La Urraca

Escrito por Jaime Escobar Corradine

-Líneas Aéreas La Urraca-

Reseña

Histórica:
La sociedad fue formada en 1962 por los hermanos Henao Jaramillo con la finalidad de prestar un servicio de transporte aéreo de abastecimientos a las comunidades más apartadas de los Llanos Orientales y los Territorios Nacionales. Su sede de operaciones se estableció en el aeropuerto Vanguardia de la ciudad de Villavicencio. Se iniciaron las operaciones con dos aviones Douglas B-18 Bolo. Este extraño modelo fue utilizado en la Segunda Guerra Mundial como bombardero, posteriormente convertido para el trasporte de carga.

La Urraca recibió posteriormente la autorización de transporte aéreo de pasajeros y vuelos especiales de carga a cualquier aeropuerto del país.

Desde el principio se corrió con muy mala suerte. El primer suceso tuvo lugar cuando en el vuelo de entrega de un avión Curtiss C-46, recientemente adquirido en los Estados Unidos sufrió un grave accidente cuando efectuaba una escala en el aeropuerto de Kingston en Jamaica el 26 de noviembre de 1962. Más tarde en el fatídico año de 1965, se perdieron los dos Douglas B-18. El primero, el HK-367 se estrelló en la localidad de Tío Barbas en el Vaupés, el 26 de enero. El segundo, el HK-537 se accidentó el 29 de junio del mismo año en San Pedro de Jagua, una población localizada en el piedemonte llanero en el límite entre Cundinamarca y el Meta.

Tiquetes de La Urraca

Imágenes: Jaime Escobar

Para reemplazarlos, se habían adquirido varias unidades Douglas DC-3 para cubrir las rutas regulares secundarias y vuelos especiales de carga. Desde la base de Villavicencio se ofrecían servicios a Cúcuta, Arauca, Miraflores, Mitú, San José del Guaviare, Tame, Yopal, Aguazul, Montería, Arauquita, Paz de Ariporo, Puerto Inírida, San Luis de Palenque, Trinidad y Orocue. Estas rutas habían sido operadas regularmente hasta entonces por AEROTAXI, la subsidiaria del sistema AVIANCA.

El 12 de febrero de 1970 se accidento en las cercanías de Puerto Inírida un DC-3 con matrícula HK-1270. El piloto reporto daños en el motor numero uno y trató de regresar al aeropuerto. Por falta de potencia, no alcanzo a llegar y se precipito a tierra. Murieron 4 tripulantes y 8 pasajeros.

Entre octubre y noviembre de 1970 se adquirieron tres unidades Handley Page Herald, turbohélices de pasajeros de fabricación británica; el HK-715 “Bachué” el HK-718 “Bochica” y el HK-721 “Cacique Nutibara”. Estas fueron asignadas a las nuevas rutas secundarias recientemente adjudicadas por la Aeronáutica Civil y que habían dejado de ser operadas temporalmente por la empresa TAC. Se estableció la base secundaria en el aeropuerto de Eldorado y se iniciaron los servicios regulares a Barrancabermeja, Valledupar, Maicao, Riohacha, Santa Marta, Barranquilla y posteriormente a San Andrés. De igual manera se le adjudicaron las rutas secundarias de Bogotá a Popayán y Pasto y Pasto-Cali-Pasto, recientemente abandonadas por Aerolíneas TAO. Los aviones fueron pintados con un diseño en color rojo muy atractivo y mantenían el logotipo con una simpática urraca, que recordaban a personajes de las tiras cómicas.

HK-715, Handley-Page Herald en Bogotá, 1974

Foto: Jaime Escobar

HK-718, Handley-Page Herald en Barranquilla, 1971

Foto: Jaime Escobar

HK-721, Handley-Page Herald en Bogotá, 1971

Foto: Jaime Escobar

A finales de 1971 se llegó a un acuerdo con TAC Aerovías del Cesar para operar en sus rutas asignadas los tres Vickers Viscount recientemente adquiridos por ellos. El HK-1412 fue bautizado con el nombre de “Yurupari”.*

Desafortunadamente, otro de los Viscounts se vino a tierra a pocos kilómetros después de decolar del aeropuerto Eldorado en el municipio de Funza, cuando cumplía un vuelo regular a San Andrés. En el siniestro del HK-1347 ocurrido el 21 de enero de 1972, perecieron 5 tripulantes y 15 pasajeros. La investigación concluía que había ocurrido una explosión a bordo. Los detalles no se conocieron.

HK-1412, Vickers Viscount en El Dorado, 1972 Foto: Jaime Escobar

El 7 de mayo de 1972 se accidentó en las cercanías del aeropuerto de Valledupar el Herald HK-721. Para fortuna de los pasajeros, se efectuó un aterrizaje de emergencia en un potrero aledaño y no hubo pérdidas humanas que lamentar.*

A raíz de estos accidentes se termino el acuerdo con TAC y se perdieron los derechos de operar las rutas a la Costa Atlántica. La aerolínea regreso a sus orígenes y recogió nuevamente su operación en Villavicencio, fortaleciendo sus servicios a los Llanos Orientales, utilizando los dos Herald y los DC-3. Se adquirieron dos unidades Britten Norman Islander, de 8 pasajeros para completar la flota. Se cambio el diseño corporativo de la empresa y los aviones se pintaron con vivos colores, manteniendo la imagen de la urraca como símbolo principal: el HK-500 en azul, el HK-1175 en naranja, el HK-1315 en verde, el HK-715 en amarillo y recibió el nombre de “Ciudad de San José de Cúcuta”, el HK1241 en rojo.

HK-500, DC-3 en Vanguardia (Villavicencio), 1974

Foto: Jaime Escobar

HK-1175, DC-3 en El Dorado, Octubre de 1974

Foto: Jaime Escobar

HK-1315, DC-3 en Vanguardia (Villavicencio), 1974

Foto: Jaime Escobar

Unos meses después, el 2 de noviembre de 1973 se estrello el HK-718 cuando aproximaba al aeropuerto Vanguardia de Villavicencio. El avión había aterrizado en Arauca, después de haber efectuado su recorrido cotidiano desde Villavicencio con escalas en Paz de Ariporo y Tame. Se identificó una fuga de fluido hidráulico en el tren de aterrizaje de nariz. Luego de haber cambiado una manguera del sistema, el avión continúo su vuelo a Cúcuta. Después de apenas 5 minutos de vuelo se reportó un fuerte olor a humo en la cabina. Parecía que el tren de aterrizaje seguía extendido, aunque los indicadores en la cabina de mando decían lo contrario. La tripulación decidió regresar a Villavicencio para hacer dos sobrepasos a baja altura para identificar el problema y tomar las medidas del caso. Aproximando a la pista 22, el piloto recibió instrucciones de apagar el motor numero uno como medida de precaución. Sin embargo, a esa baja altura, el avión perdió sustentación y se vino a tierra explotando en llamas; 6 de los 16 ocupantes del avión perdieron la vida incluyendo la tripulación de mando.

HK-1241, Britten-Norman Islander en Vanguardia (Villavicencio), Noviembre de 1978

Foto: Jaime Escobar

El tercer Herald corrió con igual suerte. El 22 de junio de 1975 tuvo que efectuar un aterrizaje forzoso en una pista de tierra bastante corta, ubicada en la hacienda La Libertad. El avión finalmente tuvo que ser abandonado allí, ante la imposibilidad de recuperarlo.

Los DC-3 fueron finalmente retirados de servicio en 1978. Se adquirieron entonces tres unidades Curtiss C-46 para ser utilizados exclusivamente para el transporte de carga. Nuevamente otro accidente tuvo lugar el 27 de Mayo de 1979 cuando el HK-1857 se accidento en las cercanías de El Yopal.

HK-1857, Curtiss C-46 en Vanguardia (Villavicencio), Noviembre de 1978

Foto: Jaime Escobar

La empresa optó finalmente por suspender todas sus actividades a partir de 1980. Líneas Aéreas La Urraca se lleva el poco honroso primer puesto en tener el mayor número de accidentes por flota. De las 24 aeronaves que han sido identificadas como registradas a su nombre, 12 sufrieron accidentes graves. Esto es el 50% de su flota en 18 años de operaciones, lo que significa un pobrísimo record de seguridad ante la falta de control efectivo por parte de las autoridades aeronáuticas.*

Destinos:

Nacionales:
Aguazul, Arauca, Arauquita, Barrancabermeja, Barranquilla, Bogotá, Cali, Cúcuta, Maicao, Miraflores, Mitú, Montería, Pasto, Paz de Ariporo, Popayán, Puerto Inírida, Orocué, Riohacha, San Andrés. San José del Guaviare, San Luis de Palenque, Santa Marta, Tame, Trinidad, Valledupar, Yopal.*

Internacionales:

Flota:

Britten-Norman IslanderCurtiss C-46Douglas B-18 BoloDouglas DC-3Handley-Page Herald Vickers Viscount

Códigos:

OACI: N/DIATA: N/D

Período de Operación:
1962 - 1980

HK-715, Handley-Page Herald en El Dorado, 1971.

Foto: Jaime Escobar.

El Domador

From: realengo
Added: January 29, 2007
Fragmento del documental "Domador" realizado por Joaquin Cortes, en un hato en las sabanas del estado Apure Venezuela

...Epale que BUENO!!!! gracias por subirlo. Este documental lo vi hace años y desde hace rato lo he querido ver! gran trabajo de Joaquin Cortes

...esta muy bueno ese video exelente me gusta cuando naricean a la vaca para juntarlas con el resto podrias subir el septimo paralelo es muy bueno tambien pero un poco mas viejita yo soy apureño hasta la muerte muy buen video graciaspor subirlo

Florentino y el Diablo

Mustangs

Mustangs
The killing fields
Jun 26th 2008
From The Economist

Long a symbol of freedom, America's wild horses may soon be no more

In 1964 a new car was launched at the New York World's Fair: the Ford Mustang. Both its name and its galloping horse logo, adapted from Frederic Remington’s portraits of the Old West, epitomised a peculiarly American dream about a land of cowboys and big skies. More than 8m Mustangs have been sold. But on America’s old frontier, the free-roaming wild horses now struggle for survival.

Deanne Stillman, a journalist, began researching this history in 1998 after 34 wild horses were massacred in the Virginia Range of mountains near Reno, Nevada. The horse began evolving on the North American continent 55m years ago, before crossing the Bering land bridge and spreading through Asia and Europe. The word mustang derives from the Spanish. Ms Stillman traces the return of the horse with the conquistadors; its partnership with Native Americans; its use in wars and cattle drives; its role in literature, lore and films; and its demise during the “Great Removal” of 1920-35 when hundreds of thousands of mustangs were sent to slaughter to provide cheap meat.

Her book culminates in the fight against the powerful cattle-ranching lobby which sees the animals as pests and wants them removed from the public (federally owned) land where cattle graze. Yet, as Ms Stillman points out, the area where most of America’s mustangs run free today supplies just 3% of the country’s beef.

The author quotes some startling statistics. In the 1700s there were so many mustangs in Texas that maps marked some areas merely as “Vast Herds of Wild Horses”. In the American civil war, 1.5m horses and mules were killed or wounded. By the turn of the 20th century some 2m wild horses roamed the American wilderness. Only about 25,000 remain today, most of them on Nevada’s vast swathes of public land, where wild horses have flourished beyond the reaches of man.

Legendary mustangs gallop through the book. Comanche survived being shot several times at the Battle of the Little Bighorn and lived out his days at Fort Lincoln begging for sugar-lumps and buckets of beer. Steamboat ejected thousands of cowboys from his saddle and became famous as “the horse who couldn’t be rode”.

Ms Stillman also includes William “Buffalo Bill” Cody and his Wild West shows, Charles “Pete” Barnham, a 19th-century mustanger whose method of running horses through a jute-lined chute into a trap is still used today, and Velma Johnston, better known as “Wild Horse Annie”, who launched a campaign to give mustangs federal protection. She succeeded in 1971, after a 20-year struggle, when President Richard Nixon signed the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act, banning inhumane round-ups of mustangs and donkeys on public lands and preventing their sale for slaughter.

Special interests have since chipped away at that legislation. In late 2004 Conrad Burns, the then Republican senator for Montana, introduced a controversial amendment removing all protection for wild horses over the age of ten (which is not that old for equines) and those that have not been adopted on the third attempt under the government’s controversial Adopt-a-Horse programme. Between 1971 and 2006, 200,000 mustangs were taken from the wild by Department of the Interior agencies such as the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which administers America’s 264m acres of public land.

“Mustang” makes for harsh reading. The cruel round-ups of the past, famously portrayed in John Huston’s 1961 film “The Misfits”, are more than matched by today’s incidents in which mustangs are surreptitiously shot or fenced off from their water sources. The author argues strongly against the current federal round-ups—or “gathers” as the BLM prefers to call them—where helicopters run exhausted and panicking horses into corrals before they are sent to various fates. Around 30,000 mustangs are now kept in government holding facilities—more than those that still roam free. Some are due to be sold for adoption as “living legends”, some will be sent to long-term pastures in Kansas and Oklahoma, where cattle ranchers are paid by taxpayers to keep them. Thanks to Mr Burns, approximately 8,000 will end up at the slaughterhouse. A sad end for the animal that was revered by Native Americans. “Horses are gods,” a Hidatsa elder once said: “Treat them well. They have minds and understand.”

Mustang: The Saga of the Wild Horse in the American West.
By Deanne Stillman.Houghton Mifflin; 348 pages; $25
(June 9, 2008)
ISBN-13: 978-0618454457

El Carrao De Palmarito

]

Added: September 18, 2007 El Carrao De Palmarito El Clarin de la llanura el mejor cantante que ha parido el estado apure inigulable voz... q dios me lo tenga en la gloria cantanto por aya... Pa´El Chamo Carrao ~ Elarpistaplecentero

El Carrao de Palmarito
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El Carrao de Palmarito

Background information
Birth name
Juan de los Santos Contreras
Also known as
El Carrao de PalmaritoClarín de la Llanura
Born
April 7, 1928(1928-04-07)Palmarito, Apure state, Venezuela
Died
December 10, 2002 (aged 74)Barinas, Barinas state, Venezuela
Genre(s)
Joropo
Occupation(s)
musician, singer, composer
Label(s)
VelvetDiscomodaCahilapo
Associated acts
José Romero BelloÁngel Custodio LoyolaSentimiento ApureñoJoseíto Romero group
Juan de los Santos Contreras, better known like El Carrao de Palmarito and Clarín de la llanura, was a Venezuelan composer, and singer of joropo, son of Juan de Mata Laguna and Carmen Cecilia Contreras, was born in Palmarito, Apure state, April 7, 1928. Passed his childhood working in a farm near of hometown, started to sing from very young, reason why frequently was guest at the celebration and parties of Palmarito. In 1955 started to live in Barinas. His first performance as singer, was in the radio station Radio Barinas, at the program Fiesta Criolla, where he acquires the pseudonym El Carrao de Palmarito, proposed by Luis Eduardo Camejo, a presenter of the station.
At this city obtained contract as singer in the Llano Alto hotel, acting during nine months, after this he travels to Caracas, appearing at the stations Radio Rumbos and Radiodifusora Venezuela, the presenter Alfredo Acuña Zapata add the nickname Clarín de la Llanura to Contreras. One successfully at the media, make tours around Venezuela, for the projection of his career. Represented Venezuela in several international events, participating at the film Más Allá Del Orinoco (Beyond the Orinoco), next to the Mexican artist Javier Solís. Also at the Venezuelan production, Agua y Sangre, next to the actor Carlos Olivier.
In 1976 the governments of the states Apure and Portuguesa, made a tribute to him, revealing a bust of the artist at the town of Palmarito. Also in that year, records with José Romero Bello, and the group of Joseíto Romero, La Leyenda de Florentino y El Diablo (The legend of Florentino and the Devil) based on the poem of Alberto Arvelo Torrealba, with this interpretation Juan de los Santos Contreras consacrates like artist.
El Carrao de Palmarito, participated at many Joropo Festivals, some of them, The first International Match of Joropo, celebrated in Arauca, Colombia, obtaing two gold medals and 15000 pesos, Second Festival of Joropo, San Fernando de Apure, winner of the Cantaclaro de Oro First Contest, also obtain three first places at the Festivals of Villavicencio, Colombia, second place at the Maracaya de Oro, in Maracay, and an Honorary degree at the Florentino de Oro, for his musical career.
In 1998, directed by John Petrizzelli and Mercedes Ramírez, was presentated a documentary film about his life, with the title of Carrao, exploring the daily life, the beliefs, customs and memories as well as the artistic trajectory and biography of the singer. This film was awarded by the Cinemateca Nacional de Venezuela.
Contreras was condecorated in many occasions, for his contribution to the Venezuelan folk music, received recognitions from institutions like, Kids Foundation of Venezuela, Central University of Venezuela, Chacao Municipality, Aragua state Government, a tribute by the embassy of Venezuela in Jamaica, and the National Prize of Music in 1998.
Between his best known songs, they emphasize, Florentino y el Diablo, Aquella mujer que amé, Furia, Chaparralito llanero, Cajón del Arauca apureño, Llanura yo soy tu hijo, Plegaria llanera, Travesía de San Camilo, Faenas del llano, Dulce María, Mis retoños, El morrocoy de doña Carmen, Caminito de Arichuna, Recorriendo a Barinas, Los martirios del Carrao, El sueño de Julio Verne, Villavicencio, among others.[1]
On December 10, 2002, at the age of 74, this legend of the Venezuelan folklore dies in Barinas,

[edit] Discography

El Carrao de Palmarito watching his bust
In 1954, records his first 45 rpm disc for the Velvet seal, titled Fiesta de los Santos, in 1965 Llanura yo soy tu hijo, with the Cachilapo seal. Llanura ... aquí están tus hijos, with the group Sentimento Apureño, Florentino y El Diablo in 1976, his discography includes in addition two 45 rpm discs, and thirty five 33 rpm, accompanied with groups and artists like: Eugenio Bandres, Eudes Álvarez, Omar Moreno, Cándido Herrera, Gustavo Sánchez, Nery Torrealba, Luis Rojas, Joseíto Romero.[

Al Atardecer Llegaron

Al atardecer
llegaron a la caballeriza
todavia oliendo a sabana,
a polvo del paradero,
a mastranto del camino
y a buen caballo
a recordar los hechos del dia
y a fumar tabaco
debajo del alumbrado del cielo
que cubria la enormidad
del Llano
y aqui termina camarita
mi relato Llanero
improvisado
cg

The Peanut Vendor - Len Lye 1933

This is the creepiest puppet film ever made, an experimental piece by filmmaker Len Lye in 1933.

~ Scuzzbobber

The Peanut Vendor (Der Erdnußverkäufer)

Added: February 28, 2008 John Brigs und sein Jazzensemble mit RefraingesangKalliope K 1711 mx. 33752Berlin, 1931

Dairynab716

El Manisero-Hibari Misora

Added: April 13, 2008 In this footage from 1952, Hibari sings the Japanese versiton of the Latin American tune 'El manisero' or 'The peanut vendor song' as commonly known around the world. Hear her hit the high F♯ at the end

=0 !!南京豆売り豆　おせんはいかがですか、キャラメルはいかがですかすてきに美味しい　ほやほやのアンパン一つ食べてごらんなさい　初恋の味がする甘いチョコレート　さあさ皆さん　お買いなさいおなかをすかせてたのじゃ　あの子がかわいそうですよお買いなさい　お買いなさい

Oldies - El Manisero - A. Machin - Homenaje

Added: March 09, 2008 Hace 80 años nacia esta cancion. Feliz cumpleaños!

~ Elpatiodenessun

Antonio Machín - El manisero

Added: April 08, 2008 Antonio Machín -

El Manisero

Maní

Maní

Si te quieres por el pico divertir

cómete un cucuruchito de maní

Qué calentito y rico está

Ya no se puede pedir más

Ay caserita, no me dejes ir

Porque después te vas a arrepentir

Y va a ser muy tarde ya

Manisero se va

Manisero se va

Caserita no te acuestes a dormir

Sin comerte un cucurucho de maní

Cuando la calle sola está

casera de mi corazón

El manisero entona su pregón

Y si la niña escucha su cantar

Llama desde su balcón

Dame de tu maní

Dame de tu maní

Que esta noche no voy a poder dormir

Sin comerme un cucurucho de maní

~ Alcalata

Manisero para Arpa

Added: October 02, 2006
Hola, esta es una versión que hice para arpa del MANISERO, rumba cubana de Simons. En realidad es una adaptación que hice sobre una versión de Bebo y Chucho Valdés. Le añadí algun ritmo criollo y diversas variaciones. El resultado no queda mal. espero que lo disfruten. ~Jesuscarni

Musica Llanera Venezolana de Arpa en Paris

Added: November 04, 2006 Musica de mi patria venezuela interpretada majestuosamente en Paris por un Arpista español.~ Silmenlitul

Aventura En Rio Bita Y Orinoco

PESCA LA SELVA
Wildlife Fishing Adventure
Orinoco 2008
Se acerca el inicio de la temporada de pesca en la Orinoquía, uno de los mejores lugares para la pesca del Pavón (Peacock Bass) en el mundo y PESCA EN LA SELVA lo invita a disfrutar de ella.
La temporada de sol hace que los ríos bajen de nivel y se de inicio a las migraciones de peces, de los cuales podrá pescar: pavones, payaras, sardinatas, caribes, agujetos, arawanas, bocones, yamus, pirañas, cachamas, bagres, cajaros, amarillos, valentones, paletones, mapurites, doncellas etc.
El refugio se encuentra ubicado a 42 kilómetros terrestres de Puerto Carreño, allí encontrará restaurante, luz eléctrica, agua potable y cómodas cabañas con habitaciones y baño privado.

El programa incluye:
Recepción en el aeropuerto de Bogotá Colombia, transporte y estadía con alimentación (cena y desayuno) en el hotel donde pasará la primera noche.
Al día siguiente transporte al aeropuerto donde tomará el vuelo hacia Puerto Carreño.
Recepción en el aeropuerto de Puerto Carreño y transporte terrestre al refugio .
Alojamiento en el refugio.
Alimentación (tres comidas diarias) en el refugio .
Seis días de pesca en el río Bita, en embarcaciones de fibra de vidrio para dos pasajeros cada una, equipadas con motores Suzuki 2T 15 HP y manejadas por motoristas expertos.
Hielo permanente ,bebidas naturales, bebidas gaseosas cervezas y licores nacionales durante su estadia.
Transporte refugio - aeropuerto Puerto Carreño.
Trayecto aéreo Puerto Carreño – Bogotá.
No incluye: tiquetes aereos desde su procedencia hasta Bogota (Colombia) Bebidas alcohólicas importadas estas se venden por separado.

"Aquí está el indio". Joropo venezolano.

Added: August 23, 2007
La Sexta Básica son:Guitarra, voz y dirección: Pablo EscalonaGuitarra: José Manuel CardonaMandolina y Bandola llanera: Mariana CardonaMandolina y voz: Roselyn RondónCuatro y voz: Lilian Córdova

Los Llaneros

Los Llaneros
1994 223p.
by Jose Antonio Giacopini Zarraga
& Rafeal Hoogesteijn
Armitano Editores Carracas
ISBN: 980-216-121-7

Rest assured that this book is one of the best photograph books available about Llanero cowboys, and cattle ranching on the northern plain of the Orinoco River basin in Venezuela. Well worth the investment for your personal library of the region. Most of the photographs were taken in the Estado de Apure which is very wet during the rainy season and is typical of the region north of the Rio Meta extending from Casanare and Arauca in Colombia, into the Estado de Apure in Venezuela. I am a north American who lived on a cattle ranch in the Eastern Colombian Llanos from 1969 until 1982. My interest lies south of the Rio Meta, below Orocue, in the Departments of Meta and Vichada around Villavicencio and Puerto Lopez, in the region Dieter Brunnschwieler referred to in, Llanos Frontier of Colombia 1971, as the badlands of the Serrania, an area somewhat higher in elevation and dryer, but virtually the same grasslands of the Orinoco, as those of the Estado de Apure. Unfortunately there are not many picture books available about the Colombian Llaneros with the exception of Llanos, published by the Corporacion Llanos de Colombia, photography by Diego Samper Martinez, and Llanos de Colombia, published by Litografia Arco. So I included the Venezuelan Llanos in my search and in addition to the book in question (which is excellent) I recommend El Llano by Christian Belpaire, Ediciones Polar, and Venezuela Los Llanos by Gerard Sioen, which both have excellent photographs of cowboys and cattle ranching in the region of the plains of the Orinoco.

Jose Antonio Giacopini Zarraga was born in 1915, so he was 79 at the time of this publication, and was in a position to have witnessed a great deal of the history and development of the Venezuelan Llanos. He held many positions in the public and private sector, was the Governor of the Federal Territory of the Amazonas from 1948 to 1949 and gave assistance and advice to the National Federation of Cattlemen for many years. As a member of the Sociedad de Ciencias Naturales he traveled the vast interior of Venezuela and gathered information on the nature, flora and fauna of the Llanos, and its population, customs and activities from as early as the 1930’s when Venezuela had less than 3 million inhabitants. During that time he encountered the older generation of Llaneros that had been born to the harsh life of the tropical plains of the Orinoco. Giacopini offers the reader of new generations the image of a long ago Llano and its intrepid vaqueros that will never be again.

Rafael Hoogesteijn was born in Caracas, Venezuela in 1953. Like Jose Antonio Giacopini Zarraga he too was a member of the Sociedad de Ciencias Naturales, and as such participated in many zoological expeditions throughout the country. From the age of 14 he visited the Llanos frequently. His early experiences on the plains of the Orinoco were associated with Hato Flores Moradas, in the Estado de Guarico, where he first became familiar with the Sabana inundable and photography. Hoogesteijn graduated from the University Central of Maracay in 1978 with a degree in veterinary medicine. Beginning in 1986 he worked as veterinarian and manager of the three cattle herds belonging to Productora Hernandez S.A.; Merecure, Juan Matero, and Las Mangas, which are situated on the sabanas inundables of the Estado of Apure, and has assisted other cattle ranches in a similar capacity in other diverse locations of Venezuela. He has written and lectured about tropical cattle ranching on the sabanas inundables del Estado de Apure, Venezuela on numerous occasions throughout the world. He began his photojournalism of the llanos as a boy, and refined his imagery and appreciation of the beauty of the mounted herder upon the vast plain of the Orinoco with the passage of time, notably during his years at Merecure, Juan Matero, and Las Mangas.

[The caption for this photograph reads: The LLanos saddle drying in the sun after a morning of work. Its origen comes from the lightweight north american saddle tree. It is made of wood reinforced with iron covered with sewn rawhide.]

__________

The saddles shown in this book are somewhat perplexing to the experienced eye and require some explanation about their origin. However, even in light of their explanation it is not clear to me why these herdsmen of the northern plain of the Orinoco River basin choose to use them rather than evolve as their counterpart the Mexican Charo did some four hundred years ago. Use of a saddle without a horn and the subsequent necessity of tying to the horse’s tail to rope cattle is a very old Spanish colonial custom probably used early throughout the land of the Vaquero and was not native to the Iberian peninsula. But this is speculation on my part and requires further elucidation. The saddles pictured in this book are replicas of the old McCellan cavalry saddle and in addition to their use in the sabanas inundables of Venezuela may also be used in parts of Arauca and Casanare in Colombia but I can not say for certain because as I’ve said I have no personal experience north of the Rio Meta.

The McCellan Saddle was a riding saddle designed by George B. McClellan, a career Army officer in the U.S. Army, and adopted by the Army in 1859. The saddle continued in continuous use from the period of adoption until the U.S. Army's last horse cavalry and horse artillery was dismounted in World War Two. Even at that, the saddle has continued on in use with ceremonial units in the U.S. Army which continue to use horses. The saddle pictured here is of simple raw hide, left oblique view. The photograph was taken at Ft Kearny Nebraska State Park. In all my years in the Llanos I never saw saddles of this kind colgados los estantillos de las ramadas de las fincas de las sabanas y menigua de la Serrania al sur del Rio Meta, hung from the posts of the palm thatched tack rooms of the ranches of the plains south of the Rio Meta. In their defence they are lightweight, for horses that are small and poorly fed, but I’ve seen other lightweight saddles used in the Llanos with a horn for roping.

[The caption for this photograph reads: Here is a Llanero saddle with "Estribos de Pala," simple ring stirrups for "el pie descalzado," barefeet. "Los arciones o correas," the strirrup leathers that support the estribo are made of nylon because the original "arciones pudrieron con las lluvias," stirrup leathers rotted with the rain and humidity and were substituted the following "verano," wet season with synthetic nylon. Note the small saw tied to the rear saddle strings of the saddle that is used to saw off the tips of the horns of the more dangerous cattle.]

__________

The evloution of horesmanship, and the subsequent use of horses for open range stock raising on the plains of the Iberian Peninsula, that was brought by the conquistadores to the new world, is beyond this disscusion. Let it suffice to point out what Robert M. Denhardt wrote in The Horses of the Americas, 1947; about tying to the horses' tail, in the evolution of the new world saddlery. He wrote, “It was not long until the style of riding had to be somewhat modified. As horses thrived in the new land, growing numerous and wild, the people (of Mexico in the late 1600’s) found difficulty in mounting a half-broken animal with such short stirrups (commonmly used by the conquistadores). As there was continous riding day after day watching the herds, this cramped method proved rather uncomfortable. Therefore, the stirrups were lengthened. The old method of tying the lazo (rope) to the horse’s tail was awkward, too; therefore, it was not long until the pommel (the front of the rider’s seat) was capped to hold the rope. Thus the modern stock saddle had achieved its basic form by the end of the seventeenth century.”

[The caption of this photograph reads: En verano los culateros se tragan todo el polvo de los arreos, trabajando poco apreciado, por lo que el caporal va pendiente que se mantengan en sus puestos en numero suficiente. Hato Matapalos, Apure.]

[The caption for this photograph reads: En la cola del caballo, la soga se amarra con un nudo especial el cual lo sujeta fuertemente, pero tambien se puede soltar rapidament si la situacion lo amerita. Buenos caballos sogueros pueden quedar "chucutos," o sin pelos en el rabo por las frecuentes enlazadas. Si ello ocurre se le hace al caballo una especie de tenza para sujetar la soga desde el pecho del caballo hacia atras.]

[The caption for this photograph reads: El enrollado y fijacion de la soga a la silla despues de utilizarla es un proceso que debe ser realizado cuidadosament para que el lazo no se enrede en la proxima enlazada, lo cual podria causar una violenta caida al caballo y su jinete.]

Bandola Venezolana Ismael Querales Tema Propio

Added: November 08, 2007 El maestro Ismael nos trae esta pieza de su autoria llamada Juan,Julian y Fulgencio y fué dedicada a sus Maestros de los cuales aprendió y rinde homenaje con esta pieza, contiene grandes recursos de ejecución. gracias MASTER Ismael.

Seis por Derecho-Luis Quintero homenaje a Antonio Lauro

Added: August 24, 2007 El Gran guitarrista Venezolano Luis Quintero homenajeando a Antonio Lauro con la insigne pieza "Seis por Derecho" en el CELARG- Venezuela patrocinado por la Asociacion Venezolana de Interpretes y Productores de Fonogramas (AVINPRO) 22 de agosto de 2007

Seis por Derecho - Alirio Diaz

Added: February 05, 2007 La maravillosa canción "Seis por Derecho" del maestro Antonio Lauro interpretada por el gran Alirio Diaz.

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Antonio Lauro's song "Seis por Derecho" played by Alirio Diaz.

UN PAJARILLO

Added: December 04, 2007 BANDOLA: CLAUDIO DAM, CUATRO: JOSE (EL GATO) DIAZ. TEMA: PAJARILLO, MUSICA: FOLKLORE. ESTADO MONAGAS, VENEZUELA.

ROBERTO BETANCOURT Y CARLOS MEZA/BRAMA

Added: November 15, 2007 BANDOLA LLANERA Y CUATRO

Segundo Garcia y su Bandola Llanera

Added: May 28, 2007 El Comejen de la Bandola nuevamente nos deleita, en esta oportunidad con un tema llamado "La Picura"

Solo Cuatro

Added: April 01, 2007 Danny Orduño Barines nos sorprende con este solo de cuatro que nació de una improvisación en un pajarillo y es de mucho gusto ver como la destreza de Danny es evidente Bravo por ese solo Hermano y Arriba Venezuela

Bandola venezolana Gaban

Added: April 13, 2007 Carlos Miguel Meza en la bandola junto a Junior Parra tocando un "Gaban" y como dice el Maestro Ismael Querales "el gaban no lleva la Cuarta sino dominante y tonica en el acompañamiento" es sabroso y provoca echarse una fria! Q lo Disfruten

Pajarillo con Revuelta

Added: May 30, 2007 (Less info)
Segundo Garcia en Al son de Venezuela

Bandola Musica Venezolana tema PAJAR Y YO

Added: February 05, 2007 Este es un ritmo tradicional de la región de los llanos interpretado con la bandola llanera el mismo es una improvisación la cual espero les guste tiene sus fallas pero lo importante es apoyar nuestro folklore...y q VIVA VENEZUELA

Pavon (peacock bass) Colombia

Un pavon capturado por Alejandro Linares en la selva del Orinoco

ANA VEYDÓ / Llano y recuerdo

Ana Veydó es integrante del Grupo Cimarrón, agrupación de música llanera de Colombia nominada a los premios Grammy anglo en el año 2004 con el álbum Si soy llanero, en la categoría Best Traditional World Music Album.Ana Veydó, intérprete de joropo de los Llanos del Orinoco reconocida en Colombia y Venezuela como una de las cantantes de música llanera con mayor proyección internacional, presenta en video los temas de su álbum Mataguayabo, con bellas canciones ambientadas en los paisajes del Llano.www.anaveydo.com

musica llanera - musica llanera - murio el caballo amarillo

Musica llanera - llano - asi es mi estilo

Gerardo Monagas San Rafael Rucio Moro

Gerardo Monagas Quitapesares

Musica llanera / musica llanera / llego el potranco

Toros y Cornadas

COGIDA ESPECTACULAR POR UN TORO LOCO

Gineteada ajeitada!!!

Hunt for big Fish - Colombia -Llanos Orientales

Concurso San Martín

Added: November 02, 2007 (Less info)
Joaquín Briceño en el privado tocando tres damas, en el publico un popurri de recuerdos de ciudad de nutrias (anselmo lopez)Gavan Pajarillo Bandola:Joaquin Briceño Cuatro: Diana Carolina Leal Maracas: Juan David Gómez

Delegación Bogotá Festival internacional San Martín 2006

Added: February 16, 2008 (Less info)
En el arpa: Mauricio CarvajalBandola: Juan Carlos ContrerasCuatro: Libardo ReyMaracas:Fernando TorresBajo: Adrian Santos

YERLY PULIDO CON EL GRUPO MACUARE FESTIVAL SAN MARTIN 2007

The link to YERLI PULIDO HACIENDO SU PRESENTACION EN EL FESTIVAL INTERNACIONAL DE SAN MARTIN disappeared and was replaced with clip from Festival Uritucu ferias del Orituco, X ferias del Orituco, Altagracia, Guarico, Venezuela. For those unaccustomed to Joropo, they begin slowly not unlike courtship...then if there is the moment of fire...they become hot! Give this one exactly 0.58 seconds to burst into conflagaration
cg

Marcos Molina: Pajarillo

Added: March 10, 2008 (Less info)
Marcos Molina, arpista colombiano, interpreta magistralmente una de las canciones llaneras más conocidas.

El gran llanerazo 2004 - Cancion a Casanare

Added: February 11, 2008 (Less info)
Cancion llanera dedicada a Casanare, parte del documental El gran llanerazo, emitido en el año 2004. http://casanareenlinea.com pretende mostrar partes del documental para que la gente se interese mas por la cultura llanera.

El Gran Llanerazo

Potreros De Santa Teresita Via A Restrepo, Meta Colombia

On the road to Restrepo that follows the paw of the Eastern Cordillera of the Andes out of Villavicencio passed the Aereopuerto de Vanguardia lies a parcel of land that has for many years been known as Santa Teresita. The house belonging to the finca is situated to the left of the road. The pastures are to the right and extend across the shallow raudal of the Rana for nearly two kilometers.

These were the fatting pastures of Don Tom Kirby, an old Florida Cowboy, and his wife Ricky. Tom had come to Colombia in the early 1960's on behalf of several Florida businessmen who were trying to hold on to some 50,000 hectarias in southeastern Meta, they called Mapiripan. That was long before the colonols built the little town of Mapiripan on the edge of the Rio Guaviari, that eventually became the municipio of some 8 to 10,000 inhabitants.

It took two days to get to Mapiripan from Villavicencio by either of two different routes. One way was south through San Martin where not far out of town one encountered a turnoff to the left in a southeasterly direction out of the piedmont and up onto the southern badlands of the serrania, around the headwaters of the Rio Manicacias to the north, through El Crucero, Morichito and Las Auras to the east. The road had been made years before by some ancient mariner who simply took off across the savannah with a compass in hand looking for the straightest and driest route from one point to the next in search of a destination.

Farther south was another turnoff to the left, that passed through Candilejas, the namesake of the entire southern route traversing what was by then the Departamento rather than the Intendencia of Meta. The llaneros would say, "Por la via de Candilejas," rather than, "Por los Kioscos," which was the other route to Mapiripan through Puerto Lopez and Puerto Gaitan." If you followed la via de Candilejas another half day, you would come to a turnoff to the right of the road heading due south through the serrania, between the headwaters of the Rio Pororio and the Cano Ovejas that approached the vegas of the Rio Guaviari and the pueblo of San Jose Del Guaviari on its southern banks. Continuing passed the turnoff to San Jose, through the highland of the Serrania between the Rio Manicacias to the north and Cano Ovejas to the south, through the landmarks of Amparo and Brasillia, you came to another branch in the road that headed south to the savannahs of Mapiripan.

The road to Mapiripan passed between Cano Ovejas to the west and Cano Jabon to the east on a narrow strip of serrania highland that subsided as it approached the Rio Guaviaria. On either side of the serrania the land dropped off toward the damp bajos and zurales where the comejen and pasto rabo de zorro were, that boarder the Canos Ovejas and Jabon. It was what the llaneros called "un rincon ciego," for which there was no other way out except in this case across the Rio Guaviari. From the mouth of the rincon in the north, to its farthest extention in the south were some 75 kilometers, by an average width of perhaps 25 that were the savannahs of Mapiripan. Just to the river though it was but some 30 kilometers from the headwaters of the Ovejas and Jabon.

There at the river’s edge was where the pueblo of Mapiripan came to be in the mid 1960's. It began as just a few ramadas. Then someone began selling food for the colonols in the surrounding selva and fuel for their outboard motors. Before you long there was a town and the people of the town needed land in a land that had never been subject to any kind of formal tenancy before, except for that of Don Tom’s and the Florida businessmen. It was not that the colonols wanted Tom’s savannah. They needed selva to slash and burn and plant their crops of yuca, arroz and maiz in. The savannah was no good for growning their crops.

It was everyone else that would become the problem. It was the town itself that was in direct conflict with the old tierreteniente’s claim to the land. Before they built the town no one went there and nobody gave a good god damn who used it. But once there was a town, once there was a place to gather, it became a magnet for anyone who had nothing, and everything to gain by being there.

The colombian writer, German Castro Caicedo wrote a novel about the role of the Dakota DC3’s in the llanos at that time that ferried tons of people and supplies out of Vanguardia to remote locations of the frontier. He said that sometime in the late 1970’s the crews of DC3’s began carring increasing amounts of people and cargo to lonely airfields were few had gone before. To such places they took beer, food and chinsaws to the agony of the jungle that died daily by the stroke of the ax.

I flew out to Mapiripan once, during the wet season of maybe 1974, on one of Alvaro Enao's DC3's. I remember we flew low and the terrain below was so green. The storm clouds roiled ominously in the distance and here and there dark sheets of rain fell from the sky. I can not remember which of the HK's it was, but I do remember there was a little plaque on the interior wall of the airplane that said it had been completely overhauled in 1954. So, it was the one that had been rebuilt in 1954, if none of the others had been rebuilt in the same year.

Alvaro Enao owned Aereolinas La Urraca, based out of el Aereopuerto de Vanguardia, near Don Tom's fattening ranch there at Santa Teresita on the road between Villavicencio and Restrepo. It serviced the greater llanos from Arauca to the north, out to Venezuela on the east and on down to Mitu, Miraflores and Leticia in the selva of the Transamozonica to the south. La Urraca means magpie in English and the logo of the airline painted somewhere on each of the aircrafts in the early 1970's was a cartoon of a black magpie. Later the planes were painted differently, but my personal favorite was always the little black cartoon magpie. The magpie was the signal of La Urraca's intent to steal airfreight and passengers from whoever whenever they could and remains legendary in the hearts of those who remember the sight of the DC3's proudly assembled on the earthen tarmac of Vanguardia, noses to the summer wind, heading dos, dos al Norte.

Sadly Cries the Plover

The Southern Lapwing is a member of the Plover family, a widspread resident of Central and South America. In the Eastern Colombian Llanos it is called "El Alcaravan." It is the constant and welcome companion of the Llanero as he tends to his cattle on the savanah, and seldom forgotten in his poetry, foklore, and music. He is..."el companero...El Alcaravan."

The Southern Lapwing

Vanellus chilensis (formerly Belonopterus cayennensis lampronotus) is a large wader. It is a common and widespread resident throughout Central and South America, except in the jungles of the Amazon and the Andes. This bird is particularly common in the basin of the River Plate. It is the national bird of Uraguay.

Discription
This lapwing is the only crested wader in South America. It is 31-33cm in length and weighs 300g. The upperparts are mainly brownish grey, with a bronze glossing on the shoulders. The head is particularly striking; mainly grey with a black forehead and throat patch extending onto the black breast. A white border separates the black of the face from the grey of the head and crest. The rest of the underparts are white, and the eye ring, legs and most of the bill are pink. It is equipped with red bony extensions under the wings (spurs), used to intimidate foes and fight birds of prey.

During its slow flapping flight, the Southern Lapwing shows a broad white wing bar separating the grey-brown of the back and wing coverts from the black flight feathers. The rump is white and the tail black.

The sexes are similar in plumage, but young birds are duller, with a shorter crest and browner face and breast. There are four geographical races of Southern Lapwing, differing mainly in the details of the black and white face pattern.

The call is a very loud and harsh keek-keek-keek.

Habitat and status

This is a Lapwing of lake and river banks or open grassland. It has benefited from the extension of the latter habitat through widespread cattle ranching.

Behaviour
Southern Lapwing breeds on grassland and sometimes ploughed fields, and has an aerobatic flapping display flight. It lays 2-3 olive brown eggs in a bare ground scrape. The nest and young are defended noisily and aggressively against all intruders.

When not breeding, this bird disperses into wetlands and seasonally flooded tropical grassland.
Its food is mainly insects and other small invertebrates, hunted by a run-and-wait technique, mainly at night. This gregarious species often feeds in flocks.
http://ibc.hbw.com/ibc/phtml/votacio.phtml?idVideo=1405&Vanellus_chilensis

Panorama of the Tribes of Colombia and Panama

Lomalinda

Southern Meta, Colombia

Instituto Linguistico Verano

In the mid 1960's the Wycliffe Bible Translators, also known as the Summer Linguistic Institute (Instituto Linguistico de Verano) built the little town seen above, on the outskirts of Puerto Lleras in the Ariari River Basin, as the base for an operation to establish a written language for native Colombian Indian tribes in the Llanos and Selva of the Orinoco River Basin of Colombia. Once each language could be written, it was the institute's objective to translate the Bible into each tribe's native tongue. The effort was highly respected by the Colombian government, which had no program to preserve the Indian native dialects at the time. However it caused a great deal of resentment among various profession disciplines, who felt the effort should be Colombian, and the town left the local inhabitants of Puerto Lleras very suspicious of the real intent of the gringo operation in their midst. I had the opportunity to visit the community on a number of occasions to visit Herb Russo, an animal husbandry major from Cal Poly Pomona University, in Southern California, whose job it was to assist the the Indians with food production. To my knowledge, Panorama of the Tribes of Colombia and Panama, was the only book published by the linguists of Lomalinda, describing the breath of their program, most likely for the faithful, who were the financiers of their program so far from home. I purchased the book on the international used book market and on the title page of my copy was stamped the name of the previous owner in green letters. It read, "Alliance Church, P.O. Box 61, Lilburn, Georgia, 30247". The book is a richly illustrated soft cover depicting the desert, mountain, plains and jungle Indians of Colombia that were the foundation of the Mestizo culture that evolve after the arrival of the Spaniards. Lomalinda disbanded in the early 1990's due to leftist guerilla activity in the southern Llanos and Selva of the Orinoco.

Panorama of the Tribes of Colombia and Panama
Edition 1: 186 pages

Panorama
Townsend Press
Lomalinda, Meta, Colombia
MMMDCC 1973
Field Adresss
Instituto Linguistico de Verano
Apartado Nacional 5787
Bogota, COlombia, South America
International Adress
Wycliffe Bible Translators, Inc.
P.O. Box 1960
Santa Ana, California, 92702 U.S.A.

The Young Llanero

W.H.G. Kingston
About “The Young Llanero”

The first edition of this book is dated 1877. The publisher was T. Nelson and Sons, Paternoster Row, London; Edin; NY The number of pages is 444.

General information
Kingston seems to be quite good at writing about South America. One wonders why he is so anti-Spanish, but as he was brought up living in Portugal this may have something to do with the matter.

We are taken on a tour round Venezuela (that’s the country on the north of South America, that has lots of oil, and whose main waterway is the Orinoco).

So there is a change of location from New Granada and Peru, but we have the same problems with Indians, Spanish troops, boa constrictors, and other flora and fauna. There are also the usual friendly priest and ditto doctor.

There were 44 engravings in the book, most of which are very nice indeed, and their quality can be seen in the pdf we have produced for the book.

About the Author
Kingston, William Henry Giles (1814-1880), English novelist, son of Lucy Henry Kingston, was born in London on the 28th of February 1814. Much of his youth was spent at Oporto, where his father was a merchant, but when he entered the business, he made his headquarters in London. He early wrote newspaper articles on Portuguese subjects. These were translated into Portuguese, and the author received a Portuguese order of knighthood and a pension for his services in the conclusion of the commercial treaty of 1842.

In 1844 his first book, The Circassian Chief, appeared, and in 1845 The Prime Minister, a Story of the Days of the Great Marquis of Pombal. The Lusitanian Sketches describe Kingston’s travels in Portugal.

In 1851 Peter the Whaler, his first book for boys, came out. These books proved so popular that Kingston retired from business, and devoted himself to the production of tales of adventure for boys. Within thirty years he wrote upwards of one hundred and thirty such books. He had a practical knowledge of seamanship, and his stories of the sea, full of thrilling adventures and hairbreadth escapes, exactly hit the taste of his boy readers.

Characteristic specimens of his work are The Three Midshipmen; The Three Lieutenants; The Three Commanders; and The Three Admirals. He also wrote popular accounts of famous travellers by land and sea, and translated some of the stories of Jules Verne.

In all philanthropic schemes Kingston took deep interest; he was the promoter of the mission to seamen; and he acted as secretary of a society for promoting an improved system of emigration. He was editor of the Colonist for a short time in 1844 and of the Colonial Magazine and East Indian Review from 1849 to 1851. He was a supporter of the volunteer movement in England from the first.

He died at Willesden on the 5th of August 1880.

Contents

Chapter I.

The home of my childhood in South America—My father’s history—Sent to school in England—Life at school—Summoned back to America—Voyage with my uncle to Jamaica—Sail for Venezuela—Chased by a Spanish man-of-war—Cross the bar of the Magdalena River—Driven on shore by a storm—Boat nearly wrecked—Our night encampment—Repair boat—A deer shot—Disturbed by Goahira indians—Flight—Pursued—Reach the port of Cervanos—Meet Tim Molloy—His delight at seeing us—Hospitably received by the Commandant, but very inhospitably by the mosquitoes.

French Photographic Double Page No 38

Double Page
Photos No. 38
Venezuela/
Gerard Sioen

by

Miguel Otero Silva

Gerard Sioen &

Naty Garcia Guadilla

Published 1986

48 Pages

ISSN: 0295-6810

Double Page,

24 Place Des Vosges

75003 Paris

Parilux Paper

Printed Switzerland

by Hertig

Inside the book the caption beneath this photograph reads: Llanero (gaucho from the Llanos) Orinoco Plain.

In the 1980's a stunning series of French Photographic Magazines appeared. Every issue contained the work of one internationally renowned photographer coverering a specific subject. They each contained 48 pages of the most amazing colour plates measuring 24cm x 32cm x 0.5cm and weighing 331 gm. Issue number 38 was the photographic work of Gerard Sioen taken in Venezuela. It included scenes of the Western Venezuelan Llanos. It begins, Venezuela, as well as a few other countries in South America (read Colombia) have inherited the fabulous legend of El Dorado: Eldorado, the golden land of a mythical Eden, a paradise of gold that the conquistadors thought was situated between the Orinoco and the Amazon Rivers.

La Violencia~ War Without End

Guadalupe Salcedo Prototype Liberal Guerillero

Time

Monday, Aug. 18, 1952

War Without End

"Death has become commonplace in Colombia," said a well-informed U.S. traveler returning from Bogota last week. "The words assassination and murder are bandied about with no more emotion than we talk of beans, butter & bread."

He was talking about the bloody, matter-of-fact, half-underground rural war that has raged for the past three years between Colombia's Liberals and Conservatives. The most cautious estimates of the men, women & children killed now run to 15,000; other estimates go as high as 20,000 or even 50,000.

In Mountain, In Plain. The struggle pits guerrillas of the out-of-power Liberal Party against the troops and military police of the Conservative government. On the map, the guerrillas hold a third of the country, but their third, the rolling, grassy eastern llanos, is thinly populated. In the llanos, 5,006 irregulars commonly ambush and cut down invading government troops and steal their arms. The guerrillas themselves are targets of futile bombing.

Fighting has been reported recently in other areas around Riosucio, Puerto Berrio, and near Cali, but most of rural, mountainous Colombia has felt such battling at one time or another since 1949. The cities have escaped because big army garrisons control them.

Inter-party warfare is not new to Colombia; in the 19th century her citizens fought some 70 civil wars, big & small. One of them cost 80,000 lives, another 100,000. Colombians fight because each and every person, with rare exception, is emotionally given over to party loyalty as much as to national loyalty. Citizens are born Liberal or Conservative.

From France, From Spain. Ideological distinctions, originally stemming from Liberal admiration of the French Revolution and from Conservative roots in monarchical Spain, have become blurred. The most frequently mentioned issue nowadays is religious: Liberals are mildly anticlerical (although Colombia is 99.5% Catholic); Conservatives warmly embrace the church and its hierarchy. There is no clean economic cleavage between the parties, but industrialists, labor, white-collar classes tend to be Liberals, while landholders, many farmers and most priests are Conservatives. Liberals, in the last contested election, polled 58% of the vote.

Elaborate attempts have been made by statesmen from both parties to strike a truce—but they could not control the countryside partisans. More recently the Catholic Church, bulwarked by an appeal from Pius XII and parades displaying great fervor for peace, tried to halt the war but failed. Now the only limitation on the ferocity of the struggle seems to be the amount of arms the guerrillas can smuggle over the border or seize from dead policemen

"Tiro Fijo" (Sure Shot) Last of the Bigtime Bandit Chieftains

Time Magazine
Friday, Jun. 26, 1964

The Backlands Violence Is Almost Ended

The orders read like the work of a bored general trying to inject a little life into a standard peacetime troop maneuver: the Colombian army and air force were to invade, conquer and hold the "Independent Republic of Marquetalia," a 1,400-sq.-mi. enemy enclave deep in the Andean highlands 170 miles southwest of Bogotá. But this war is real, and so is Marquetalia. Colombians know it as the stronghold of Pedro Antonio Marín, 34, alias "Tiro Fijo" (Sure Shot), last of the country's bigtime bandit chieftains.

Communist Country. By wiping out Tiro Fijo, Colombia would just about end the savage backlands violence that began in 1948 as a feud between the country's Liberals and Conservatives. But catching Sure Shot is no sure thing. Reared in poverty and squalor, he drifted into a Communist guerrilla band in the early 1950s. By 1960 he had his own gang, and moved his family and followers onto a 10,000-acre hacienda near the foot of snow-topped Mount Huila—after killing the hacienda's owner. From his new home Tiro Fijo began taking over all neighboring haciendas, establishing Communist cells throughout the area, indoctrinating peasants, levying a monthly head tax and collecting up to 30% of farmers' profits. His bandit gang numbered some 250 men; to the area's 6,000 population, he was the only law.

Busy with outbreaks of banditry elsewhere, the federal government let the remote coffee-growing land slip away by default. Marquetalia paid no taxes, and death awaited any police or military force rash enough to cross its borders. Last December Tiro Fijo and his men ambushed an army patrol, killing six soldiers. All told, the army credits him with 200 murders.

Two-Stage Assault. The army started planning Tiro Fijo's downfall months ago. Combat units were divided into small, tightly organized teams, given extensive training in anti-guerrilla warfare. To backstop the military campaign, new roads, schools and other civic-action projects were planned to draw the peasants closer to the government. The offensive began four weeks ago as units of five battalions—totaling 3,500 men—poured into Marquetalia.

Flitting through the thickly wooded mountainsides, Tiro Fijo's men fought half a dozen bitter skirmishes. But in the deadly game of hide-and-seek, the guerrilla-wise soldiers came out on top, pressed steadily on toward Tiro Fijo's hacienda headquarters. Early one morning last week, a fleet of helicopters airlifted 170 crack troops into position surrounding the hacienda. The desperate Communists opened fire from underbrush and foxholes. In the three-hour fight, they wounded only one soldier; finally Tiro Fijo put the hacienda to torch and retreated into the mountains. That night his men ambushed an army patrol, killing two soldiers; four nights later they killed four more.

But "Operation Marquetalia" was virtually complete. The yellow-blue-and-red Colombian flag now flew over the area for the first time in its history. Tiro Fijo himself was holed up with 50 to 80 men in a narrow canyon six miles from his old base, and at week's end two army pincer columns were closing in for the kill.