Mexico: The Land And The People (1961)

[Music] welcome to my home I'm seor Rafael Gesa won't you come [Music] in I have lived in this house and in these Gardens for all of my life my family came from Spain to live in in Mexico about 300 years ago we have been here a long time still it is not an easy country to understand this Mexico let's go inside my great-grandfather Don Francisco gorar built this house he owned land and mines in Mexico there are very few houses like this one because there were not many great grandfathers like ton Francisco I think I'm getting old now I like to sit here with my pictures and my books that one is by a friend of mine one of the most famous artists of Mexico it gives me much pleasure to look at I like to sit here in this room and read our history and have around me the things of the past for in Mexico the past is so much a part of the present to understand Mexico even a little you must know something about the beginning about the history about the people who live here now on this land which is like no other in the [Music] world how do I tell you about this country of a million faces this Mexico of so many mountains of sunbaked deserts and cool forests of sweltering swamps and Breezy Rocky sea coasts [Music] we say in Spanish here there is a little of everything which Nature has to offer on the map this is how Mexico is founded by the United States the Pacific Ocean the Gulf of Mexico and by Guatemala and British Honduras a country about one quarter the size of the United States two mountain ranges the Sierra Madre Oriental and the sad ental form the walls of the high Central Plateau which covers about 1/3 of the country most of the people live on the central plateau and most of the cities are here the high mountains meet in the center near Mexico City and then drop down to the ismos of tantek the peninsula of Yucatan is low and flat as is also the peninsula of baka California which is mostly desert the mountains make transportation and communication very difficult and many parts of the Republic are cut off from the rest of the country in the north the land is mostly desert parched and water hungry for this reason not many people live here the lack of rainfall in most of Mexico makes farming very difficult or impossible even on the central Plateau which is the chief agriculture Cal region there is barely enough rain along the narrow tropical lowlands by the Sea there is an overabundance of rain it's very warm here throughout the year the temperature becomes cooler as the land Rises at Mexico City which is nearly 8,000 ft above sea level the average temperature in the winter is about 54° and in the summer a cool 62 there are many rivers which flow down from the mountains but almost none are good for transportation many have water in them only during the rainy season which is usually in the summer now I must tell you about the people and the great problems made for them by this land they live on long before Columbus discovered America and Cortez conquered Mexico for Spain a rich Indian civilization was here they made figures like these they were Craftsmen and artists and great Builders building enormous pyramids to their gods marvels of engineering knowledge and skill the ruins of their cities are still here Splendid cities that thrived before Europe even knew that there was a new world we think that about 20 million Indians were living in Mexico when the Spanish conquerors came in the year 1521 today maybe 2 million toriles Aztec sapot chamulas and other tribes live in their Mountain Villages they still speak their own languages and many do not even know Spanish the language of Mexico the Indian and the Spanish conquerors married and and soon a new race began to grow the MSO most of the 35 million people of Mexico now are of this mixed Spanish and Indian blood called just Mexicans many towns stand today almost exactly as they were during the nearly 400 years of Spanish rule towns like San Miguel aende [Music] Tasco wanu with their Spanish [Music] architecture but Spain brought much more than architecture to Mexico she brought the feudal Spain of the 16th century the Spain of a few Lords and many surfs she brought the Catholic religion the religion of Mexico today she forced the Indians to destroy their old gods in favor of a new one the god of Christianity whom they accepted very quickly [Music] from the earth of Mexico immense amounts of silver and gold flowed back to Spain besides mineral wealth the valuable hides and cheap labor of the people enriched not only the Spanish Crown but families like mine as [Music] well for nearly 400 years Mexico lay still under the Spanish yoke she did not grow she did not change under a fudal system of Life long outmoded in other countries the Spanish did not wish to change and the Indian did not know how [Music] to now more than 150 years since Mexico gained her independence from Spain the country is still poor over 60% of the people work on the land raising cattle plowing the Earth in the same primitive way they have plowed it for hundreds of years but the land is not really good land for farming there is not enough rain or there is too much there are too many mountains and deserts which will produce nothing and life is very hard on the 30% of the land which is even a little good for agriculture the people harvest wheat the magay plant produces a liquid used to make different drinks along the tropical Sea Coast there are coconuts and the people fish sugar cane is usually harvested on lands the people of the village own in common we call this the aido or aido system a great portion of the Farmland is operated under this system corn is the most important food for the people of Mexico it covers more acreage than all of the other crops combined wherever the land will grow anything there is corn which in Mexico is called ma like most cesos or Farmers Juan Alvarez grows corn on his own little plot of land by his house and the rest of the time he works on the AO or Village lands from the corn seora Alvarez makes tortillas which are the main food for most Mexicans the corn is first soaked in water then it is grounded found between Stones until it is like dough all over Mexico you can hear the patting patting sound of tortillas being made and smell them toasting over the fire for the Cino and his family there are no luxuries barely the Necessities there is only hard work and the struggle to have enough food to keep alive but there is another Mexico a fin homes and luxury and people who have more than enough once there were only the very rich and the very poor but now the people of the Cities who work in shops offices and factories make up the rapidly growing middle class which a country must have if it is to develop Mexico City is totally unlike the rest of the country 15 years ago it was the largest city in the whole Western Hemisphere today with a population of close to 4 million people it's one of the world's great capitals and centers of Commerce a city of well tended parks of fine theaters and art a city with the oldest university in North America housed in some of of the world's most modern buildings for over three centuries the University of Mexico has been a center of culture and learning cities like guadalahara and others are growing as people move from the country 20 years ago only a small percentage of the people lived in urban centers now almost half are part of the city's Rising middle class Mexico knows it must industrialize quickly if it is to provide a better life for more of the people new factories are being built all the time as the country produces more and more of the things a modern society needs from the port city of Veracruz on the Gulf of Mexico we ship out sugar and cotton to other countries and we get back the Machinery with which to build our industry and make at home the manufactured goods which now must be imported there are great natural resources here Mexico is one of the richest mineral countries in the world and Mining is the most highly developed and well organized National Industry Mexico leads the world in the production of silver and is ninth in the production of gold there are great reserves of Base Metals lead zinc and copper as well as iron there is plenty of oil to Pump from the ground water also can be taken from Underground to irrigate the dry lands and make them bloom with rice and fruit gradually agricultural methods are changing under irrigation lands once parched and Barren can be made to yield abundantly with the growing use of modern farm machinery and methods it is possible now to produce much more food with far less labor there are more schools in The Villages where before there were none and the problem of teaching all of the people of a Nation to read and write is slowly being solved roads are being cut through the mountains to communities once was isolated from the world for want of a way to reach them modern buses carry people who not long ago had only buros to [Music] ride with the construction of the railways in the 1880s the industrialization of Mexico began slowly gaining momentum until today Mexico is growing industrially at a more rapid rate than any other country of the Americas through the airport at Mexico City thousands of tourists come to enjoy this most beautiful country with its days filled with warmth and sunshine Acapulco on the Pacific coast has become one of the most famous resorts in the World tourism is one of the chief Industries and very important because Mexico needs the money from abroad which the visitors bring [Music] in there are many mexicos at one extreme there is this Acapulco with its beauty and luxury at the other there is the Mexico in which life has changed little in hundreds of years the Mexico of sparse existence for over half the people this Mexico is our problem but as you have seen we are working to solve it I hope that in my small way I've helped you understand Mexico won't you come back [Music]