Chihuahua - Day 3

Eternal Flame at Site of Hidalgo's Execution

After a great breakfast at the Quality Inn hotel we went back to Palacio de Gobierno to see something that we had missed the day before: the room where Miguel Hidalgo was executed.  The accompanying photo shows the room that a perpetual flame in his memory.

Strange Statue in Plaza Armas

Then we walked across the street to the Palacio Federal, which contains a museum covering the full spectrum of the history of Chihuahua.  The most special place was the dungeon where Hidalgo spent his last months.  It was a true dungeon with high stone walls and no natural light.  However, he had his bed, a desk, a trunk with personal possessions, a bible, writing material and a candle.

A corner of the museum was dedicated to the actor Anthony Quinn, born Antony Rudolfo Quinn Oaxaca here in the city of Chihuahua in 1915.  His mother was Mexican and father was half Mexican and half Irish.  He was a thoughtful and reflective man with a philosophical bent.  We saw examples of his art and writing that were very good.  Brenda and I will see if we can find his biography or autobiography.

Unfortunately the taking of photographs in this excellently presented museum was prohibited.

Note Bullet Holes

We hurried back to the hotel and cleared out just after noon the caught a bus and got off in front of the Jesuit-built church on Ocampo street and checked into our room here at the El Barcelones hotel, across the street from the train station.

After a short nap we walked over to the Museo Casa de Villa, dedicated to the life of Pancho Villa, who had an extraordinary life.  He was born to poor peasants, became a bandit, and had the charisma, leadership, almost reckless drive, and military cunning to rise the rank of General in the revolutionary struggle and become the governor of Chihuahua.  Pancho Villa's war tactics were studied by the U.S. Army and he and Álvaro Obregón were invited to Fort Bliss to meet Brigadier General John J. Pershing.  But the political winds changed and the US switched its support from Villa and the revolutionaries to the legal government. Pancho responded by leading the only successful foreign invasion of  U.S. soil, taking over the town of Columbus, New Mexico, then attacking towns in Texas.  As a result the U.S. Army spent close to a year chasing Pancho Villa around Northern Mexico without success.

Eventually Villa "retired" to a large ranch in Durango but was killed in a well planned assassination on 20 July 1923.  After his death 25 women came forward claiming to be his wife.  After a government investigation Luz Corral was deemed to be his true wife and she finished her days living in the Pancho Villa house that is now his museum.    (See http://www.calnative.com/stories/n_msvilla.htm)

Brenda and I spoke with an English-speaking guide at the museum who told us that Pancho had 26 children by his 25 "wives", and that there was a total of 65 women in his life.  (I'm not sure if one night stands count.)  Back in Guadalajara a museum official asked me if I was Mexican, and when I replied No he told me that I had the facial structure of Pancho Villa.  Maybe he keeps running into Pancho's descendants.  The guide also told us that Pancho said that the reason why the US Army could not catch him is that while they were looking ahead searching for him he was behind them, following.

The centerpiece of the museum is the bullet-riddled 1922 Dodge which Pancho Villa was driving when he was assassinated in Parral.  For me there were other items of interest.  The museum has a great display of armaments of the time.  I was able to see close up for the first time Winchester bolt and lever action rifles, and a variety of machine guns that I had seen only in films of WWI.  There was a U.S. Pratt double barrelled 44 caliber machine gun of 1882 and a Colt water cooled machine gun that would have fitted well in All Quiet on the Western Front.  But there were many other things: The furnishings of their daily life, saddles of the day, swords,  cannons, etc.  On a wall are photographs of Anthony Quinn visiting Luz Corral de Villa at her home, sometime before her death in 1981.

Fashion notes from Brenda

Many men in Chihuahua State dress in a particular cowboy style: a white finely woven white straw hat, a long-sleeved open neck shirt, distinctive pointy-toed boots, jeans, and a leather belt to match the boots.

We find it hard to believe how many shoe and boot shops there are especially in Chihuahua and Durango States. As well as colourful cowboy boots for men, very high heels and imaginative styling are popular with women.

Indians have quite a presence in Chihuahua. Many of the women and girls wear long and colourful dresses.