Francisco Villa Museum

The house once known as the Quinta, but know the Museum Located in Chihuahua, Mexico

The Francisco Villa Museum is dedicated to the life and times of Mexican Revolutionary Francisco "Pancho" Villa. This museum is in Parral, Chihuahua, Mexico, the city where Villa was killed. The museum is located in the exact place where the assassination took place.

History Behind the Museum

The house that is now known as the museum of Francisco "Pancho" Villa was constructed between 1905-1907. It is located in Chihuahua, Mexico on 3010, Colonia Santa Rosa. By June 1911 the house was acquired by General Francisco Villa but did not fulfil his needs. By the time Villa was governor of Chihuahua in early 1914, he began to remodel and enlarge the area making it a residence known as the Quinta Luz in honor of his wife, Luz Corral.

The works of the remodeled house was made possible by Santo Vega, Hilario Berumen, Manuel Portillio and Italian painter Mario Ferrer. It was remodeled into three sections: the Main house which is where Villa stayed, the back house and the Courtyard.

By 1915 the house became abandoned because the family of Villa took refuge in the United States. After five years, Villa's wife returned because of missing her homeland. She died in 1923 when the Centaurio del Norte was assassinated in Parral, Chihuahua.

In 1981, Luz Corral, who was ill and too advanced in age to maintain the house, made an offer to the Ministry that when she died the house would be donated to them provided that they turned it into a museum in honor of Villa. The Ministry of Defense accepted the offer but because of the poor state in which it was received many restorations had to be made by the National Institute of Anthropology and History.

The house re-opened on November 17, 1982 under the name of the Historical Museum of the Revolution. Within it, the office and music room were used to display the personal belongings of Villa. There are also photographs and other personal belongings of Villa's era. One exhibit is the car in which he was traveling with his escort on the day he was assassinated.

Within the Museum

Within the First floor of the Museum people can observe utensils and furniture that were commonly used by the Villa Corral family.

On the second floor of the museum people are able to observe five showrooms, but also on second floor people are able to go through the Hall of Arms where historical weapons Francisco Villa used in many combat mission while being part of the Northern Division. Some the weapons that are displayed are a variety of revolvers, rifles, machine guns, Calvary sabers, baskets and leather cases with brass as well as a photograph of Rafael Mendoza, a native of Maderas, Chihuahua , who during the Mexican Revolution Mexican invented the first machine gun air cooled 250 rounds per minute.

In one of the showcases known as the Room Tour Tragic people are able to witness the death of General Villa. Within the showcase there is a display that shows the map of the route General Villa took before his assassination, also on display are photographs and his death mask, taken three hours after his death.

Gallery

General Villa leading his guerilla and also a common portrait found within the Museum in Chihuahua, Mex.

The curator of the museum is Adolfo Carrasco Vargas.

See also

External links

"Pancho Villa, the Museum", New York Times

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 7/21/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.