There once was a monument

With one hand directed to the sky pointing to outer space and the other lifting the veil that hid a part of a recently discovered world, there was once a huge statue of Christopher Columbus – which would become a Monument – and which stood on the Paseo de the Reformation in August 1877. The authorization for its installation and inauguration had been ordered by General Porfirio Díaz, who had been inaugurated as president just four months earlier.

The monument would remain in its own roundabout for a very long time, receiving everything from flowers to Molotov cocktails every October 12. Of course, changing its name and meaning according to the intentions, creeds and policies of each prevailing ideology. And so it was that a certain date of the month – the day after tomorrow, dear reader – was called Columbus Day, the Discovery of America, the meeting of two worlds, Hispanic people, Race, Multiculturalism, the Dignification of the Original Peoples and the Indigenous Resistance.

Paradoxically or perhaps obviously, the creation of such a controversial sculpture had its historical precedent in the government of Emperor Maximilian of Habsburg, when his father-in-law, King Leopold I of Belgium, decided to give Mexico a sculpture of Christopher Columbus to build a monument to such a curious and navigating character. Such a project, which would be a fabulous ornament to complete the beauty of the Calzada de la Emperatriz – as Paseo de la Reforma was called today – was entrusted to the sculptor Manuel Vilar with the specification that it be a work of monumental architecture that, in addition to sculpture, that honored Christopher Columbus, contained allegories of the seas that surround Mexico. The project did not materialize because the (government) oven was not for buns and Maximiliano was about to be shot.

However – with that persistence that characterizes us – the idea of ​​Columbus in his roundabout continued. Slowly but surely. After the triumph of the Liberals and the death of Benito Juárez, the tycoon Antonio Escandón proposed to take up the idea again and requested authorization from then President Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada. It was proposed to designate the French sculptor Charles Cardier to carry out the work and, after a final amount of 60,000 pesos, Antonio Escandón and Garmendia went on a trip to Paris in 1872 and hired the famous artist.

In December 1875, the statue arrived in Veracruz, but due to electoral upheavals and the Tuxtepec rebellion of 1876, its installation was delayed. However, in view of the figures –made of bronze and marble– of Columbus and the four seated statues of the friars Pedro de Gante, Bartolomé de las Casas, Juan Pérez de Marchena and Diego de Deza, located at the base of the work everything was jubilant and happy. Vicente Riva Palacio, appointed by Díaz Porfirio Díaz as Secretary of Development, Colonization, Industry and Commerce, began the work of locating the monument to place it in the first roundabout on Reforma Avenue. And although there were complaints, the inauguration took place.

The reports varied: some media praised the sculptural composition and the party, but once the sculpture was installed, bitter criticism was received from the artistic guild –Francisco Sosa, Felipe Gutiérrez, Ramón Rodríguez Arangoiti, Francisco Jiménez–, assured superiority in the composition of the figures of the friars, problems of harmony in the proportions of the base that supported the main figure and the inaccurate representation of the navigator. Wide sectors of the press protested because a Frenchman had done the work when there were such good sculptors in Mexico.

The years passed, each one with its rulers and reactions. On September 24, 1892, for example, the Congress of the Union decreed October 12 as a national holiday. And some time later, in 1917 and at the initiative of Venustiano Carranza. October 12 was called Columbus Day

Upon Carranza’s death, President Álvaro Obregón appointed José Vasconcelos as Secretary of Education, who, in addition to promoting educational reforms and the creation of more than 1,000 rural schools, instituted, within the Civic Calendar, the official celebration of the 12th of October from 1928 and organized school, teacher and bureaucratic celebrations at the foot of the now disappeared monument.

Finally, Emilio Portes Gil, launched an initiative in 1929 to the Congress of the Union to declare October 12 as a national holiday, calling it Day of the Race and Anniversary of the Discovery of America.

Today the monument no longer exists, there is nothing to celebrate and we do not know where the statues were. And although next Wednesday the sculpture of “The young woman from Amajac” will be placed, to replace the figure of Christopher Columbus, removed more than a year ago, it will be something else. To find out that the Glorieta was taken and renamed as the one for “The Women who fight” – against mistreatment, femicide, disappearances – and decide if we still want to go. Not to party or celebrate, but to join the claim and not let anyone forget.