Nahuatl speakers there, and they find the only regular work they can get is by hiring themselves out as mercenaries. I’m sure they were also the target of unflattering jokes, like, “Hey, how many Mexica does it take to interpret omens in the sky? NONE! Because they’re so darn stupid! Hahahaha!” This, no doubt, serves to reinforce both their warlike spirit and desire to eventually take over the Valley of Mexico and beat down on all the jerks that cracked wise in such a manner.

- 1325: The Mexica start Tenochtitlan… keep in mind, now, that Tenochtitlan wasn’t built in a day.

1325: The Mexica found Tenochtitlan. They will go on to claim the right to dominate all of Mexico culturally and politically, like the Toltecs. Just not right then.

- 1430: Mexica form the Triple Alliance with Texcoco and Tlacopan, then proceed to take over the Valley of Mexico and set up an empire. It’s safe to call them “Aztecs” now.

- 1492: Spain takes the last Moorish bastion of Granada. Yay! They now ask, “Who do we bash next?”

- 1492: Columbus discovers the Western Hemisphere for Spain. Suddenly, new candidates for the next bashing are evident.

- 1500: Aztec Empire rules over 38 cities and upwards of 15 millions of people.

- 1502: Moctezuma II takes over. Little does he know, but his reign will end… in murder! The Aztec Empire showed signs of strain by the start of his reign and, had the Spanish not showed up to bash them, one wonders if the Aztecs would have held together for much longer either during or after Moctezuma’s reign.

- 1507: Spanish ships notice there’s a Mexico in their way as they try to sail from the Caribbean to Asia. This is most disappointing to them.

- 1511: The Audiencia in Santo Domingo tries to get the Spanish settlers in the Caribbean to stop bashing the natives. It doesn’t work.

- 1517: The governor of Cuba sends an expedition to Mexico to take it over. These guys don’t feel like taking over Mexico when they get there.

- 1518: The governor of Cuba tries again with an expedition to Mexico. Not much fire in the belly for this gang, either. Ironically, when the governor of Cuba finds a guy who will conquer Mexico – Cortés – he tries to cancel the expedition before it leaves port.

- 1519: The Spanish meet with the Mexica and

that leads to a blend of cultures, for better or

for worse…

1519: The Spanish land on Mexican soil and proceed to check the place out. If they can’t find an easy way to China, then they hope to find people with gold. Then they can bash the people with gold, take the gold, and enjoy the profits of organized crime.

- 1519: Incidentally, this is also the year Quetzalcoatl is supposed to return from exile to smite his enemies and destroy the world. What timing, eh?

- 1520: Cortés gets run out of Tenochtitlan during La Noche Triste. He later vows to return.

- 1520-1521: First smallpox epidemic in Mexico. Up to half the population there perishes due to a lack of resistance to the European strain of the disease.

- 1521: Cortés returns to Tenochtitlan and destroys the place, then orders a new city built upon the dust and ruins of the old.

The Viceroyalty of New Spain: 1521-1821

- 1524: Twelve Franciscan monks arrive in Mexico to get the conversion of the natives underway.

- 1526: Seeing as how there are millions of Mexicans, the Dominicans arrive to help convert everyone.

- 1530: A choir made up of indigenous peoples graces the Mexico City cathedral with its music. It is considered to be at least the equal of some of the best choirs in Europe.

- 1531: Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin claims to have seen the Virgin Mary on Tepeyac Hill. Bishop Juan de Zumárraga later confirms the veracity of the vision and has a church built on that hill in honor of the Virgin.

- 1533: Since Mexico still isn’t all converted to Catholicism, the Augustinians show up to do their bit in spreading Christianity. Talk about bandwagonning…

- 1535: Spain establishes a mint in Mexico City. Peppermints for everyone! No, wait, not that kind of mint… this mint is where coins are made… Silver for everyone! No, wait, it doesn’t really work that way…

- 1535: Spain gets its Viceroyalty of New Spain started up. It’ll last until 1821.

- 1537: The Franciscan Order opens up a college in Mexico for training members of the priesthood.

- 1540-1542: The Mixton War starts in the rugged northwest of New Spain and nearly wipes out the Spanish presence in Mexico. It is the most serious rebellion against Spanish rule until the outbreak of the Mexican War of Independence in 1810.

- 1540: Coronado explores New Mexico and surrounding regions. Spanish missionaries and soldiers follow…

- 1545-1548: Second big smallpox epidemic in Mexico. Very, very devastating.

- 1548: The first Bishop of Mexico, Juan de Zumárraga, passes away. He was known for making the conquistadors mad for telling them to not mistreat the natives they ruled over.

- 1552: The first viceroy of New Spain, Antonio de Mendoza, passes away. He will be remembered for the way he was the boss of everyone, even Cortés, and establishing order and commerce in the region.

- 1573-1817: Construction of the

Metropolitan Cathedral in Mexico

City. Lately, folks are busy keeping

it from sinking into the ground.

1553: The University of Mexico opens. The first student strike starts only a week after it opens, then the rectors explain it’s about 415 years too early for student radicalism, causing the students to disperse in embarrassment.

- 1559: The funeral ceremony for Charles V, or exequies, takes place in Mexico City. Historians point to this ceremony as having been critical in converting native culture into Spanish culture.

- 1568: Bernal Diaz del Castillo begins to record his memoirs of his campaigns with Cortés. While a reader would be cautioned to believe everything Diaz says in his book, it is considered to be a highly faithful account of the conquest from a Spanish perspective.

- 1573: Construction of the Metropolitan Cathedral begins in Mexico City. Although it’s not finished entirely until 1817, it’s quite usable from an early date.

- 1576-1579: Pandemics in Mexico. While there is some debate about which diseases, exactly, were involved in this outbreak, historians do agree that the populations in Mexico were vulnerable to disease because of the stress they were under from Spanish occupation.

- 1590s: Spanish crown authorizes more slavery in New Spain to fill in the labor gap created by the native population collapse.

- 1629-1631: Another round of devastating disease in Mexico. Again, no matter what the diseases may have been, the populations there were undernourished and overworked: not the best way to resist a disease.

- 1648: First mention of the story behind

the appearance of the Virgin of

Guadalupe. From here forward, she

stands as a symbol for all Mexico.

1634-1635: Last major round of pandemics in Mexico. The native population is less than 10% of what it was pre-conquest. Put another way, from just over 25 million in 1519, the native population is around one million in 1635.

- 1648: Earliest verifiable source that mentions the Virgin of Guadalupe is published.

- 1650: Only 16.5% of all immigrants to Mexico are European women. This means that most men in Mexico seek native, mestizo, or African brides… and that means most people in Mexico are not of pure Spanish descent.

- 1664: Sor Juana begins writing poetry and plays in Mexico City.

- 1680: Pueblo Revolt – the Pueblo Indians rise up against Spanish rule and drive them out of New Mexico. The Spaniards return in greater force to retake the area.

- 1691: Sor Juana writes Repuesta a Sor Filotea, which affirms a woman’s right to education and self-expression. It is considered an important document in outlining women’s rights.

- 1713: The Bourbon family takes over in Spain and is amazed that its empire is still holding together, after the recent misrule of the Hapsburgs. They set about reforming Spain and its imperial holdings. One of their tastiest reforms is the introduction of French bakeries in Mexico.

- 1765-1771: José de Gálvez tries to make some massive reforms in the way Mexico is governed, and manages only to make limited changes. Even so, the upper classes of Mexico grumble at the way Gálvez disrupted their cozy little arrangements that made them quite wealthy.

- 1785: Royal Academy of San Carlos established in Mexico City. It’s where all the cool kids go to paint.

- 1800: Mexican economy no longer tightly tied to Spain: Revolutions in France and the USA lead some Mexicans to start planning for Mexico’s independence.

- Late 1700s-1810: Many Mexicans call their

relationship with Spain into question.

1810: Mexicans start revolting instead of

questioning… and will do so until 1821.

1808: Napoleon’s armies marching through Spain on their way to attack Portugal suddenly stop in Spain and take over the nation. Napoleon has his brother Joseph take over as the King of Spain. This puts folks all over the Spanish Empire into a tizzy. Do they support the French takeover? Or do they dare… revolt? Many in Spain did choose to revolt – the whole nation, in fact – and the fever spread to Mexico.

- 16 September 1810: This is the “diez y seis” of legend, the day celebrated as Mexican Independence Day. Father Hidalgo, a priest in Dolores, near Queretaro, started his rebellion against Spain early, as he was warned that the Spanish were coming to arrest him. The calm of the colonial period in Mexico gave way to over 50 years of chaos and war after Hidalgo sounded his call to revolution, El Grito de Dolores.

- 1810-1821: Mexico has a combination war of independence and civil war. Lots of stuff gets devastated as things get all crazy go nuts.

- 1811: Spanish forces capture and execute Father Hidalgo. The rebellion against Spain now shifts to the control of Father Morelos, in the southern part of New Spain. Morelos keeps his troops from sacking captured cities, making his rebellion more popular than Hidalgo’s.

- 1812: Spain adopts a very liberal constitution. It makes the upper class types in Mexico very uneasy, as they would rather not relinquish their near-feudal hold on the peasantry.

- 1813: Morelos captures Oaxaca and Acapulco. He very nearly captures Puebla: had he done that, he could have taken Mexico City.

- 1814: Fernando VII begins his reign in Spain. Due to his inability to control mountain bandits, his reign stayed mainly on the plain. Seriously, he was an arch-conservative and abolished the 1812 constitution. That managed to ease the mind of the elites, but made the peasants already in rebellion fight on all the harder, yes, from their mountain bases.

- 1814: Morelos issues a declaration of Mexican independence from Spain and a new constitution for the parts of Mexico under his control.

- 1815: Spanish forces capture and execute Morelos, but other rebellions against Spanish rule continue until 1821.

- 1820: In spite of the Mexican War of Independence, the University of Mexico manages to grant its 29,882nd bachelor’s degree and its 1680th advanced degree. That’ll be it for education in New Spain, seeing as how it’ll be Mexico in 1821.

- 1820: Liberals in Spain force the king there to reinstate the 1812 constitution. They’re able to force the king to do this because most of the armed forces are among the Liberals.

- 1821: To try and better defend Coahuila y Texas from Apache and Comanche raids, the Spanish government solicits settlers from the USA to move to the region.

- 1821: Iturbide crowned as the first

Emperor of Mexico. That’s it for the

Spanish rule…

1821: Iturbide conspires with Santa Anna to create an independent Mexico. Iturbide’s power grab does not do anything to address the issues that led to Hidalgo’s peasant rebellion in 1810. Iturbide then maneuvers to have himself proclaimed emperor to prevent political chaos or a military coup. Iturbide guarantees the Catholic Church will be the only official religion in Mexico and that a rich Mexican was every bit as good as a rich Spaniard. That’s one small step towards racial equality, one giant leap towards absolute power.

- 1821: On his way over to settle Texas, Stephen F. Austin finds out Mexico became independent. He meets with the Mexican government, which agrees to honor the deal he made with the Spanish.

Independence to Revolution: 1821-1910

- 1822: Anglo settlers begin to arrive in Texas. Many bring slaves with them.

- 1823: Iturbide abdicates his throne because everyone hates him. He later tries to return to Mexico to set up another monarchy, and is executed for his cluelessness.

- 1823: Stephen F. Austin has to renegotiate with the new, new Mexican government. One should note that the borders of the state of Coahuila y Texas do not include the area around Laredo, which was part of Tamaulipas, nor did they include El Paso, which was part of Chihuahua.

- 1824: The guys that deposed Iturbide give Mexico a republican constitution. The Catholic Church is not specifically mentioned in it, for good or for bad. The constitution is also a federal one with a weak central government.

- 1824: Political parties in Mexico form along the lines of Masonic lodges. Centrists hang out in the more conservative Scottish Rite lodges while the Federalists roll with the more liberal York Rite lodges.

- 1829: The government of Mexico, upset that Texans are supporting their political opponents, outlaws slavery to try and get the Anglos in Texas to leave. Those that own slaves just call them indentured servants and carry on as before.

- 1833-1836: Gomez Farías serves admirably as vice president, guiding Mexico towards greater liberalism and freedoms. The president, Santa Anna, spends most of his term just chillin’ at his crib in Jalapa. Unfortunately for Gomez Farías, his liberalizations anger the Mexican upper classes, who call upon Santa Anna to overthrow his… own… vice-president? Things become complicated as Santa Anna takes a more active role as president in opposition to his own vice president, eventually seizing control in 1835, dismissing the 1824 constitution in that move. That stunt causes massive revolts in Zacatecas, Yucatan, Coahuila, and Texas. In 1836, he introduces the 1836 constitution, which proves to be the darling of the Church and über-rich in Mexico. Many in the middle classes and not-so-über-rich hate the 1836 constitution and start even more revolts.

- 1835: Santa Anna suppresses the rebellion in Zacatecas. After scattering the rebel forces, he allows his soldiers to rape and sack the city of Zacatecas and then plunder its mines. Santa Anna then splits Zacatecas into two states.

- 1835: Late in the year, Texas declares its independence from Mexico. There are about 7800 Texans of Spanish-Mexican descent and over 30,000 Texans of Anglo descent. The Texans have a successful stand-off against the Mexicans at Gonzales and manage to take San Antonio after a two-month siege.

- 1836: The War of Texas Independence. It does

not end well for Santa Anna…

1836: Santa Anna’s military advisors inform him that the Texans are revolting. Santa Anna says, “I know! They don’t even bother to learn Spanish and hardly ever bathe…” After clearing up the misunderstanding, Santa Anna takes an army into Texas to suppress that rebellion. His forces beat the Texans at The Alamo and Goliad. Santa Anna orders the massacre of all prisoners at both actions. He then chases Sam Houston’s force across Texas, only to be defeated at the Battle of San Jacinto. In defeat, he promises Texas its independence.

- 1836: Meanwhile in Mexico, the government there deposes Santa Anna. It later declares that Santa Anna had no authority to negotiate with Sam Houston. Mexico refuses to recognize Texas as an independent nation.

- 1836: Britain and the USA recognize the independent nation of Texas. Each has its reasons for doing so…

- 1838: Santa Anna manages to re-invent himself as a hero of Mexico by fighting the French in the Pastry War.

- 1845: The USA annexes Texas, in spite of the fact that Mexico still considers it to be part of Mexico. Worse for USA-Mexican relations, the USA claims the southern boundary of Texas is the Rio Grande, not the Nueces River. Polk also sends John Slidell to Mexico to try and purchase California and New Mexico… but with the Mexican presidency alone changing hands four times in 1846, it’s hard to find anyone in Mexico City with authority to negotiate, let alone get a treaty through their Congress.

- 1846-1848: War between Mexico and the USA. The USA invades Mexican territory, makes it look like the Mexicans invaded the USA, and then proceed to bash at Mexico until it hands over half of its land area. Nowadays, planning and prosecuting such wars are defined as war crimes.

- 1846: US forces cross this river (the Nueces) and

have a fight with Mexican forces north of the Rio

Grande… but Polk lies to Congress and says the

US forces were attacked north of the Nueces.

May, 1846: Polk claims Mexican forces attacked USA troops on USA territory. The actual battle was at Palo Alto, near Fort Brown, a US-build fort at the southern end of the disputed territory. The US Congress votes to go to war with Mexico. Once the sham is revealed, many in Congress stand in opposition to the war, but that opposition does not translate into cancelling it.

- June, 1846: Anglo settlers in California revolt and, in a brilliant political move, create the “Bear Flag Republic.” War ensues between the Mexican loyalists and the Yankee traitors. Well, since the Yankees won, I guess they’re now “rebels”…

- July, 1846: Mexico declares war on the USA. Meanwhile, Santa Anna negotiates with the US that if they help him return to Mexico from his exile in Cuba, he’ll take over the government and sell California to the US. Of course, the US puts Santa Anna on a boat to Mexico.

- July, 1846: The US government requests the Mormons fleeing religious persecution in the USA to consider enlisting in a military unit for action in the war. Since the Mormons had fled the USA, leaving all their possessions in the hands of violent anti-Mormon mobs, they were happy to do work that would earn them some hard cash.

- August, 1846: Santa Anna arrives in Mexico City. He offers his services in support of the Mexican Republic and cancels his deal with the US. This will end well, I’m sure…

- September, 1846: US troops under Zachary Taylor fight Mexicans under Pedro de Ampudia at the Battle of Monterrey. Taylor fails to take the city, but pressures de Ampudia enough to force him to withdraw in a cease-fire agreement. Taylor then breaks the cease-fire and carries on with the war. This battle also showcased the San Patricio battalion: Irish-American volunteers for the Mexican army – including many deserters from the US Army, who refused to fight an unjust war against a Catholic nation.

- January, 1847: Sufficient men from the US Army arrive in California to secure the place for US interests. The US forces include the “Mormon Battalion,” which covered 1900 miles from Iowa to California – one of the longest recorded military marches in history, and that’s not even counting the hike back into Utah!

- February, 1847: Taylor fights Santa Anna at Buena Vista. Well, more like their armies fight each other. It wasn’t a boxing match, I can tell you that for sure! Most of Taylor’s army had been sent off to invade Veracruz with General Winfield Scott, but Taylor wanted more glory, so he went and drove on further into Mexico. After much hard fighting, Santa Anna had to leave because of a coup against him back in Mexico City. Both Taylor and Santa Anna declared victory, but Santa Anna’s claim was slightly more valid.

- 1847: Winfield Scott takes the city of Veracruz as part of

his master plan to win the war against Mexico.

March, 1847: Scott’s army besieges Veracruz. He orders his artillery and ships to bombard the entire city, subjecting the civilian population to direct military attack. When it looked like Scott was preparing to assault the city without allowing women and children to first depart, the Mexicans chose to surrender rather than have the civilian population face the possibility of a general sack.

- April, 1847: Scott is horrified to discover he’s lost about a third of his men to disease and decides he’d better get the heck out of La Tierra Caliente. Santa Anna tries to stop him at the Battle of Cerro Gordo. Scott wins, and marches on to Mexico City on the relatively disease-free Plain of Anahuac.

- May, 1847: Scott takes the city of Puebla and rests his forces. He has to rest his men: many have to recover from disease and he needs a big chunk of reinforcements to replace the volunteers that left his army at this time.

- August, 1847: Scott’s army fights the Mexicans under Gen. Valencia at Contreras. The Mexican soldiers fought as bravely and desperately as ever, but their commanders were in a near-constant state of bickering and betrayal. The US forces rout the Mexicans and proceed onward to Mexico City, fighting a regrouped Mexican force under Santa Anna right after Contreras. At Churubusco, the Mexicans repulsed several US attacks until they ran out of ammunition. When a US general asked Mexican Gen. Anaya to hand over his ammo, Anaya replied, “If I had any ammunition, you would not be here.” After Churubusco, the Mexicans and US forces have a cease-fire and begin negotiations.

- September, 1847: The negotiations break down and Scott attacks Mexican lines at Molino del Rey and the fortress of Chapultepec. The huge US forces overwhelm the Mexicans in their assault, but the defenders refuse to surrender, choosing to hurl themselves over the battlements than allow the US soldiers to touch the Mexican flag. As the US hauled up its colors at Chapultepec, Scott ordered that captured members of the San Patricio battalion be hung in view of that flag.

- September, 1847: US forces begin attacking Mexico City itself, again directly bombarding the civilian population. The Mexicans withdraw from the city and General Winfield Scott occupies Mexico City, ruling as military governor in the National Palace.

- October, 1847: Santa Anna steps down from the presidency and attacks US forces at Puebla. A group of Texas Rangers, led by one Captain Samuel Walker, is part of the first US relief force. Walker is killed in battle against Santa Anna, probably because he didn’t have mad kung fu skillz. After the US lifts the siege, the Mexican government asks Santa Anna to stop offering his services on behalf of the nation.

- 1848: The borders between Mexico and the USA are

redrawn. Using MSPaint, from the looks of it…

February, 1848: The Mexican government agrees to negotiate a peace treaty: in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, Mexico surrenders half its land in exchange for a payment from the USA. Although fewer than 8,000 Mexican families shifted from being Mexican to US citizens, the losses of this war had a stark effect upon Mexican politics. For the record, the aftermath of the Mexican-American War led into the US Civil War, so… yeah…

- March, 1848: General Sterling Price attacks the Mexicans at the Battle of Santa Cruz, in Chihuahua. He hadn’t gotten the memo that the war was over.

- 1852: Napoleon III comes into power in France. If Santa Anna was the Napoleon of the West, this guy is the Santa Anna of France.

- 1853: Continued turmoil in the wake of the Mexican-American War results in Santa Anna returning to power, this time at the head of a Conservative coup. Whenever Santa Anna is involved, things do not go well for Mexico.

- 1854: Santa Anna sells another chunk of Mexico to the USA in the Gadsden Purchase. This outrages many Mexicans, who resent the sale of their nation, particularly to the nation that raided them most grievously a scant six years before.

- 1854: Santa Anna messes up Mexican trade by massively increasing tariffs. He really is going too far. General Juan Álvarez leads a revolt in Guerrero that gains steam and results in a widespread revolution in Mexico.

- 1855: Liberals counter-coup Santa Anna. This only makes the Conservatives want to start a counter-counter-coup.

- 1857: The Liberals produce their constitution of 1857. As if the Conservatives weren’t mad enough over the counter-coup already…

- 1858: The Conservatives launch their counter-counter-coup and the Liberals immediately get to work on their counter-counter-counter-coup, but decide to instead start a civil war so that people don’t have to keep track of how many “counters” to use to describe their attempt to take over the government by force. So begins the War of Reform. During this time, the US tries to buy even more of Mexico, but with all the political chaos, no deals are finalized.

- 1861: Somehow, historians figure the War of Reform ends here, even though the defeated Conservatives plot and plan ways to destroy the power of the Liberals. I say the war didn’t end so much as folks took a break from the fighting so they could have at it again once they were rested up. Kinda like, “Best 2 out of 3.”

- 1862-1867: French intervention in Mexico. The French try to take what the USA didn’t, and fail miserably. The French made their move when the US was busy with its own civil war and could not intervene in Mexico.

- 1862: British, Spanish, and French forces seize Veracruz to force Mexico to pay its debts. France stays on and sends in more troops to build an empire there. Britain and Spain withdraw, but the French Foreign Legion presses forward to Puebla where, on 5 May, Mexican forces under General Zaragoza pummel the disease-ridden French. While “Cinco de Mayo” is celebrated mostly outside Mexico as a victory, the battles of resistance against the French are all remembered in Mexico.

- 1863: The French return to Puebla in greater numbers and defeat the Mexican forces there. They then move on to Mexico City. The French occupation could secure the cities and highways, but could not hold down the countryside. The Mexican resistance becomes asymmetric and persistent.

- 1864: Maximilian sets up as the second

Emperor of Mexico. Like Iturbide, he won’t

last long…

1864-1867: Maximilian von Hapsburg rules over Mexico in a way that pleases no one, even though he tried really hard to be more than just a puppet for France. His imperial career is cut short by a firing squad. Had he not ordered executions for Mexican resistance fighters, his own life might have been spared.

- 1865: US Civil War ends. The French get nervous about being able to stay in Mexico.

- 1866: The Austro-Prussian War ends in a crushing defeat for Austria. Napoleon III mediates the peace terms, which leave Prussia as the most dominant power in Germany… and as a new threat to France.

- 1867: The French withdraw from Mexico. Things are just too hairy in Mexico and Germany for them to leave troops there. Maximilian chooses to die in Mexico rather than live in Europe.

- 1867: Juarez announces his plans to run for re-election, since he spent most of his time as president outside of Mexico City. This leads to a bit of a revolt among the Liberals, with Porfirio Diaz emerging as Juarez’ most vocal opponent.

- 1868: Gabino Barreda opens a Comte-influenced school in Mexico. Comte was a philosopher that said order and progress were pretty much more important than freedoms and rights. Comte felt that scientific, rather than democratic, government would be the key to orderly, stable, and successful nations. Comtian thought becomes dominant in Mexican government circles.

- 1870: Juarez succumbs to the temptations of power and chooses to run for president again. Sebastian Lerdo de Tejada and Porfirio Diaz oppose him.

- 1871: Juarez wins re-election. Lerdo de Tejada joins his government, but Diaz starts an armed rebellion.

- 1872: Juarez dies in office. Lerdo de Tejada rigs the following election and continues implementing Juarez’ Comtian policies.

- 1876: Lerdo de Tejada’s presidential term ends. Diaz campaigns hard on a “no-reelection” platform and goes into another armed rebellion when Lerdo de Tejada wins the election. Diaz’ rebellion succeeds and Diaz, not Lerdo de Tejada, becomes the next President of the United States of Mexico.

- 1876-1910: “El Porfiriato”… a time when trains

and other infrastructure get built all over Mexico.

1876-1910: “The Porfiriato”: a time of intense economic development and political repression along Comtian lines. Not that Comte recommended repression, but that’s how things normally shook out in Comtian governments.

- 1877: Diaz convinces USA President Rutherford B. Hayes to not have US troops cross the Mexican border when fighting Indian bands.

- 1880: Even though Manuel Gonzalez is president, Diaz still has a strong degree of influence on the governing of Mexico. Also in this year, the Ministry of Development gets a bigger budget than the army.

- 1883: Mexico surveys its “vacant land” and sells it off. This results in the formation of some of the largest ranches in the world, among other things. Since the government sells off land that it acquired at no cost, it makes a killing. Any hapless peasants with but an ancestral claim on their lands are out of luck. New cities start to pop up in the north of Mexico, near the new economic opportunities.

- 1884: New mining code for Mexico! Foreign mining interests flock to Mexico to run its mines at great profit.

- 1888: Minister of the Treasury Dublán restructures Mexico’s debt. This allows the borrowing to continue and Mexico to keep building more infrastructure.

- 1888: Posada starts his print shop in Mexico

City. His works are highly entertaining and

very influential.

1888: José Guadalupe Posada starts up his print shop in Mexico City. His calavera figures are wildly popular.

- 1895: Diaz demonstrates how much closer the Catholic Church and Mexican state have become since 1857 by participating in a ceremonial crowning of the Virgin of Guadalupe.

- 1899: Dublán restructures that debt again. Mexico looks like a very responsible borrower, able to meet its obligations. Not like that Mexico of old that kept defaulting…

- 1899: Mexico receives more and more diplomatic status in the world, with many nations, including the US, upgrading their representatives in Mexico to full ambassadors, not just consuls.

- 1900: Most foreign folks reckon that Mexico is a darn fine place, getting better all the time. Most Mexicans are either grumbling about the Porfiriato or are too poor to grumble.

- 1901: Diaz gets sick… everyone in Mexico wonders who’s gonna take over when he dies.

- 1902: Gerardo Murillo, an instructor at the Academy of San Carlos, changes his name to Dr. Atl and begins promoting both independent Mexican artists and artists that stress pre-Columbian themes.

- 1903: Francisco Bulnes writes an article that calls for actual political parties, democracy, and the like when Diaz passes on.

- 1904: Mexico’s Congress amends the 1857 constitution to allow for a vice-president. Diaz senses what’s going on and chooses a guy nobody would EVER want to be president.

- 1909: Madero starts publishing his book

on how he thinks Diaz should step out

of the way and let some democracy in.

With every edition, he gets more and

more vocal about it. By the way, did

you know that Madero is about as tall

as my son? Now you know.

1905: Ricardo Flores Magón starts the Mexican Liberal Party while in exile in the USA. Diaz encourages US officials to arrest Magón with his brother, Enrique, because they’re both anarchists.

- 1907: Prices in Mexico are much higher than what they were in 1877, while wages have remained constant and rural food production has decreased significantly. Many poor in Mexico are half-starving, if not in worse shape.

- 1908: Diaz mentions to US journalist James Creelman that Mexico was ready for democracy. He then sends his most popular possible opponent, Bernardo Reyes, on a diplomatic mission.

- 1909: Francisco Madero publishes a book titled The Election of 1910, in which he drops some pretty strong hints that he’d like to be Diaz’ vice-president. Then he puts out an edition in which he says he’d rather have Diaz just not be returned to the presidency. Diaz does not like this Madero fellow.

- 1910: Diaz orders another of his rivals, Francisco Madero, to be tossed in jail. Madero misses out on the election. Madero’s supporters still vote for him, but Diaz’ people declare that Diaz won in a landslide. In light of the massive voter fraud, the next event takes place.

- 20 November 1910: Madero calls for revolution all across Mexico! No revolution happens.

The Revolution and on: 1911-Today

- 1911: *THE* Mexican Revolution kicks off in the north of Mexico. Like Mexico needed another war… By May, Madero’s supporters, led by Generals Orozco and Villa, have forced a tough situation for Diaz…

- 1911: Mexico refinances its debts. It’s like the foreign bankers don’t even know what’s about to happen next…

- May, 1911: Diaz decides it’s in his best interests to leave Mexico, so he takes a train to Veracruz and a boat to France, where he dies in 1915.

- May-November 1911: Madero’s boys try to get revolutionaries to disband. Emiliano Zapata refuses to lay down his arms until his people have their lands returned to them.

- November, 1911: Madero wins the national election, but is clueless that a social revolution is brewing up right under his nose.

- 1913: Huerta murders Madero (Author’s note: On Feb. 22, my birthday!) and takes over the government in a coup known as “The Ten Tragic Days.” US ambassador Henry Lane Wilson has a hand in planning and executing the coup. USA President Wilson, no relation, is shocked and refuses to recognize Huerta’s “government of butchers.”

- Failure at the Aguascalientes Convention. Zapata and Villa split with Obregón and Carranza over issues of land reform and other poverty relief matters.

- 1914: Venustiano Carranza organizes Constitutionalist (pro-Madero) resistance in Veracruz and recruits generals Obregón and Villa to his cause.

- 1914: Villa and Zapata drive Huerta out of Mexico

City. They have a photo session with the presidential

throne: Zapata refuses to sit in it, while Villa figures

“what the heck.”

1914: President Wilson orders US troops to take the ports of Tampico and Veracruz. He wanted them to support Carranza, but when they start killing civilians, Carranza distances himself from the US and Huerta enjoys a swell of support. Later in the year, Villa and Zapata manage to drive Huerta out of Mexico City, then their forces withdraw.

- 1914: The US passes the Harrison Act, which is the federal opening shot in the War on Drugs.

- 1915: Obregón and Carranza return to Mexico City, placing the Constitutionalists back in power.  Later on, Obregón’s forces defeat Villa’s at Celaya.

- 1916: Pancho Villa, feeling cranky after getting beaten down by Obregón, decides to attack US citizens at Columbus, New Mexico. He hopes the resulting US intervention somehow topples Obregón, or at least ruins his day. President Wilson sends General Pershing into Mexico to try and catch Villa, but he fails.

- 1917: Constitutionalists live up to their name and make a new constitution for Mexico.

- 1919: Carranza’s boys corner Zapata and kill him in Morelos, just south of Mexico City. Some people say Zapata got away, but he didn’t. He got killed.

- 1920: Carranza falls from grace and tries to get out of Mexico. He’s not fast enough. His opponents stop his train and kill him. Ouch. Obregón becomes the next President of Mexico.

- 1921: Secretary of Education José Vasconcelos commissions the first big ol’ mural project for the National Preparatory School.

- 1922: Obregón stalls the land reform aspects of the 1917 Constitution by creating a vast bureaucracy to handle them.

- 1922: David Siqueiros, Diego Rivera, and José Clemente Orozco form the Union of Technical Workers, Painters, and Sculptors. They intend to create radical new forms of art. Given the political bent of Siqueiros and Rivera, it’s not hard to see why they want to be radical…

- 1922: Siqueiros, Rivera, and Orozco form a new school of art in Mexico, dedicated to the

production of revolutionary art for and on behalf of the people. They concentrate on

historical revision, glorification of the common people, and murals. The reason they

chose murals was because they can’t really be owned by one person: they have to be  held

in common by all the people.

1923: Gangsters kill Pancho Villa in a drive-by. Everyone in Mexico says the government was behind it.

- 1924: In the first peaceful transfer of power since, like, ever, Plutarco Elías Calles takes over as President of Mexico. He’s a good buddy of Obregón, which probably helped the whole peaceful transfer thing.

- 1924: The USA creates the Border Patrol to keep an eye on Canada.

- 1924: David Siqueiros publishes the manifesto for the Union of Technical Workers, Painters, and Sculptors. In it, he lashes out against work done for rich clients and embraces monumental works… for the people! He’s a Commie, by the way…

- 1926: Congress fixes the constitution so that presidents can serve non-consecutive terms. People in Mexico look at Obregón and say, “I see what you did there.” This ticks off a lot of people, but Obregón keeps them in line with workers and farmers that he’s helped out.

- 1926: The Cristero revolt begins when Calles, in a brilliant political move, creates the Mexican Apostolic Church.

- 1928: A Cristero assassinates Obregón, which cuts short Obregón’s plans to serve a second term. Calles installs his man Emilio Portes Gil as interim president since he can’t serve a consecutive term…

- 1929: US Ambassador to Mexico, Dwight W. Morrow, helps to broker an end to the Cristero rebellion.

- 1929: Diego Rivera begins his epic series of murals depicting the History of Mexico at the

National Palace. They are even more massive in person…

1929: Calles consolidates his backers into a political party: the Partido Nacional Revolucionario, or PNR. He starts it off in the same building in Querétaro that the 1917 Constitutional Convention was held.

- 1929-1930: Diego Rivera begins painting his series of murals for the National Palace.

- 1930: Gil’s term ends and Calles calls up Pascual Ortiz Rubio to serve as an interim president. Calles also uses his influence to break up a rebellion staged by General Escobar and his supporters. Rubio is thereafter associated as a puppet of the REAL guy in power, Calles.

- 1931: PNR sets up its own radio station, XE-PNR (later XEFO). Its propaganda machine is now in high gear. Through its newspapers and government-run education programs, PNR develops a unifying political culture in Mexico.

- 1931: The Mexican government passes a law that limits how long people have to file petitions for land reform: the Mexican Revolution becomes more conservative with this development.

- 1932: Rubio steps aside and Abelardo Rodriguez serves as interim president. Calles’ style is to have the party rule over the presidency, as in the Soviet Union. Because the PNR is the only party in Mexico, it can pretty much rig up the elections to have whatever results they want. Rodriguez has a different style and is able to consolidate power independent of Calles, particularly through a rival labor union structure.

- 1934: Lázaro Cárdenas becomes Calles’ next choice as president. Calles felt the revolution needed a bit more radicalization and Cárdenas turns out to be the guy to make the revolution more radical, all right…

- 1936: Cárdenas puts Calles on a plane to Brownsville, Texas and Calles remains in exile until after Cárdenas’ term is over.

- 1937: Due to the Great Depression, Cárdenas has to pull back on his revolutionary programs. But an oil worker strike leads to his one biggest revolutionary move of them all…

- 1937: The USA makes marijuana illegal, largely due to pressure from the oil and paper industries, which saw hemp plants as possible threats to their economic well-being.

- 1938: Cárdenas nationalizes the petroleum industry

in Mexico. Modern discussions of possible returns

to privatization are political hot potatoes…

1938: President Lázaro Cárdenas nationalizes Mexico’s oil industry, thereby creating PEMEX. This move makes a lot of rich dudes angry, but the USA is too busy with its Great Depression to invade Mexico to protect US business interests. This move seals Cárdenas’ reputation as a revolutionary and nationalistic leader of Mexico.

- 1938: Cárdenas converts the PNR into the PRM, Partido Revolucionario Mexicano.

- 1939: The conservative Partido Accion Nacional (PAN) forms with much Catholic support.

- 1939: Trotsky breaks up with Frida Kahlo.

- 1940: Stalin’s man assassinates Trotsky, just a

few blocks away from where Frida Kahlo lives.

1940: Trotsky is assassinated at his Coyoacan home by a servant of Stalin’s.

- 1940-1946: Manuel Ávila Camacho serves as President of Mexico: his administration is characterized by closer relations with the Catholic Church and a more conservative flavor.

- 1941: Mexico offers support for the US war effort with some military aid, but mostly through the bracero program to provide cheap, particularly agricultural labor to the USA, which lasts until 1964… and growing opium for use in medicines… PEMEX also cuts a sweet deal with US-based Standard Oil.

- 1943: Ávila Camacho institutes the IMSS – the Mexican equivalent of the US’ Social Security program.

- 1945-1951: Diego Rivera paints another mural series for the National Palace.

- 1946-1952: President Miguel Alemán serves as the first non-military president in over 40 years. He’s the first civilian president to serve a full term without getting invaded or assassinated since Benito Juarez, almost 100 years before Alemán’s time.

- 1946: The official party in Mexico changes its name to PRI – Partido Revolucionario Institucional – and keeps it that way.

- 1947-1948: Rivera paints one heckuva cool mural.

1947-1948: Diego Rivera paints one of his most whimsical murals, A Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park. There’s a cool part in it where he paints himself looking up to one of Posada’s calavera figures.

- 1950: Mexico City’s sprawl begins to extend outside the Federal District. Slums around the city – including caves carved into the sides of mountains – host rural migrants swelling the size of Mexico City.

- 1950s: Acapulco emerges as a popular vacation destination, leading to a growing exchange of culture between Mexico and the USA.

- 1958: PAN runs its first presidential candidate. He loses.

- 1964: Mexico initiates the maquiladora program to encourage industrialization along the border with the USA.

- 1968: Just before it hosts the Summer Olympics, Mexico has a PR nightmare when federal troops massacre protesting students in Tlatelolco Plaza.

- 1973 and on: Mexicans fight and die in increasing numbers as part of the War on Drugs. Although corruption is rife in many Mexican units and government offices, they still fight on for what is right. The Spirit of Chapultepec lives on…

1973: The USA establishes the Drug Enforcement Agency and tears into suppliers of Turkish heroin, but ignores heroin coming into the country from pro-US drug dealers in Southeast Asia.

- 1973: The world oil crisis hits Mexico hard, as it is still a net importer of oil.

- 1976: Major devaluation of the peso. People get all crazy-go-nuts when they wake up one morning to find out that their money has sharply declined in value.

- 1978: Mexico discovers lots more oil: its economy improves. Vastly, even.

- 1980s: Mexican emigration to the USA, including illegal emigration, emerges as a key issue in both Mexican and US politics due to the magnitude of the flow of people.

- 1982: Mexico announces it can’t pay its debts. This causes investors around the world to call in their Latin American debts. These nations have to borrow money from the IMF and World Bank to stay afloat, and those loans always come with certain strings attached, if you know what I mean and I think you do know what I mean.

- 1982: Mexico nationalizes its banks. Not the swiftest thing to do in a crisis, but, hey, at least they tried something.

- 1985: The federal government has a highly ineffective response to the Mexico City earthquake: public confidence in the government’s value plummets. The economy also plummets as the price of oil, well… plummets.

- 1987: Mexico initiates a series of Pactos between various economic groups in a successful effort to control inflation.

- 1988: Lázaro Cárdenas’ grandson, Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, runs as the candidate of the Partido Revolucionario Democratico (PRD) as a liberal alternative to the conservative PRI and the even more conservative PAN. Most folks think he won the election, but that PRI rigged the results to put their man Carlos Salinas de Gortari in office.

- 1991-1992: Mexico re-privatizes its banks to help boost the economy.

- The Banco de Mexico, in case you were

wondering what it looked like.

1993: The Bank of Mexico becomes independent of the politicos and can actually implement monetary policies a la the US’ Federal Reserve System.

- 1994: Big year for Mexico. NAFTA takes effect, the Zapatistas in Chiapas revolt, Ernesto Zedillo is elected president, and President Salinas’ political arch-rival is gunned down in Mexico City… and the assassin is later linked to the president’s family.

- 1994: Oh yeah, the peso crashes. Almost forgot that one.

- 1994: Two PRI officials, including their presidential candidate Colosio, are assassinated. Like I said, big year for Mexico.

- 1995: Mexico’s banking system falls to pieces. So much for the economic boost… foreigners move in to run Mexico’s banks.

- 2000: PAN Presidential candidate Vicente Fox wins the election, putting PRI out of that office for the first time since, like, ever. He has a hard time governing, and PRI still dominates in the legislature.

- 2003: PAN gets hammered in the midterm elections.

- 2004: Mexico publishes a cool guide that describes how to survive as an illegal immigrant. One of those, “They’re gonna do it anyway, so we might as well tell ‘em how to do it right” type of solutions.

- 2006: PAN’s man Felipe Calderón, wins the presidential election, but by a very slim margin. Because the government doesn’t order a massacre of the PRD opponents, the election crisis ends peacefully.

- 2008: L. Dean Webb discovers the perfect mango cup

in Chapultepec Park.

2007: Carlos Slim, the TELMEX king, becomes the richest man in the world. LOL Bill Gates…

- 2008: L. Dean Webb plans a trip to Mexico, but chooses to avoid visiting Ciudad Juarez, just across the border from El Paso, due to the massive drug wars going on there. He also opts out of visiting Chiapas, which remains home to the Zapatista rebellion, as well as host to increased Mara Salvatrucha activity… but he does catch some really cool scenes in Veracruz, Cuernavaca, and the environs in and around Mexico City.

Appendix B: Traveling in Mexico

No resorts, no regrets…

I don’t like resorts. I’ve been to one before, and had a nice, pre-packaged time. It wasn’t awesome, just nice. I was in no danger, whatsoever, at any time of my experience. As a result, all I can remember from the experience was that I had a good snooze on clean sheets. Once I left the resort and started a tour of the local Spanish missions, I had a memorable, historical romp. The powerful memories from that trip aren’t from the resort. They’re from the adventures outside.

Others are free to stay in resorts, but that lack of dirt and danger also means a lack of potentially amazing fun stuff. When I started planning my trip to Mexico with my son, Calvin, I avoided the five-star hotels and looked for the places where I could get a good snooze on clean sheets without having to pay for someone else deciding what would be fun for me.

I used Hotwire and Priceline to book my hotels, flight, and rental car. Going with either site means booking with “name” vendors, even if the name isn’t known in the USA. All the same, they promise a certain level of quality and while I like to rough it some, I don’t want to be totally unable to sleep at nights.

I had both websites going at the same time and would compare one with the other. In my travel experiences, I’ve seen better deals on one site for one part of my trip, and then the other has a better deal for a different leg of my trip. Between the two, I can get some really good deals in North America and Europe. There are different sites for helping to book Asian travel, but they’re not part of this narrative.

The first part of my plans was to go for a “do it all” plan. I planned to fly into Mexico City, head up to Queretaro, swing down to Oaxaca, take in some Mayan ruins near Chiapas, then swing back through Olmec country, Veracruz, and back to Mexico City. That plan had it all, but it also had over 50% of my time on the roads. I wanted to spend most of my time in Mexico doing something other than driving.

So I had to cross things off. A great maxim of travel is that you can’t do everything. No matter how much everyone stresses how important it will be for you to do what they suggest, you simply can’t entertain all suggestions. Time during travel is precious and unless you’re really planning a road trip, you don’t want to be wasting time in between destinations.

I looked at what I wanted to accomplish and how long I had to do it. I wanted to see as much cool Mexican History in two weeks as I could. Mexico City was a must-see, no question. Veracruz was my second most important place to visit, due to its recurrence as an invasion site as well as its proximity to other historical sites. I looked at the distance between Mexico City and Veracruz, and it didn’t look all that bad: just a few hours’ drive, with plenty of time to stop and see sights along the way.

I planned to land in Mexico City, get the rental car, and then head out to Veracruz all on day one. I planned one major activity per day, so as not to crowd the schedule and get exhausted. I’ve got some kind of medical condition that doctors don’t know what it is, exactly, but I know it can lead to my becoming over-fatigued. I plan accordingly, and things work out well.

Day two would be a visit to an Olmec site, Tres Zapotes. Next would be a trip up to Cempoala, followed by a day of roaming around Veracruz. Day five would be a drive back to Mexico City. The following Saturday and Sunday would be museum days, then we’d hit Teotihuacan on Monday. Why did I know we’d be going to Teotihuacan on a Monday? That’s a very good question. The answer will be long, so bear with me…

Every nation has its idiosyncrasies one would do well to discover prior to arrival. I strongly recommend Lonely Planet city guides. The LP city guides have excellent maps in the back. I did not use italics lightly: they simply have the best city maps I’ve ever used. The guide should be new – if it’s a year or two old, that’s fine. Anything older than that, and you may have to take its advice with a grain of salt. At least try and confirm old advice with a recent web search – the most common changes will be in admission prices for museums or attractions.

What changes less is the national culture. In my LP guidebook to Mexico City, it said that all major museums in Mexico are closed on Mondays. Big archaeological sites like Teotihuacan, however, are not closed on Monday, so they’re great to visit when all the museums are closed. The guide book also recommended taking a few days to acclimate to Mexico City’s altitude before doing anything strenuous like climbing a pyramid in Teotihuacan. That’s why I planned two days of museums in the days before Teotihuacan.

I got really clever in planning those museum visits, too. The Metropolitan Cathedral and National Palace are both free, all the time, so I would visit them first. Public museums in Mexico are free on Sundays, so I’d go to the National Museum of Art and the Belles Artes on Sunday. I felt like a regular Rick Steeves as I planned things out.

After Teotihuacan, I planned to see the Museum of the Revolution, then Chapultepec Park and the Museum of Anthropology. I also wanted to swing south into Coyoacan and take in Frida Kahlo’s house and the Trotsky Museum. Last on my list of things to do was go to the Xochimilco Floating Gardens for a nice little boat ride. Our last full day in Mexico would be to go anywhere we wanted to go see again.

Two weeks from arrival to departure, with plenty of fun. Once I picked the days to travel, I hit the web to book travel arrangements. I got a Mexicana flight from DFW early in the morning, a rental car for $15 a day, and a Holiday Inn in Veracruz.

The Holiday Inn in Veracruz I booked was the one in the city center, not the more resort-y one on the south side of town. I wanted to be close to where all the Veracruz history was. With that booked and paid for, I turned my sights on Mexico City.

Hotwire promised me $45 per night for a 4-star hotel in the historical center of Mexico City. It couldn’t say where it was, exactly, but I trusted Hotwire. I wound up getting the Sheraton Centro Historico, which was bam in the middle of where I needed to be. It was an excellent hotel, and I felt like I’d won the lottery when I booked it.

Before leaving, I read up on Mexican history, art, and music. I wanted to learn when I got to Mexico, sure, but I wanted to learn on a foundation I’d prepared before going down there. Guide books can provide some back story, but they’re no substitute for some great history books one can check out of the library or dig up at a used book store. My favorite was Bernal Diaz del Castillo’s memoir of his days as a soldier in Cortes’ army. Wikipedia also proved helpful in assembling good background information.

I also needed to get my son and myself up on our shots. Mexico can be a dangerous place when it comes to hepatitis, so both me and my son went to the doctor for a hepatitis A shot. Since neither of us planned to exchange bodily fluids with the locals, we didn’t need a hep B vaccine.

After the trip to the doc, I got Calvin his passport. Travel to Mexico used to not require a passport, but it does now. Allow at least 2 months to get a passport, so you won’t be disappointed if there’s a delay. Calvin’s arrived rather speedily, but it’s best to be conservative when planning around passport delivery times. We did not need a visa to travel to Mexico, but I did need to have a notarized letter from my wife granting me permission to travel alone with my son: Mexico does not smile upon parents that kidnap their own children to avoid custody arrangements in the USA.

Since the LP guide didn’t have full maps of Veracruz or the road there, I planned to buy a Mexican road atlas upon arrival. The red atlases are inexpensive and are as easy to use as any Mapsco or Rand McNally road atlas. I also printed off Google maps of where I wanted to go as backups.

All that I had left to do, I figured, was to pack. We each had a carry-on bag and a bag to check in, so we had plenty of room. I got a little medicine chest together with pills for allergies, diarrhea, constipation, upset stomach, and headache all in it. I packed band-aids and 3-ounce vials of 100% DEET insect repellent for those days down in the jungles around Veracruz.

I also packed a roll of toilet paper. This is VERY important in Mexico. There’s no point in being euphemistic or delicate about this topic. If you do not bring your own toilet paper, you may find yourself in a bad situation.

So, off we went. We landed in Mexico City after having a nifty breakfast on the Mexicana flight. By the way, if you don’t like refried beans, you need to learn to at least tolerate them before going into Mexico. Start with beans made from scratch, as they have the best taste and consistency.

We landed, breezed through customs because we were the first flight of the day, and made our way to the rental car counter. As we waited for it to open, a guy walked up to us and asked if we’d like a professional driver to take us around town. There are guys like that everywhere, and if you don’t want their services, just give them a polite no. They’ll hand you a card and head off to the next potential customer.

When we got the car, the lady at the counter wanted to know if we wanted insurance. I SAID YES PLEASE AND LOTS OF IT. USA insurance does not always extend into Mexico, and mine was one of those that didn’t. Without insurance, any accident could result in my being put into jail which would affect my vacation schedule to say the least. Insurance bumped up the cost of the car by $20 per day. I was only using it for a week, so I wasn’t upset about the higher price. We loaded up into the insured car and took off.

At that point, we discovered that Mexico has no street signs.

Mexico does have little tiles on the corners of streets to show you which street you’re on and major intersections are decorated with the name of the cross streets, but the roads just outside the airport had no such indicators. As soon as we drove out of that parking lot, we were lost.

No problem: we had our city map of Mexico City in the Lonely Planet guidebook. Unfortunately, it did not have a detailed map of the rather untouristy parts around the airport. No matter, there was the map in the Guia Rojo, our Mexican road atlas… and… no. No good. We were profoundly lost.

We stopped at a PEMEX station to ask for directions. As we bought our bottled water – one should drink extra water when at altitude – I asked where the road was to get to the main highway out of town.

That’s when I found out he didn’t speak any English. That’s when I also found out I’d have to rely on what Spanish I’d learned in a seventh-grade conversational Spanish class and years of watching Spanish-language programming at infrequent intervals.

I did pretty well, considering. Words came to me and I found I was a lot more fluent in Spanish than I’d ever supposed. I also discovered he wasn’t too sure about the best way of getting out of our barrio and that he had no idea how to read a map. That’s when his more learned co-worker intervened and provided us with directions.

We got to the highway, but I didn’t dare get on. Mexico City traffic is highly aggressive and very dense, which can be daunting even for a bad driver like me. As the traffic piled up behind me and local drivers flaunted the law and went around me to get on the highway without getting killed, I tried my luck. I gunned the engine, cried out Dios, Santiago, y España, and plunged into the fury.

That worked. My next problem was that the highway set-up was very confusing. I had no idea which lane to get in to get out of town and exits came and went by without warning. When I checked the shadows, I noticed they indicated I was heading north. Once I made my way to a numbered toll or “cuota” road, I had Calvin look it up on the map and we were all set.

No we weren’t. You see, south of the Tropic of Capricorn in a North American summer, the sun is in the opposite part of the sky than it is north of the tropic line. In other words, my noting of the shadows was 180 degrees off: we were heading south, not north. I noticed this as we passed by exits for the University of Mexico, which I knew to be on the south side of the city. It also explained why we were getting closer and closer to Cuernavaca, a city to the south of Mexico City.

At that point, I didn’t care. We’d been lost and/or stuck in traffic for almost an hour and a half since getting the car, so I just wanted to get out of Mexico City and then figure out how to get to Veracruz once I’d gotten to a place with fewer roads.

The road to Cuernavaca is a cuota road, which means one pays a toll to use it. In exchange for the toll, the road is well-maintained and patrolled, both with police and service vehicles.

Bibliography

Have mercy, but I read a lot of books.

I also went to a lot of museums, saw a bunch of films, read a lot of websites, and stuff like that…

Sources Available Upon Request

I just want to get this thing finished. Seriously, if you need to know my sources, shoot me an email and I’ll discuss them with you. Otherwise, this section is not one likely to be read, so I’m leaving it out.

Acerca del Autor

L. Dean Webb is tired right now and just wants to finish writing this dang book. If you look at the end of the timeline, you’ll see a picture of him, so that’s the picture out of the way. If you want to get to know him better, reading this really isn’t the way to go. You should go to www.zzzptm.com and post on his blog there, or look him up on the Facebook.