A Guest Post to Celebrate Independence Day

Note from Lauren: Today I turn over my blog to a friend of mine, Pia.  You may remember her from my last post where I linked to her tumblr.  I did so again.  I turn over my blog to her for a post because she grew up in Puerto Rico and is therefore more familiar with Puerto Rican history.  Take it away Pia:

Until now, I never thought I’d actually need any knowledge of my little island of Puerto Rico other than, “it has been invaded a lot and the mongooses are always rabid.” I think I spent most of the time in Puerto Rican History class doodling on the back of my exams and seeing how many pencils I could stick in the curly hair of the girl in the previous desk before she noticed. However, it looks like now a little bit of that knowledge would come in handy. So, in order to help me with this post, I’ve pulled out my old seventh-grade textbook. It’s called, Historia y Geografia de Puerto Rico and it’s very second-hand. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if it were third, fourth, fifth, or even over-nine-thousandth-hand. It’s so old that Tito Trinidad is mentioned in it as being a young, promising boxer. Yeah.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Despite the rumors, Puerto Rican history does not begin and end with Tito’s career. Instead, we must travel far back in time to find a beginning…

A long, long time ago, though quite a bit after the Big Bang, the Earth formed out of the extra gas and dust floating around our newborn Sun. (Or, if you prefer, God/s made it magically appear out of nothing, because he/she/it/they are/is awesome like that.)

The Earth turned out to be a good place for things to live, and live they did! Bacteria became worms, which became fish, which became amphibians, which became reptiles, which became dinosaurs, which died out, thus saving us from the evil reign of the hyper-intelligent lizard-men that surely would have evolved down the line. Mammals did not die out, though. They prospered in the newly dino-free world. Eventually, some of them became apes. Some of these apes became hominids. Some of these hominids became humans. Then humans, being the travel-hungry and sex-crazed parasites we are, walked around and had so many babies that we covered the globe.

Some of these fertile people ended up in Puerto Rico. Actually, several different waves of them did. According to Historia y Geografia, Puerto Rico was inhabited at different points by various native tribes such as the Arcaicos, the Igneris, and the Sub-Tainos. They treated men and women equally, made ceramic pots, smoked hallucinogenic leaves, ate roast rodents with yucca, shared everything communally, and walked around naked. In other words: they were like hippies, only a really long time ago.

The most famous and well-studied tribe of natives, though, is that of the Taino Indians. They were pretty similar to the tribes mentioned earlier. They lived in little towns called “yucayeques,” which literally means, “where yucca is grown.” They were animists, and their primary god was named “Yucahu.” He was, of course, the god of yucca. (What was it about that little root that the Tainos were so crazy about? The thing is, that stuff is DELICIOUS. Also, parts of it are terribly poisonous, adding a very worship-able life/death connection to a great meal.)

I could write about these folks for ages; they were the most friendly and relaxed natives ever. They gave the island a beautiful, fitting name: “Borinquen.” They were lovers, not fighters. Despite this, they were great at defending themselves against the nomadic Caribe tribes that would come around periodically to plunder, rape, and pillage. However, eventually they would come face to face with an enemy they couldn’t defeat: the sadistic Spaniards.

So, let’s move away from our lovely island and focus on somewhere else for a moment. Spain, in the year 1493, was a complex place. Just one year earlier, its paranoid and fanatical Queen Isabella had ordered the expulsion of all Jews and Muslims from Spain. This act left Spain devoid of doctors, teachers, architects, and other useful people. Also Portugal, Spain’s baby sister, had recently turned out to be a child prodigy at trade and conquest. Spain, ever the jealous older child, needed a new source of wealth, and it needed it fast. Luckily, the navigator Christopher Columbus had found a route across the Atlantic Ocean in 1492. In 1493, he set off on his second journey across the Ocean. This time, though, he used a slightly different route, which led him – you guessed it – right to the shores of Puerto Rico.

Columbus arrived on the 16^th of November of 1493. There is a verse in our national anthem that describes that moment. It goes: (translated, of course)

“When on our beaches stepped Columbus,

He exclaimed in full admiration,

‘Oh, oh!

This is the lovely island

I’m searching for!

It’s Borinquen, the daughter;

The daughter of Sea and Sun[…]’”

LIES. Columbus probably never set foot on the island, and he certainly wasn’t impressed. He just jotted down the island’s position and name (San Juan Bautista, or St. John the Baptist) before setting off. He never even met our Tainos. He spent much more time on the Hispaniola (modern-day Haiti and Dominican Republic) killing theirs.

Although there was one failed attempt at colonization, the Island wasn’t properly taken over by the Spanish until the summer of 1508. Juan Ponce de Leon, the famous nutcase who went hunting for the fountain of youth in Florida, brought 50 men over to St. John the Baptist from the Hispaniola, and they proceeded to take over. The mining town of Caparra was built near the location of the modern day city of San Juan. The natives were taken on as slaves and were used to extract gold. (The native women, of course, were mostly saved for the beds of the colonists, the original sex- tourists.)

A Taino revolt in 1511 came to nothing, but a ridiculous number of natives died in the process. After the massacre, the Spaniards found that they were running out of workers, so they began to do what everyone did back then: import African slaves! So, the three races that modern Puerto Ricans are descended from finally began to mix: the Spanish, the Taino, and the African.

While all this was going on, many new towns and cities were being founded around the Island. There was a lot of gold around in those days, and many ports grew as trading centers. Gold and ports in the Caribbean can only lead to one thing: PIRATES!

Puerto Rico was definitely a hub for pirates. There were hundreds of men running black-market connections between the local islands. However, there were also much larger-scale hijinks going on: Spanish ships were prime targets for privateers such as Sir Francis Drake and Sir George Clifford. (My old history teacher described these two especially as “filthy racist blue-blood pirates.”) At one point, Sir George actually invaded Puerto Rico and claimed it for the British. Unfortunately, we Puerto Ricans were deprived of the chance to become monocled tea-drinkers when most of his crew died of dysentery and he ran away. Stupid pirate.

When gold ran out, Puerto Rico began to be used as farmland. Many crops, especially sugar cane and, later, coffee [Lauren’s Note: the nectar of the Gods.  I happen to be a particular fan of Caribbean blends.], were grown here. Slavery continued until the 19^th century, when it was abolished without much issue. Throughout the years, Puerto Rico’s culture, social order, and lifestyle began to deviate from Spain more and more. Even the dialect of Spanish spoken on the island became very distinct from that of the old, Iberian Peninsula.

The people of Puerto Rico became very dissatisfied with Spain. Many began to collect in the town of Lares, where eventually a march known as the “Grito de Lares” or “Shout of Lares” was held. While the rebels from this event were defeated, more soon appeared. Eventually, events led to Puerto Rico receiving the “Letter of Autonomy” from Spain, which essentially granted it independence.

So, Puerto Rico was doing well for about three months with its newly democratic bi-cameral government. What could go wrong?

The Spanish-American war broke out, and America invaded Puerto Rico [Lauren’s Note:  Liberated.  America LIBERATED Puerto Rico from their independence.  It wasn’t American enough.]. Yes, you read that right. It was ridiculous, but it happened. The Americans raped and pillaged their way across an island that they mistakenly believed to be Spanish. Because, that’s how America rolls [Lauren’s Note: Damn straight.]. Puerto Rico got Teddy’s big stick up its backside, and stopped caring about who was in charge.

America built factories. The Island got poorer and lots of people moved to places like New York and Chicago. Certain governors - like Luis Muñoz Marin who is like our FDR - tried to fix things, and managed well enough. People still left the island, but no one was starving. Agriculture was pretty much abandoned, and a middle class finally truly formed. Two political parties, which are both essentially Democratic, but differ in their position on Statehood, formed. (The third, the independence party, has no influence whatsoever.) Globalization, and all the associated problems, hit.

Nowadays, the Island is an interesting mix of the old and the new. There are no real Tainos, Spaniards, or Africans remaining. Everyone’s a wonderful mix, as is our culture. Like the Tainos, we eat yucca boiled and seasoned. We are mostly Christians and speak Spanish, like the Spaniards. Most of our music and dances have distinctly African roots. We watch MTV and wear Aeropostale t-shirts and Uggs. (No, I’m not kidding. Even in this heat, Uggs abound. As does athlete’s foot, I’ve heard.)

And for the future? Well, who knows? I doubt that the question of whether the Island will become a state will be solved any time soon. Yet, it seems to me that even as we continue to assimilate global culture, we Puerto Ricans will remain connected to our own history and culture. Because, there really is a lot of it, and it is worth preserving.

Thank you, Lauren.

[Thank you Pia!]