Venezuela – Page 23 – The Pull Of The Land

“Venezuela’s Magnetic Mountain”, Harry Chapin Plummer, Popular Mechanics, July, 1949

January 29, 2020January 29, 2020 Richard Barnes

Prep time for this blog has had me looking through old journals and publications partly because I get a kick out of the more un-self-conscious, optimistic (exuberant?) mid-20th century reporting compared to today’s dour, blame-America-first, Chicken Little iterations.

Something else that impresses me upon reading this over 70 years after its publication, is how accurate it was in reflecting the plans being made in 1949. There were, of course, some changes to the plans, as there are in all good plans. However, these great American companies were pretty thorough in their operations.

Enjoy:

When the Conquistadores of old Spain explored the jungle country of eastern Venezuela four centuries ago, the native Indians told them tales of a strange mountain which attracted lightning. Later the Spaniards saw for themselves this magic mound which, when struck by a lightning bolt, game forth a spray of flashes. The Spaniards dubbed the mountain “El Florero” — the Flower Pot — because the lightning flashes looked like flowers growing from the peak.

Today that mound has been found to hold one of the world’s richest iron-ore deposits.

Credit for that discovery goes to an alert Venezuelan mining inspector, Eduardo Boccardo. In 1926 he determined to penetrate beyond the superstitions of the natives and to find out why the mountain was one of the spots most frequently struck by lightning on the South American continent. What he discovered was a fabulously rich lode of iron ore which, by magnetic attraction, drew lightning to the mountain. The Spaniards, intent upon their quest for gold and silver, had passed up a deposit so valuable that even now its riches can be only estimated.

Surveys of that part of the mountain granted to Boccardo show that about 35,000,000 tons of mineral rich in iron underlay his concession. Assays have proved that this ore actually is 55 to 68 percent iron. Absolutely pure iron ore is made up of 72 percent iron and 28 percent oxygen. The iron content of Minnesota’s famous Mesabi range is about 57 to 63 percent. On this basis, the Flower Pot represents one of the most important discoveries of the century in the field of metallurgy.

Naturally, it didn’t take industry long to jump into this whopping mountain of ore. Today the Iron Mines Company of Venezuela, organized as a subsidiary of the Bethlehem Steel Company of the United States, already has a small army of employees in the jungles near the Orinoco. Their task is to form a modern mining industry in the heart of the forests. They are at work between El Pao, the ore site, and Palua, the loading point on the Orinoco.

The task of these workers is staggering. They must build the mines and the port, highway and railway — even their own homes in the wilderness. Already they have completed a highway more than 14 miles long which eventually will serve as the right-of-way for a standard-gauge railway, the vital artery from the mines to the river. This railroad will have a steep grade from sea level to the mines.

When the harbor and dock installations, the roads and railways finally are completed, the ore will move by truck and train from the mines to the ships on the Orinoco. It then will travel aboard a fleet of ore carriers, especially built for the purpose, to the blast furnaces at Baltimore, Md.

It is estimated that production will rise to 3,000,000 tons of ore annually from ore reserves that will last a quarter of a century.

Already rolling along the uncompleted rail line is a 1500-horsepower diesel locomotive. When the track is completed, the railroad will have four locomotives, 100 ore cars with a capacity of 70 tons each, eight boxcars, four tank cars and a crane.

Before the end of this year the ore will begin to flow from the mines atop the magnetic mountain. There crews especially trained for the job will perforate and excavate the rock and earth, which will be picked up by four gigantic electric shovels each capable of taking a huge bite out of the ground. The shovels will load the ore into trailer-trucks hauled by tractors. From there it will be taken to big ore crushers — one of them said to be the largest in the world. The fragments of crushed ore will be carried by an aerial cable arrangement to the waiting ore cars on the railway.

It is estimated that about 10,000 tons of the rich earth will be hauled down the mountainside every working day.

When the ore reaches the harbor, it will be dumped into a huge storage area. An ingenious series of chutes at the base of the area will drop each load into an underground conveyor installed in a tunnel. After passing through the earth, it will climb up a huge loading bridge which extends like a pointing finger over the waters of the Orinoco. The load will slide by toboggan into 4000-ton lighters. Tugs then will pick up six of the lighters form them into a train and haul them downriver to the Gulf of Paria. From there the new 24,000-ton ore carriers will take the ore by ocean to Baltimore.

This modern industrial system in the heart of the jungle is within the orbit of Ciudad Bolivar, the principal river port of the Orinoco and the administrative and financial center of the region watered by the river.

Almost due south of Ciudad Bolivar the United States Steel Corporation has been conducting explorations of another area that appears to have huge ore deposits. it seems likely that the same vein which crops out atop the magnetic mountain also appears in this new area [the author was correct: that ‘new area’ became known as Cerro Bolivar, one of the greatest ore finds ever].

Reports state that the mineral deposits found in this second area are of a high quality, satisfactory for smelting in open hearth furnaces.

These two ore strikes are the second great boon to Venezuelan national within the past half-century. The first was the discovery of petroleum around Lake Maracaibo. Huge investments in drilling and pumping equipment, pipe lines, railways, bridges, community settlements, hospitals, and schools have been made by the participating oil companies.

Venezuela has enacted a law which requires the oil companies, both foreign and national, to refine within the country a percentage of the crude oil that is recovered. The purpose, of course, is to have a supply of domestic oil. It is anticipated that similar legislation will apply to recoveries of iron ore, and that eventually there will be smelting operations within Venezuela [a major understatement, of course].

Such a development would place Venezuela in the forefront of South American nations which at the turn of the century were dependent upon agriculture — cattle, coffee, sugar, cacao, tobacco, and rubber growing.

Thus the magic mountain that attracts lightning may revolutionize the economy of a nation.

Ore Crusher (one of the largest, if not the largest at the time, in the world) in El Pao. Note the administrative (American) camp in the background.

The More Things Change, The More They Stay the Same

January 9, 2020January 9, 2020 Richard Barnes

As a year ends and another begins, it is good to pause and look back at recent events and developments in Venezuela which have been alluded to in the blog.

Malaria is making a comeback in Latin America, with Venezuela earning the unfortunate distinction of leading in this revival. Refer to the August 17, 2019 blog post, “Clouds of DDT” https://thepulloftheland.com/clouds-of-ddt for a discussion of the phenomenally successful control of malaria in Venezuela in the 20th century (we don’t hear much about this because DDT is politically incorrect. Best keep quiet about that!). For an update on the return of malaria to the stricken land, refer to the Caracas Chronicles article, “Blame the Gold Rush: Malaria Keeps Spreading”, link below.

The December 13, 2019 blog post, “The Lost Children of Vargas” The Lost Children of Vargas tells of the terrible events precipitated by the rains of December 1999. For one account of that calamity, you might want to read another Caracas Chronicles narrative, “Only Two of Us Survived”, linked below. It is a heart-wrenching tale about the then-mayor of Vargas. Incredibly, politics intruded in this devastation. Assuming your heart is not made of stone, he will speak to you.

What about the elderly? Again, the redoubtable Caracas Chronicles has an interesting article about the demographic unit, the elderly, included in the millions who have voted with their feet, emigrating from the stricken land. The March 12, 2019 blog post, “Humanitarian Crisis” Humanitarian Crisis tells of this catastrophic migration. The Caracas Chronicles article about the older folks in the throngs is linked below.

You may have read recently about Juan Guaidó’s re-election as Speaker of the Venezuelan National Assembly. His breaking through the wall of Chavista soldiers a few days ago, might inspire hope. However, I’m afraid that hope will likely be dashed absent a true change of heart by Mr. Guaidó, wherein he sincerely rejects Socialism. Otherwise, all we’re talking about is a switch from leaded to slightly-less-leaded Socialism: both more of the same and both deadly. See the September 20, 2019 blog post, “Venezuelan Second Amendment?” for comments on this potential bait and switch A Venezuelan Second Amendment?

Contra Caracas Chronicles, this blogger has little faith in Mr. Guaidó and his party, Mesa de la Unidad Democrática (MUD, no pun intended). First of all, do not put your faith in princes. So says the Good Book. Secondly, MUD and Guaidó may talk “big”, but their actions are sheer accommodation with the tyrannical regime. From gun control to submission to controlled elections, MUD and its supporters are no Founding Fathers.

And Founding Fathers are what Venezuela needs at this moment.

Pray for the land of my birth.

Blame the Gold Rush: Malaria Keeps Spreading

‘Only Two of Us Survived’

Older Venezuelans Also Deserve to Rebuild Their Lives Abroad

For the second year in a row, Venezuela emigration has been deemed by UN as a top migration issue in the world, second only to Syria’s.

The Vargas disaster continues to echo in modern memory twenty years later.

Christmas Sorrows

January 3, 2020January 3, 2020 Richard Barnes

“Hey, why are all the Christmas lights off?” I had said to no one in particular one night. My mother and father were out. So I dutifully began plugging all Christmas lights back into their respective power outlets, fully expecting hearty congratulations the next morning, for having had the self-initiative to have covered my parents’ gross oversight in not having switched on the season’s bright and lively bulbs.

Reactions, congratulatory or otherwise, would not have to wait till morning.

As I was plugging in an old, petrified Orinoco bough laced sparingly with small, white lights — a lovely, natural Christmas-embellished furnishing with a place of honor in the front, enclosed porch from where it could be enjoyed by anyone passing by on the lower side of the block — my parents drove up.

I was stunned, expressionless, as they rushed in, unplugging every light they came across. “The Christmas lights are on!” my mother anxiously exclaimed as she reached to the nearest socket and pulled the plug. My father was outside, pulling the plugs there.

What on earth? Christmas season in the camp extended well beyond the 25th of December. Festivities lived on at least through January 6th, Día de Reyes Magos (Epiphany), and in many cases beyond, especially in the labor camp.

I looked outside, through the porch screens, and noticed that neither of our immediate neighbors had a single light on. I suppressed the urge to run outside to see if any lights were on in the entire block. I rightly suspected that none were.

Standing there, in the middle of the passageway between the porch and living room, my father’s voice explained the matter, “Son, I realize you were thinking we somehow forgot to turn on these lights tonight, but did you forget that Mr. Fuentes died today?”

Of course I had not forgotten. Mr. Fuentes was a corpulent, true-to-stereotype jolly man who delighted in greeting children at the club and elsewhere in the camp. A Spaniard who had left Spain for greener pastures in Venezuela, he was well-liked. His wife possessed a sharp wit and hearty laughter, yet retained that lighthearted femininity so characteristic of Spanish women. They had one young daughter.

He had suffered a heart attack as he drove a company pickup to the Otro Campo (labor camp). The vehicle had gone over a small cliff of about fifty feet. Mr. G____ had been driving behind him and raised the alarm. But, according to the camp’s doctor, he had expired before the pickup had crunched to a stop at the bottom.

Afterwards, as the weeks and months went by, every time I accompanied my father or mother to the Otro Campo, as the automobile approached and passed by the spot where Mr. Fuentes had gone over, I would look, conscious that no one paused. Cars came and went by that spot as if nothing had ever happened there; as if he had been forgotten as quickly as he had died. Life is for the living, and must go on.

But there is a time for sorrow and the entire camp was in mourning that Christmastime; it was understood no festive lights would be switched on for at least two days, if not three. Grief was a shared passion there. I now felt I had violated that shared spirit of compassion and felt utterly miserable. My father pulled me to himself, “I know you meant well, son. We should have told you clearly why we left the lights off.”

That was his way of apologizing. And my love and respect for him increase all the more.

That year, the block without any lights shining those nights was sorrowfully dark indeed. The joy of Christmas outweighed the sorrow, but did not erase it totally. The season was joyous, yet serious. Like the profoundly evocative Wexford Carol, it bade all to consider well and bear in mind its eternal as well as temporal import — after all, the world has never been the same since that first Christmas. This juxtaposition of joy and quiet seriousness may have appeared contradictory to more sophisticated, technically oriented observers, but not to me as a boy.

Paradoxical perhaps, but not contradictory.

So, still being within the twelve days of Christmas, I again wish you all a Merry Christmas and also a most prosperous new year. We may not know what the year brings, but we certainly do know Him in Whom all things consist, including every single day of our lives.

Venezuelan nativity scenes tended to be elaborate and memorable.

Christmas, 1959

December 19, 2019December 19, 2019 Richard Barnes

Yes, it’s my favorite season. You can blame my parents for that. They abused us by making every effort to ensure we children experienced the joy of Christmas every year we lived in El Pao. Did they not realize that those memories they took such pains to create would endure throughout all the years of our lives? For shame.

They also forced us to receive visits from my mother’s side of the family who, every Christmas, drove over an hour on the dirt/rock road (later, when the road was asphalted, it took 45 minutes or so) to our house in El Pao for Christmas dinner (something we’d reciprocate by visiting them, every year, on New Year’s Day). Ah, what visits! All the laughter and joy. How did we ever endure such mistreatment?

We even believed in Santa Claus! Yikes!

I recall rushing through our front screen door, which led to the screen-enclosed, spacious porch area, sparsely outfitted with a rattan lounge chair and small sofa to the left, and a tall wooden bookcase, built to order by Señor Montaño, the camp’s carpenter, to my right. These furnishings seemed, to me, to be permanently covered by what appeared to be clear plastic shower curtains to protect them from the mists and drizzle which would drift in through the screen windows during the rainy season. However, since Christmastime was not the rainy season, the diaphanous coverings were absent. But I’d see them anyway.

Then I’d hear the at once familiar diapason sounding forth from the living room, where the record player sat. The vinyl disc was a Christmas album by The Randolph Singers whose broad tessitura instantly announced the upcoming joyous season. It must be 1959, because we are only two children. To this day, whenever “The Boar’s Head Carol” or “The Wassail Song” or “Fum Fum Fum” is performed on radio or stage or disc, I can’t help but to compare such to The Randolph Singers.

A few nights later, the camp would shine with a host of blinking white lights interlaced among the scores of steady, multi-colored bulbs entwined throughout overhangs, bushes, and large boughs, and stately trunks and throughout the vast coronas of the Araguaneys. The lights were so many that the camp seemed a mini-Times Square in the eye of the jungle, forever stamping in my memory an enduring association of lights with Christmas.

A most apt association indeed as Jesus Christ is the Light of the world.

The aguinalderos would soon begin their sporadic visits, going door to door, singing with good cheer and hilarious make-them-up-as-you-go carols. The aguinalderos were the Venezuelan version of 20th century descendants of the medieval jongleurs, or English and French minstrels. These men were adept at playing the “cuatro”, a four-string, mini-guitar, the tambour, a lightweight, slender, but sufficiently long and loud percussion instrument, maracas, and, often, the guiro, a conical instrument with washboard-like grooves across which the musician would rasp a small wooden board.

But these men were even more adept at making up songs with pointed, relevant lyrics, often detailing some physical characteristics of the house at which they sang, or quirks of its inhabitants, along with some historical anecdotes about them; but all tying back to Christmas somehow, and all at the spur of the moment. Those who knew Spanish, would laugh uproariously, fully understanding and marveling at the jokes, the light sarcasm, the sweetness, but most of all, the agility. Those homes with little or no Spanish knowledge enjoyed the lively music, but only for a little while because it quickly began to sound repetitious, which it was to those not understanding what was being said.

Another two memories which come immediately to mind at Christmas.

Mrs. Bebita De La Torre had a beautiful and sweet singing voice. At Christmastime, events would be held at the camp club. One Christmas season night, it seemed the entire camp population fit into the main club hall and we stood around the hall about two lines deep and sang “Silent Night” in English and Spanish. I happened to have been placed right next to Mrs. Bebita. To me, her voice seemed to waft, to carry across the hall, even though it was not loud or overwhelming, and certainly not ostentatious. Towards the last verse, I just pretended to be singing, because I preferred to just hear her as she sang “Silent Night” next to me.

And then there’s “The Christmas Song”. The record player sits across the room from the tree under which many wrapped presents are placed and we children are being readied for bed. The silky soothing voice of Nat King Cole issues forth from the player and I know it is Christmas night.

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=the+randolph+singers&view=detail&mid=91822C3C81A5C580039B91822C3C81A5C580039B&FORM=VIRE
Should you like to hear one of The Randolph Singers Christmas albums

Should you like to take 6 minutes to see snippets of a family Christmas in 1958. You’ll see four generations here, including the pipe smoking great-grandmother. This is around the same time of the events in this post.

Should you like to bask in the late, great Nat King Cole’s voice singing “The Christmas Song”

Christmas 1961, the last Christmas in the “old house”.

Early Christmas season, circa 1964, in the “new house.”

Uncle Alfred and Cousin Janis, early Christmas season, 1960, Miami. Aunt Sarah in background.

Ikeya-Seki, 1965

December 10, 2019December 10, 2019 Richard Barnes

I did not remember anyone talking about waking us up at, what? 2 A. M.? 4 A. M.?

But there was my father, shaking me awake hours before dawn on a weekday morning.

In my torpor I figured we were going fishing, but the little voice in the back insisted and persisted in affirming that today was a school day and it would be highly unlikely for him to encourage us to play hooky.

By the time I was on my feet, shuffling to the living room, I saw that my mother had already awakened my sisters, who, equally perplexed, waited for me in the living room. We were too sleepy to speak or even grumble. The house was silent.

Our parents led us through the long kitchen and someone drowsily asked whether the Flor de La Medianoche (Midnight Flower) was blooming that night. A most reasonable question, which would unlock tonight’s mystery.

However, there was a difference: trumpets usually (always?) preceded the Flor de La Medianoche spectacle. Throughout the day, the talk around the camp, among children as well as adults, would reflect the excited anticipation of getting up at midnight to witness the event. We’d go to bed knowing that we’d be awakened to go outside and gawk at this magnificent, aromatic flower which buds at midnight. Sometimes, at that hour, we’d receive visitors who did not cultivate it but who enjoyed its beauty and would come over to celebrate with us. Photos would be taken. Other families around the camp who cultivated the flower, would do likewise.

The flower not only blooms at midnight, but it also begins to die almost immediately. As I recall, this was a biannual occurrence.

But tonight was different. Too quiet, for one thing. No excited talk the previous day, for another. It was as if the adults had thought about engaging in whatever it was that we were about to do, but did not commit, given the nuttiness of the hour.

My father held the kitchen door open and we all, no longer shuffling, marched out to the carport as he ordered us to get in the car. In our pajamas? Really?

Mother and father said nothing or very little or very quietly or I was too sleepy to capture any conversation. We three children (at the time) just sat in the back seat as we rode along the familiar camp road out, past the club grounds, and to the alcabala (security gate) whose guard dutifully opened for us.

I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I recall is coming to Rankin Hill, a residential section of the labor camp (otro campo) with a clearing at the edge, which afforded an expansive overlook. As my father sought a space to park, we saw many (many!) people, from both camps, gathered there. Through the windshield we beheld the most spectacular constellation of lights, with a brightness that surpassed the moon’s, and an apparent proximity which felt as if we could reach out, just beyond the hill, and grab a handful of stars.

We walked, hurriedly, to the clearing; everyone knew everyone and greetings were continuously exchanged, but always the gaze, the commentary, the wonderment was towards the spectacle displayed against the tropical night sky. The brightness was powerfully magnetic, like a consuming fire which doesn’t allow you to look away.

“Ikeya-Seki”, someone said. What? “Ikeya-Seki!” And what in the world is an Ikeya-Seki? A new constellation appearing next to the earth?

It was a magnificent comet, discovered by Japanese scientists in 1965, just a month or so before it became visible to the naked eye as it swept within 500,000 miles of the sun. This was brighter than Halley’s. I had seen photos of Halley’s. I had read about Halley’s. Halley’s was a good friend of mine. And this was way more impressive than Halley’s.

Ikeya-Seki was confirmed to have been the brightest comet of the 20th century; indeed, of the past one-thousand years. Some called it “The Great Comet”.

Scientists tell us it was 10 times brighter than the full moon. From a child’s perspective, it seemed like another sun, only broken into countless, infinitesimal pieces, with a 75 million-mile long tail that looked like a curtain majestically splayed across a massive night stage. From Rankin Hill, the comet shot downwards, with a tail stretching up into limitless space. We looked almost straight up, as if standing at the foot of the Empire State Building and looking up to try to see the observatory deck. The tail seemed to “hang” down from infinity, and lowering our gaze to behold it horizontally, we could see its width extending across, and its length dropping behind the jungle horizon. To say it dominated the sky would be the understatement of the ages.

Ikeya-Seki continued to own the sky throughout the month of November, 1965.

Seems that someone from the labor camp had called our parents and encouraged them to come, and to bring us along, as the sight was one for a lifetime.

And that it was.

I had never seen anything like it; nor have I since.

It’s due to return in about 1,000 years.