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Carlos Fuentes in Washington DC (1934-1939)
The great Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes lived in DC when his father, Rafael Fuentes, was assigned to the Embassy as Counselor from 1934 to 1939. Living in a residential hotel on 16th Street, Carlos attended Henry D. Cooke Elementary School, where he learned English. Due to their presence at the Embassy, both Fuentes and his father appear in the mural:
"I used to live here as a child. My father was Counselor at the Mexican Embassy -- right here on 16th Street -- and I used to come and play in this park. Those were exciting years, New Deal years, when the United States tried to solve problems by mobilizing its most precious resource: human capital, people...
... In 1938, it was a center of intense diplomatic activity. My father used to tell us about these affairs at dinnertime, instilling in each of us, our small Mexican family in Washington -- my father, my mother, my sister and I -- an intense interest and concern regarding what was going on in Mexico.
The Mexican Revolution reached its peak during the presidency of Lázaro Cárdenas: Agrarian Reform redistributed land, returning land to the peasants; but this aff ected American interests a great deal and in March 1938, President Cárdenas nationalized Mexican oil. But this time, instead of sending his gunboats to Veracruz, President Franklin Roosevelt chose to respect Mexico's sovereign decision. Presidents Cárdenas and Roosevelt initiated a new stage in Mexico-U.S. relations: cooperation instead of confrontation, negotiation instead of intervention, which is all we've ever asked for in our relations with America.
All this was celebrated here at the Embassy, in murals painted by Mexican artist Cueva del Río. Latin America and North America shake hands under the approving gaze of Juárez, Lincoln and Bolívar. The new identity of Mexico as a modern nation is celebrated with airplanes, factories and tractors. The traditional spears of the charros became symbols of agrarian culture. This is my father, on horseback; even I, aged 9 back then, was included in this celebration.
Yet many Americans were opposed to the Mexican Revolution. I lost a few friends at school. However, all this made me realize that I was a Mexican citizen, bearer of an identity diff erent than that of America. Or as I began asking myself at the time, what was the identity of the United States? Were the United States just the neoclassic façades of their public buildings? Or were they that multicultural river of many currents I'd met at school?"
- Carlos Fuentes, The Buried Mirror |