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Last updateFri, 29 Apr 2016 3pm

Looking Back: A review of November news from the last 50 years

In this monthly series, the Guadalajara Reporter republishes a few of the headlines from its November editions 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 years ago.

1965

U.S. air acrobats

The U.S. Air Force acrobatic squadron, the Thunderbirds, put on a spectacular aerial show in a one-mile area around the Guadalajara airport using four red white and blue Super-Sabor F-100 jets. 

Med student wives

Wives of six fifth-year U.S. medical students at the Universidad Autonoma de Guadalajara (UAG) hosted 51 women at the first meeting of the Society of American Medical Students wives. Twenty-five of those attending the inaugural event were wives of first-year students.

1975

Population estimate

Speaking at a World Urbanism Day conference in Guadalajara, architect Mario Schjetman said the metro area’s population would double every 15 years and reach 9.2 million by 2000. (Editor’s note: the 2000 census put the figure at 3,696,136.) He said one example of the unchecked growth was the central bus station near Parque Agua Azul, which was built to handle six million passengers a year but moves 42,800 passengers each day – around 12 million a year.

Gum is not change

The federal government will no longer permit stores to give customers chewing gum and candy, or any other product in lieu of change, according to Industry and Commerce Secretary Jose Campillo. 

Ladybird at border

Ladybird Johnson, widow of former U.S. president Lyndon B. Johnson, was refused entrance to Mexico by customs officials at Ciudad Juarez because her armed escort declined to relinquish their weapons. She had intended to visit her ranch property in the state of Chihuahua. 

Anti-Zionism vote

Mexico’s vote in favor of a United Nations resolution equating Zionism with racism has already cost this nation 30,000 tourist reservations, said Rodolfo Casparius, president of the Mexican Hotel Association. A boycott campaign in the United States is issuing billboard announcements and full-page magazine ads exhorting North Americans not to visit Mexico, a “hostile country.”

1985

Lakeside land grab

Some 320 members of an indigenous community claimed ownership of various properties between Lake Chapala and the highway from La Floresta to San Juan Cosala. After a fiery meeting between the head of the Agrarian Reform Commission and some 500 land and property owners,  indigenous leaders agreed to drop their claims as long as they could see almost any proof of ownership, including a neighbor’s affidavit concerning the tenant’s length of occupancy. Real estate broker Richard Tingen said the demand was illegal and that experts say there is no need for property owners to respond to the commission’s demands.

Ex-Convento anger

Cultural fireworks and civic tempers exploded when numerous newspaper reports reported that Guadalajara’s stand-out cultural center, the Ex Convento del Carmen, would be temporarily closed to make room for the local organizing committee of the Soccer World Cup, to be held in Mexico May/June 1986. The apparent ease with which the state government could change officially-designated and popular cultural centers to sports offices provoked widespread dismay and anger.

1995

Cutbacks

The United States ordered its overseas agencies to temporarily cut back spending after President Bill Clinton vetoed an eleventh-hour budget compromise bill November 13, effectively ending the government’s authorization to spend. U.S. agencies in Guadalajara, such as the Department of Commerce, U.S. Information Service, FBI and DEA, have furloughed U.S. employees and are cutting back on all but essential spending.

Turning the tables

Those who want to see table dancing in Zapopan may also be seeing their face in the newspaper. One Zapopan councilman warns that if the former discotheque, Osiris, in Jardines de San Ignacio, reopens as a table-dance club, citizens in the area are going to publish names and photographs of those who frequent it. 

Kids for rent

Some parents in Guadalajara’s poorer neighborhoods rent out their children to beg in the streets. In Colonia Briseño, Balcones del Colli and two or three other shanty towns, women can make as much as 150 to 200 pesos per day (more than ten times the minimum wage) renting their children to beggars. 

2005

Dog flu spreads

Lakeside veterinarians report they have seen evidence that an epidemic of canine influenza rampant in some parts of the United States is spreading here. Symptoms include a cough, sneezing, nasal discharge and gagging. The disease is airborne and highly contagious. Dr. Ladron de Guevara recommends all dog owners maintain current inoculations against kennel cough, parainfluenza and several other diseases with similar symptoms.

Cristero recognition

Sixty thousand worshippers jammed the Jalisco Stadium in Guadalajara to celebrate a beatification mass for 13 Catholic martyrs of the religious Cristero War of the 1920s. Despite the solemn occasion, the mood was one of jubilant excitement, a testament to the enduring power of the Roman Catholic Church in Mexico. 

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