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A Stab in the Dark. Facundo Bernal
Читать онлайн.Название A Stab in the Dark
Год выпуска 0
isbn 9781940660646
Автор произведения Facundo Bernal
Серия LARB Classics
Издательство Ingram
Even while in jail, he continued to write articles against the government. His own mother, Doña Luisa López, would take them out from beneath the dirty dishes in the basket in which she used to deliver his meals. That’s why they decided to kill him, because even though he was imprisoned, they couldn’t quiet him. But one of the guards advised him of their plans. He told him that they were going to shoot him from a position on the roof. Facundo moved the cot on which he slept to another side of the cell. And that night, just like the guard said, someone fired some rounds at the spot where he usually slept.
By February 1913, the political situation in Mexico was on the verge of disaster; a decade of tragedies, the assassinations of Madero and his Vice President, José María Pino Suárez (1869-1913), the regime of Victoriano Huerta (1850-1916) and his stuffed shirts, the armed insurrection in Coahuila led by Venustiano Carranza (1859-1920), and, just a short while later, a direct confrontation between the main political figures presiding over Sonora. Moderates begged for armed help and power against the Huerta uprising. Indignation brimmed over in every “pueblo” and “ranchería.” The Sonorans, who never resisted in using their own weapons, blocked road crossings, occupied government buildings, and claimed public and private properties as their own. Faced with chaos, Maytorena asked for a license from the local congress, but the congress instead named Ignacio L. Persqueira as Governor on February 25. A few days later, during the first days of March, Facundo left the Sonora prison — not to live in freedom, but to leave the state at once, under threat of further imprisonment if he were apprehended. For Facundo, abandoning his beloved Hermosillo was immensely painful. But there was no other option. And the only road to freedom led him north, far from the great battles and privations of the Mexican Revolution.
One of Facundo’s brothers, Pedro, was already living in Los Angeles, California, and so the Bernal family could count on stable, if crowded, living quarters. Neither Facundo’s mother nor his other siblings — Ricardo, Francisco, Enriqueta, and Carmelita — wished to remain in Hermosillo. If Facundo were to set off, so would the entire Bernal clan. This hasty departure was traumatic for all of them. Half a century later, Fransciso described how that radical change altered their lives forever: “School had recently been cancelled, and then unforeseen political circumstances prevented me from taking advantage of a scholarship and continuing my studies at the university in Mexico City, as had some of my high school companions, like Juan de Dios Bojórquez and Francisco Terminel, who both found work in the government; the first one became the General Secretary and the second one led the cabinet for agriculture under Plutarco Elías Calles.”11 The destiny awaiting Facundo and Francisco would be less powerful, but more humane. In March 1913 the Bernals took the road towards the city of Los Angeles, which was by then already the playground of gangsters and dazzling movie stars.
From Los Angeles to Mexicali
That same March, after a stop in Tucson, Arizona, the Bernals reached Los Angeles. They were among the many Mexicans crossing the border each day to reach American soil. The primary motive for this was the Revolution’s violence: forced conscription, firing squads, looting, and bombings. Those who had no economic means or family on “the other side” ended up in the refugee camps that the United States government set up to control the flow of immigrants. Those who could rely on funds or personal contacts had no problems reaching their destinations. Such was the luck of the Bernal family.
At the time of Facundo’s and Francisco’s arrival, Los Angeles confined the Mexican minority population to barrios located east of the Los Angeles River, despite the community’s growing influence on the city’s economy and social life. The Bernal family permanently settled in the house of Pedro, a humble clothing merchant. Facundo soon found employment in a tomato cannery, but he wasn’t cut out for the daily grind; sensing his impending failure as a worker, he decided to help his brother with his business instead. Soon, however, he found an even more suitable occupation, becoming a stringer for the most important Spanish-language newspapers of the time, such as El Eco de México, La Prensa, and El Heraldo de México.
Facundo’s stay in Los Angeles lasted from 1913 to 1917. As Pedro’s clothing business provided more dividends, he asked his brothers to establish a similar storefront in Mexicali — a first step toward sending the entire family back to Mexico. Mexicali, which had been founded in 1903, was a perfect choice for this plan: it was a border town from which one could reach Los Angeles in a few hours by train or car, and although it had been declared the capital of the Northern District of Baja California in 1915, it was peaceful, far from the upheavals taking place in the rest of the Mexican Republic. Another attractive feature was it geographic proximity to Sonora, not to mention their similar climate and desert landscapes, which the Bernals missed a great deal. Another compelling factor was that business competition was scarce, and the border market demanded clothing for the city’s growing population.
Pedro, who took on all the financial risk for this venture, decided that Facundo and Francisco would run the new business. Before leaving, Facundo married Rosaura Metzler, a young woman from Sonora who was living in Los Angeles. Her bloodline was profoundly mestizaje: Yaquis, Spanish, and German. Immediately after their marriage, Facundo and Rosaura, accompanied by Pedro and Francisco, took the train to the border. The entire family gathered on the platform to say farewell and wish them luck. Although they did not suspect this, their days of wandering were coming to an end.
Pedro and Facundo arrived at their destination on November 27, 1917. Mexicali would remain their place of residence for their rest of their lives. The business they started — the first of a long chain of clothing outlets, shoe stores, and suit emporiums — was called “Trajes a la Medida,” and located next to Hotel del Norte, just south of the international border and in the very commercial heart of Mexicali. This was a bonanza period in the valley of Mexicali, but it was fleeting. The coming years would see the collapse of the cotton market, the principal regional crop; social tension between Chinese immigrants and Mexican residents; the lamentable practices of the Colorado River Land Company, the American corporation that essentially owned the valley; as well as political upheaval under the rule of General Esteban Cantú (1881-1966), whose regime in Baja was terminated in 1920.
But even with the economic setbacks and political troubles, the 1920s saw Mexicali grow and expand. Facundo and Rosaura contributed to these changes by having five daughters, all of them proud Mexicalenses: Obdulia, Ofelia, Angelina, Estela, and Margarita. Once the businesses were consolidated, Pedro and Ricardo kept them running, while Facundo returned to journalism and literature, especially after 1923, with the arrival of General Abelardo L. Rodríguez (1889-1967) as the Governor of the Northern District. Both Facundo and the General were of Sonoran origin, and they also shared the same pragmatic and mercantile spirit.
Mexicali was a young city when the Bernal brothers settled there. Its newspaper tradition was even younger: two years prior to their arrival, the city had seen the founding of its first newspaper, El Noticiero del Distrito, which was actually printed in the nearby city of Imperial, California. The first true native newspaper was La Vanguardia, which first appeared in 1917. General Cantú himself was its owner. Ever since, journalism in Baja California has been the tool of those in power. That being said, there was never a lack of opposing voices in the press, nor a dearth of newspapers critical of mainstream politics.