chihuahua

PANCHO VILLA'S ARRANGEMENT WITH THE MUTUAL FILM COMPANY: "In January 1914, Pancho Villa became Hollywood's first Mexican superstar when he signed an exclusive contract with the Mutual Film Corporation. In return for $25,000, he agreed to keep other film companies from his battlefield, to fight in daylight whenever possible, and to reconstruct battles if the footage needed reshooting. "Now the subject of an HBO film starring Antonio Banderas (And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself), Villa is one of the main protagonists in Margarita de Orellana's vivid account of the American movie industry's fascination with the events of the Mexican Revolution. "Through memoir accounts, newspaper reports, and analysis of the films themselves, "Filming Pancho" reveals much about how Mexico was constructed in the American imagination and how the film images reinforced and justified American expansionism and racial and social prejudices." --From a description, on Amazon, of a documentary movie of Hollywood's treatment of the Mexican Revolution. (The DVD is available for purchase from various Amazon vendors.)

A brighter view of the scene:

Info about Abraham Gonzalez and Francisco Villa, from Wikipedia: "Villa's hatred of ['usurper' Mexican Presidente] Huerta became more personal and intense after March 7, 1913, when Huerta ordered the murder of Villa's political mentor, Abraham González, who had worked with Madero and Villa since 1910. González had been one of Madero's political advisors. He recruited Francisco Villa in 1910 to support Madero with the Plan de San Luis which started the first part of the Mexican Revolution with the armed movement of 20 November 1910. The Plan de San Luis was conceived to force Dictator Porfirio Diaz (Mexican president for 33 years) to leave the presidency and allow for a Mexican democracy.[3] Villa later recovered González's remains and gave his friend a proper funeral in Chihuahua."

Wystan: Thank you for catching the typo in Gonzalez's name. We will fix the record when we update.

don't forget Wystan's question about "General", Governor seems more accuate see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Gonz%C3%A1lez

Presumably should be "Oroszco". See flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/2868000539/

Date on negative is March 6, 1912.

Thanks! We'll make the correction in the source data and reload the description.

I agree about the name but is bad writing. The right way to write this last name is "Orozco". Maybe an american or a poor educated man write this in the original's negative. Alejandro Joya from México

Correct spelling is "Orozco", for General Pascual Orozco, one of Pancho Villa's closests. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascual_Orozco I work in that building in the left, which today is a museum. Actually, my office is the best-seen window in the pic.

This picture was taken in front of the Old Mission [Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de lo Mansos. See your www.flickr.com/photos/smu_cul_digitalcollections/8245873562/ ], Ciudad Juárez (formerly Paso del Norte), Chihuahua, México, The camera is most likely facing east. The scene takes place in what today is Avenida 16 de Septiembre. Wonder if the cargo is guayule (pronounce, wayoole) bushes [Parthenium argentatum gray]. A Source of Natural Rubber. A Rubber-plant of the Chihuahuan Desert. es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenium_argentatum In my home town (Torreón, Coahuila) it was stablished one of the first factories of the Continental Rubber, Co. at the end of XIX century. It yielded tires and other products of natural rubber. The bush was harvested in the surrounding semidesertic land. I've seen it and is very simmilar to that shown in the cargo. If somebody knows otherwise, please reply. Roberto Duarte Torreón, Coahuila.