size=2>-----Original Message-----
From: ranchos@...om
[mailto:ranchos@yahoogroups.com]On Behalf Of Margarita
Vallazza
Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2006 9:03 AM
To:
ranchos@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [ranchos] Mexico Trip Report
Part I

Oh, how wonderful this report is! Thank you for
sharing this! We need to keep this in our rancho archives!!!! I'm willing to
send a small donation for republication of Mr. Valdes Salazar's work to keep
it alive for us, despite my not having any connection with Totatiche. Why not
have him look into the Lulu publications that Joseph, our fearless leader,
told us about in one of his messages. It would save Mr. Valdes lots of moola!
Marge:)

On Jan 5, 2006, at 10:50 AM, Arturo Ramos wrote:

I just got back from two and a half weeks in
Mexico.

Though I did not spend them in "working" on
genealogy or historical
research, as I did have the need to
spend time with my family and
decompress at the beach for some
days, I did get a fair amount of
work done.

I
arrived in Guadalajara, Jalisco on Dec. 17.  I met up with my

brothers and my younger brother's Japanese host-mother to
celebrate
our birthdays in Tlaquepaque with mariachis.  The
singer had lived in
Japan for three years and sang to my
brother's Japanese host mother
in Japanese.

The
next day I attempted to visit the Archivos Publicos del Estado
de
Jalisco.  They were closed early because of staff
shortages due to
the holidays.

I headed to
Villa Guerrero, Jalisco on Dec. 19 (where my parents have
now
built a beautiful house on the edge of town where they plan to

live half-time).  The next day, we travelled to Bolanos (a
mining
town dating to circa 1550) at the bottom of the canyon by
the same
name.  The town is is serious disrepair as the
mines have been shut
down for some time and there is no other
real source of economic
sustenance.  There are remnants of
beautiful buildings throughout,
however.

From
there, we headed over the Sierra de los Huicholes to Tuxpan de

Bolanos (an indigenous wixarika village three hours by dirt
road from
Bolanos) where we explored a very poor settlement
that now has
phones, electricity and running water.  The
locals were very shy, but
we managed to speak to a woman who
spoke Spanish who introduced us to
some handcraft makers. 
Noticeably, there is no church in the town,
as I understand is
the case in most wixarika towns.

The next day, my father,
Esteban Valdes (cronista of Totatiche,
Jalisco) and Leonardo de
la Torre Berumen (municipal archivist of
Jerez, Zacatecas)
headed to Colotlan to attempt to see and photograph
the records
of the old Franciscan Convent that was founded there in
1591
and served as the primary base for the missionaries in the

area.  We waited over an hour for the priest to show up
and then he
called in to say he would not be coming in that day
and that we would
not be allowed to see the records... for no
good reason.  I had been
forwarned that he was not the
friendliest of people.  It was a real
shame because many
of the records have not been filmed.

I spoke at length with
both of the gentlemen and confirmed suspicions
that I had a
lineage that led to the sister of Miguel Caldera, one of
the
first mestizo officials of the viceroyal government and Justicia

Mayor del Valle de Jerez y Tlaltenango.  I also found out
that my
mother's lineage (PINEDO) was one of the first in
Jerez, dates back
to the 1580s or 90s in the area and also
leads to Miguel Caldera. 
There are many records in Jerez
that were not filmed by the Mormons
because they were not bound
and/or were in disrepair including
several decades of marriages
and all of the confirmation records.  In
addition there
are will/testament and protocol records to which Mr.
de la
Torre has access.  Thus the genealogical information in Jerez

exists to trace families back to settlement in the late
1500s.

I interviewed Esteban Valdes Salazar, who spoke about
the work of
Cronistas and the lack of support for it from
government agencies. 
He is currently trying to publish a
new edition of his "Historia de
Totatiche" which is a very well
researched and written book that was
purchased by many U.S.
libraries and whose first edition has sold
out.  The State
of Jalisco who published the first edition is not
helping him
so he is trying to raise money to do so himself.  He also

has several other genealogical manuscripts on the PINEDO,
GARCIA and
ORTEGA lineages which he would like to
publish.  He is a prolific
researcher and writer.  I
will be forwarding my interview to Joseph
for posting on his
site.

I told him I would approach the group about obtaining
some sort of
support for him, so if anybody is interested in
helping out,
especially those of you with Totatiche or Colotlan
lineages, please
let me know.

I also visited
the asilo (convalescence home) in Tlaltenango, where I
went to
deliver some items for Helyn Sparkman-Castaneda.  The

intended recipient of one of the items (a renowned local
scholar and
historian) had passed away, but my father and I
spoke at length with
the home director who gave us great
insight on his life and work. 
Helyn had informed me that
he had a great collection of historical
manuscripts and
books.  These have been donated by his survirors to
the
Universidad de Zacatecas in the city of Zacatecas.

In my
father's town I interviewed a great-uncle of mine who is 83

years old and has been keeping diaries of deaths, historical
events,
etc. in the town for decades.  He also had an
incredible amount of
oral history about the family (PINEDO) and
local history dating back
to the Mexican Revolution.  I
knew that the family came from Jerez,
Zacatecas but asked him
if he knew and he did, even though the
migration happened in
1730...  When I showed him the genealogies I
had compiled,
light bulbs went off when he read names of people who
lived in
the 1820s and 1830s, whose names he remembered from family

histories told to him by his grandfather.

I
have four hours of recordings from my meetings with him which I

plan to transcribe.

I also have pictures and
will try to post these when I get a
chance.






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