Hat Tip to Monica Showalter for this post. Her blog led me to this “video treasure on Twitter,” which was posted by economist Steve Hanke, Johns Hopkins University.
The video is in Spanish but it’s clear enough for non-Spanish speakers to catch the message. The photos and graphics alone are sufficient to explain the narrative of the devastation which once gripped Chile and now overwhelms Venezuela. What did Chile do to overthrow its imminent collapse? In a word, it embraced a free market model. What did Venezuela do to go from an economic powerhouse in 1975 to a basket case today? In a word, see the clip.
It’s a bit over 2 minutes and well worth your time.
In the initial euforia of concessions by the Venezuelan government to American oil and iron ore companies, was any thought given to where these companies’ employees, many of whom would come from countries other than Venezuela, would live?
As it turns out, President Marcos Pérez Jimenez had given it much thought and had requested such companies establish “open cities” wherever possible. Puerto Ordaz, the crown jewel of Ciudad Guayana, whose impetus was The US Steel Company, was one result of the open city policy.
El Pao, where I was born, was more of what most folks think of when they conjure up images of an “American Camp.”
Jimenez understood that not all camps could be open cities. El Pao was deep in the Venezuelan jungle, relatively shut off from potential commercial centers, such as a major river, highway, airport, railway, etc.
On the other hand, the future Puerto Ordaz was situated at the confluence of two major rivers, one of which is the mighty Orinoco, the third or fourth largest in the world, measured by average discharge, meaning the river’s flow rate. I had to look this up and, from a layman’s perspective, this is probably the best illustration: “The volume of an Olympic-size swimming pool is 2,500 cubic meters. So the flow rate at the mouth of the Amazon [the world’s largest] is sufficient to fill more than 83 such pools each second.”
The flow rate at the mouth of the Congo and the Orinoco (second and third largest rivers) would each fill 16 such pools per second.
By the way, of the 10 largest rivers in the world, 5 are in South America.
As for El Pao, this area was explored by the Spanish 5 centuries ago. The Indians told them about a mountain which, when struck by lightning, would give off bright flashes. The Spanish investigated for themselves and confirmed the tales. They named the mountain, El Florero, meaning, Flower Pot, since the flashes looked like flowers on the mountain peak.
Actually, the area was rich in orchids and also an abundance of “purguo”, a tree which yielded very high quality rubber. In fact, the era in which the ore was discovered, was known as “la fiebre del balatá” (the balatá fever). Balatá refers to a natural gum of high quality found in the purguo. Mr. Aturo Vera, whom, years later, my father would often contract to drive us to fishing spots on the Caroní River, explored that area with his own father in the 1920’s. On one such journey, father and son espied a splendid ore specimen and took it with them to their home near the Caroní.
Word spread quickly and a miner, Simón Piñero, accompanied by his boss, entrepreneur Eduardo Boccardo, also explored and contracted an engineer, Frank Paglucci, to stake a claim. Mr. Vera, seeing all the excitement, also staked his claim, and rightfully so.
The ore was analyzed by American laboratories, found to be of extraordinary quality, and the Bethlehem Steel Company assigned their geologist, Earl H. Nixon, to the site.
On June 3, 1944 (3 days before D Day) , The New York Times reported, “The Bethlehem Steel Corporation’s big Venezuelan iron ore development, first disclosed as a prospect a few weeks ago, is now under way. Twenty American engineers and technicians are in charge, with some 600 native Venezuelans, skilled and unskilled, at work on the big project.” This project represented capital investments of $50 million ($1 billion in today’s money) and more in Puerto de Hierro (Iron Port), their deep sea port on the Atlantic.
By July, 1950, the first train load of ore was transported from El Pao to Palúa, the company’s river port on the Orinoco for transshipment to Puerto de Hierro. And in 1951, the seaport yielded its first shipment to the United States. The March 23 New York Times headline read: “First Cargo of Venezuela Iron Ore Arrives for Bethlehem Steel Plant; Sparrows Point Pier in Maryland Is Scene of Significant Ceremony Marking Start of 3,000,000-Ton-a-Year Shipments.” The article’s lead sentence read, “Vessels laden with iron ore have docked here for decades, but special significance attached to the arrival of an ore boat this morning.”
We’ll speak more of life in an American camp in future posts. For now, I’ll end this post by quoting some recent comments by folks who, when children, lived in Puerto de Hierro. This will give an idea of life in an American camp in Venezuela and also the pull of the land.
“That is the place of enchantment and he who has lived or even visited it will remember it for all of life. And I had the fortune of having been born there. Those good years of the 1950’s, 60’s, 70’s, 80’s…. The best …?”
“My! All those wonderful people who worked there are beautiful I tell you! I salute that wonderful and dear place and people!”
“The best town and the most beautiful place in Venezuela; the only beach with a diving board in the ocean. I developed my life there along with my parents and siblings. Eternal memories and the best times of my childhood and my youth. My best friends of my life were from there.”
“My beautiful town. I can never forget you, although all is different now.”
“What wonderful memories of my childhood, of my parents, of my siblings, of my neighbors who once lived and those who still live. I embrace you all!”
“My beautiful town. Now, it is not even the shadow of what it once was. How much sadness it brings me to see the ruin that it is now!”
“My town! I was born there in 1961. How I long to go and run there again. My adored land. Venezuela, how much sadness you bring me now! My dear Lord!”
“I could not have asked for a better childhood.”
Neither could I.
Puerto de Hierro on the Atlantic coast, in the state of Sucre. The Bethlehem Steel ceded this to the Venezuelan government and it is now a Venezuelan navy base.
The loading bridge over the Orinoco in the company port of Palúa. My father used to dive off that into the river. Folks called him Tarzan. El Pao under construction in the 1940’s. Men carved a modern road and railroad out of this jungle. Above is a 1940’s map. You’ll not see Puerto Ordaz thereon. It would grow across the Caroní from San Félix, at the spot between the Caroní and the Orinoco (the Caroní is that river which runs into the Orinoco at San Félix). El Pao is the spot denoted as “Iron Mining Area”. The confluence of the Caroní and the Orinoco rivers. Yes, at this point, the Orinoco is carrying much soil as it continues its journey to the Atlantic. It clears up again miles downriver. Puerto Ordaz grew on the right. Notice the ore ships on the right. Before the bridges were built, we’d cross by ferry. As the Caroní approaches the Orinoco the change in topography yields several series of rapids and falls. Above are the Cachamay Falls. An Intercontinental hotel was built here in the 1970’s. Ciudad Guayana. Foreground is San Felix (Old Town); background, across the Caroní, is Puerto Ordaz (New Town). Arturo Vera, second from right, accompanies Bethlehem Steel engineers arriving in 1934, in Ciudad Bolivar, the closest major city. Photo source: El Pao Yacimiento Pionero.
Arturo Vera. Died in 1990, age 88. I vividly remember him. As a child, I used to think he was a great driver as he’d drive us over seemingly impassable paths to places I could never find again, even if my life depended on it. My father would often remind me that Mr. Vera owned part of the area which became El Pao. He was an unassuming and kindly man. And a great driver!
Santiago Smith: The camp had many men like him: unusual backgrounds, hard workers, colorful, sometimes mysterious. I was privileged to know them in my childhood. Mr. Smith was born of English parents in the gold mining area. In the late 40’s that area began to be shut down and he and some companions had to look elsewhere for work. They came to El Pao. He worked and lived there until his death in 2010. He was close to a century by most estimates. Photo Source: El Pao Yacimiento Pionero.
To gauge the extent of French revolutionary influence in Latin America, an influence which persists to this day, one need not look further than any popular source to see which system of law predominates in any given country.
For centuries, Latin America’s legal system was based on the “major legislative achievement from the Middle Ages,” the Siete Partidas. After the revolutionary wars, the legal systems were modeled after the Napoleonic Code, although, to be sure, the influence of the Siete Partidas , or “Seven Part Code”, persisted.
In brief, the Seven Part Code, promulgated in the 1200’s, declared that all law is to conform to God’s decree. It recognized the ultimate Law Giver as God, not man. It’s first part, roughly translated, states, “To the service of God.” The Napoleonic code, which was developed to codify the French Revolution, rejects any mention of God, but does pay obeisance to the Serpent’s ancient temptation by making man a god. It is humanistic to the core. Of course, it borrowed much from the Christian capital accumulated over millennia, but its deafening silence on God and religion was obvious.
(In striking contrast, consider: the legal system in the then recently independent North American, former English colonies remained the same as England’s: Common Law, with its Christian roots in the Magna Carta. South America was convulsed by a true “revolution”; North America, not so much.)
All South American law is heavily Napoleonic, except for Chile and the countries that adopted or were heavily influenced by Chile’s civil law.
Why is Chile an exception?
We can thank Venezuelan Andrés Bello, whom we will visit in future posts. For now, we will say he was truly one of the most influential personages of history. Poet, illustrious philologist, excellent diplomat, and unique thinker, this man led a most singular life whose benign influence continues to this day. Although born in Venezuela, he lived 19 years in London, where he met another great personage to whom we’ll return in future posts, Francisco de Miranda, a man who had personally met George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and other founding fathers of the United States.
He briefly tutored Bolivar, but Bolivar did not heed his request for help to return to his native land. Eventually, Bello was invited to come to Chile where he lived the remaining 36 years of his life. And a most industrious life it was: founded the University of Santiago; developed the Gramática de la Lengua Castellana Destinada Al Uso de Los Americanos, a masterpiece of Spanish grammar and vocabulary.
And, as if that were not enough, he developed the Civil Code of Chile, adopted by some countries and heavily relied upon by others. His approach incorporated some of the Napoleonic Code, while retaining much of the Spanish Seven Part Code, in modified fashion. A truly remarkable man. He died aged 83 in Santiago, Chile, in 1865.
Another influence, although not so benign, was Simón Rodriguez, long time tutor of Bolivar in his youth. Bolivar lived with him from the age of 12 to 14. Rodriguez was immersed in Rousseau’s philosophy and revolutionary ideology. In exile he met up with his former protege, Bolivar, in Europe and traveled much of the continent with him, including meetings with Napoleon and his coronation in Milan. Rodriguez witnessed Bolivar’s famous oath of not giving rest to his arm until he had “broken the chains … of Spanish power.”
Bolivar helped him return to South America where he died aged 84 in 1854 in Amotape, Peru. He referred to him as “my Socrates. A consummate philosopher. The Socrates of Caracas.” Although his personal influence pales alongside that of Bello, his mentoring of Bolivar impacted Venezuela and much of South America to this day.
(Guess which of the two was honored by the geniuses at Google: Bello or Rodriguez? Hint: the same one who is idolized by the current regime in Venezuela: Rodriguez. No surprise there. And yet another reason to use Bing.)
From a layman’s point of view, Bello managed to tip his hat to the Napoleonic code, while recognizing that the legal tradition and mores of the former Spanish colonies were deeply “non-revolutionary”, even religious. So, since the 19th century, a certain tension has been a part of the legal and intellectual life in South America with some regions or countries handling it with less disruptions than others. This matter deserves much more study and consideration and I am convinced it will help explain much of Latin American life from the 1800’s to the present.
For now, I am grateful it was Bello who developed the Civil Code, not Rodriguez.
We’ll return to Bolivar and these men in future posts.
Simón Rodriguez (1769-1854). Bolivar lived with him for several years as a youth and was heavily influenced by Rodriguez who in turn followed the theories and philosophy of Rousseau who in turn was a great influence on the French Revolution. Refer to prior post (Bolivar II) for more on Rousseau.
Andres Bello (1781-1865). Portrait was painted, circa 1850, by Raymond Monvoisin, French painter who lived in Chile at the time. Photograph was taken circa 1863, shortly before his death in 1865. A truly remarkable man.
First page of a 1555 version of the Seven Part Code. The Napoleonic Code in the Historical Museum of the Palatinate in Speyer. Francisco de Miranda (1750-1816). Before Bolivar, he sought independence from Spain, but for not for the same revolutionary reasons. Miranda lived in the United States and met George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, Samuel Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, among others. A soldier, statesman, scholar. He was betrayed by his Venezuelan compatriots, including Bolivar, handed to the Spanish, and died in exile in Spain, aged 66. The portrait is by Martin Tovar y Tovar, a famous Venezuelan painter.
To add to the prior post, I thought it good to tell a bit more about El Pao’s background and impetus as something of a microcosm of the myriad mining and petroleum camps dotting Venezuela in the 1950’s.
As noted in the Time Magazine article cited in the previous post, El Pao was a Bethlehem Steel iron ore mining camp built in the 1940’s in the Venezuelan southeastern interior, within a low and gentle mountain range in an area of dense, seemingly infinite jungles, just beyond the Gran Sabana prairies and plains whose boundaries seemed to melt with the sky.
The company, along with US Steel had negotiated concessions with the government of Marcos Pérez Jimenez, the shortest-lived of the numberless military dictatorships in Venezuela’s history. Actually, these concessions were signed prior to Jimenez’s official assumption of the presidency, but “everybody knew” he was actually in charge a few years before his official ascension in 1952. Perez Jimenez sought to enhance Venezuela’s independence by promoting oil and ore concessions and improving and expanding the transit infrastructure. He insisted, wherever possible, the companies build “open cities” as opposed to closed camps. US Steel did just that, which impelled the phenomenal growth of the thriving metropolis of Puerto Ordaz, at the confluence of the Orinoco and Caroní rivers. As for Caracas, it was modernized with skyscrapers, including the symbolic Humboldt Hotel, overlooking the capital city from atop Mt. Ávila. The hotel was named after the famous naturalist and explorer, Alexander Von Humboldt, who explored and studied much of Venezuela in the late 18th century. We’ll be seeing more of him in later posts. Construction projects were launched to build large public housing projects, bridges, and South America’s finest highway system, most of which would still be in use into the 21st century, including the then spectacular La Guira – Caracas expressway in 1953 and the Tejerías – Caracas expressway in 1954.
Furthermore, his tenure saw the creation, in 1956, of cable car transport to the 6,000 ft., Mt. Avila, which stands like an imposing sentinel over Caracas. He also commissioned the building of the even more remarkable cable car system to the 20,000 ft. Pico Bolivar in the Andes in the western state of Mérida. Both systems were built by Swiss engineers and materiel. Venezuela was transformed into the most modern nation of South America: “modern” defined as excellent infrastructure, breathtaking skylines, and a rapidly growing middle class. Today, some old timers say it was the Dubai of the 1950’s.
A telling but quickly forgotten change imposed by Perez Jimenez was the revision of the official name of the nation. Since 1864 the country’s name was “United States of Venezuela”, reflecting Simón Bolivar’s admiration for the United States, but not his conviction that South America should not seek to emulate a similar type government because, as he put it, “the United States form of government will only work for saints, which is what they are [and what we are not]”; Marcos Pérez Jimenez, apparently understanding Bolivar’s admonition, changed the name to “Republic of Venezuela”, a name which stuck until, in the 21stcentury, another authoritarian politician changed the name yet again, but left Venezuela’s 20 states intact. El Pao was in the large state of Bolivar, to the southeast of the country, bordering on Brazil to the south and British Guiana to the east.
Marcos Perez Jimenez ruled from December, 1952 to 1958, but his following persisted even after his death five decades later, in 2001.
A plebiscite was held in December, 1957 which Jimenez won by a wide margin, but which opponents insisted was a rigged exercise. He went into self-imposed exile in Miami Beach, in 1959, only to be deported later by the Kennedy administration, which vainly believed it could afford to break the United States’ promise of asylum in exchange for the applause of Venezuelan politicians: honor out; applause, in. But, as often happens with asymmetrical swaps, Kennedy succeeded with the former, weightier matter; and failed with the latter, transitory one.
Unbelievably, Jimenez was, in 1968, elected to the Senate, even though he ran in absentia from Spain; however, the Venezuelan politicians succeeded in overturning his election on technicalities. In 1973 his supporters nominated him for the presidency of Venezuela; however, the political parties amended the constitution, in effect prohibiting him from running for president again.
He never returned to Venezuela. Nevertheless, love him or hate him, his administration’s negotiations with the American steel and petroleum industries brought matchless prosperity to the country. This promise of future increase and liberality was reversed by the overturning of his economic policies, which tended to favor free enterprise locally coupled with pragmatic agreements with foreign companies, within a low tax and regulatory environment.
Amazingly, all major projects undertaken by the Perez Jimenez administration still stand, unsurpassed: either still in use, such as in the case of the magnificent, now barely maintained, and, therefore, in some places dangerous expressways, or as silent, empty monuments of a long past era, such as the Humboldt Hotel, alone and padlocked, alternating between stints as a reflector of countless brilliant sparkles of sunlight or as a lone sentry shrouded in clouds atop Mt. Ávila, reminding all who look and wonder, that historical eras ought not be facilely catalogued as bright or dark, evil or good. Much depends on who tells the story, how it’s told, of whom it is told, and, of course, by whom it is told.
But the foregoing was yet in the future. Most, if not all, Americans who came to Venezuela when Pérez Jimenez was either in power or was the power behind the throne, that is, from the late 1940’s through the 1950’s, were quite apolitical and gave little thought to the country’s civil government. Streets were safe, people were courteous, Americans were respected and admired, and work was abundant for both Americans and Venezuelans. What mattered to them, and to their companies, was that Venezuela became their largest supplier of iron ore, by far – ore ultimately incorporated in America’s magnificent bridges, skyscrapers, monuments, homes, and automobiles.
For those of you interested in Marcos Pérez Jimenez, you might want to check out the series of interviews (in Spanish) he granted not too long before his death. The link below is for the sixth of the series.
For those of you interested in the Humboldt Hotel, you might find the documentary linked below to be worth your while
Photo of construction of highway from The Orinoco River to El Pao
El Pao baseball team, circa 1950. IMCOV stood for Iron Mines Company of Venezuela, the Bethlehem Steel subsidiary which built El Pao. They began as inexperienced rag-tags and rose to be national AA champions.
One cannot begin to understand Venezuela without knowing some of its revolutionary history.
In the previous post I alluded to the bloodletting in Venezuela in the revolutionary wars of the 19th century. Among the most terrible campaigns of the era (of any era) were those of José Tomás Boves, Venezuela’s own Attila the Hun, also known as The Beast On Horseback. Boves was born in Spain but lived in Venezuela most of his life. He began his horrors in the vast plains of Apure and Guárico, scenes of immense bloodshed. Numerous contemporary reports describe the monstrous rainy season lakes as reddish with the blood of thousands of Venezuelans slaughtered by their own countrymen during the unbelievably heinous racial wars unleashed by strongmen such as Boves who incited los negros against the white criollos, including the gang rapes of women, children and even toddlers. Some of the tortures inflicted on the criollos (Spanish descendants, but Venezuelan-born) are beyond belief, including the live skinning of men, women, and children.
By the end of the revolution in the late 1820’s, foreign observers reported without exaggeration that Venezuela’s criollo population had practically disappeared. Young women from reputable families, when initiating a courtship, felt compelled to inform their beaus early on, “I am from the time of Boves.” Nothing more needed to be said.
Boves lived by the sword and died by the spear. A few months before his death his army had left Valencia in ruins. One of his many despicable acts was to swear profusely and formally, as the Eucharist was held by a priest outside the city, that he would harm no one. After this ceremony, he and his army entered and called the citizens to a banquet and elaborate ball at which he had his musicians play the tawdry songs of the Apure region, to which he forced the women to dance with his men while the husbands and fathers and brothers were taken and thrust through, impaled, skinned, or otherwise tortured before suffering the coup de grace.
This frenzy lasted 3 days.
On their way out of Valencia, heading east, they came to the home and ranch of the Bravante family. Boves gathered the family, including the 19 and 12-year-old daughters. He ordered his men to defile the girls as he forced the father and brother to watch. He then ordered the family’s slaves to further defile them. Finally, he himself proceeded to engage in the same acts only now the girls were in death’s agony and shortly afterwards were killed.
Boves’s men killed the father but somehow the brother tore loose, killed one of the attackers as he took his horse and fled.
Now we come to the battle of Urica, about a day’s journey north of Maturín, a colonial town just north of the Orinoco River in southwest Venezuela, about three months after the slaughter in Valencia. Boves was in the midst of the battle as the town of Maturín was emptying out into the vast prairies of Venezuela. There was little hope that Boves’s army would be stopped and the people knew better than to expect anything but the vilest treatment.
As the battle raged and Boves’s men took advantage, a young man, fighting in defense of Urica and Maturín, espied him on his horse as he led his men and fought. This young man, with a singleness of purpose and steel in his eyes, fought desperately, to get closer to Boves. As he neared Boves, the opposition of Boves’s men became almost irresistible, but the man, killing as he advanced, was not deterred. Closer, closer he came.
Finally, after several wounds, the young man was thrust to the hard ground. With his sword he killed one of Boves’s lance men and, grabbing the dead man’s lance, he ran like a whirlwind towards the horse and his rider. Screaming like a dervish, he mightily rammed the lance right through the chest of the evil man. So powerful was the act, that the lance protruded out Boves’s back as he fell from his horse, the eyes glazed open, dead, before he hit the ground. The young man was immediately sliced to death by Boves’s frenzied men.
The young man was Ambrosio Bravante, avenging his sisters’ miserable deaths at the hands of Boves.
The ravages experienced in Venezuela resembled those of the French Revolution. That is not a coincidence. And it explains much of Venezuelan history. More on this in later posts.
Early 19th century depiction of José Tomás Boves
Mid-19th century depiction based on description by Daniel O’Leary, Irishman who fought with Bolivar against Boves. Boves defeated Bolivar the two times they met in the field of battle.
Note: Historians agree that Boves won the Battle of Urica, but was killed there, by a spear through his chest. But they disagree as to the identity of the man who killed him. I’ve used a well-sourced biography for my description above, but others disagree. Furthermore, historians acknowledge, some reluctantly, that arguments can be made that Boves’ actions were in reprisal to Simón Bolivar’s own actions and his “War To The Death” proclamation. These posts will discuss these and more, in future weeks and months.
