I love reading tour books. It is, obviously, an armchair way of traveling and learning about other cultures, especially if the real thing is elusive. Overall, Paul Theroux is one of my favorite travel writers. But, whereas he is alive,
my really favorite ones have all passed away. They are favorites because the world about which they wrote is slipping away also.
A few years ago I started a collection of travel books about Mexico that were written mainly in the 30’s and 40’s and which are now out of print. These travel writers were adventurers. They came to Mexico when it was not a simple thing to do. Some took the train down from the United States but most drove down as this was the beginning of modern traveling and the car was the way to go. One of the first books to address this new type of touring was, Guide to Mexico for the Motorist, written and published by William Goolsby. Thinking about it I wonder how they did it…gas stations were few and far between, mechanics were not on every corner as they are now, and there was greater distance between towns. But Americans have always been eager to explore new horizons.
Most of the writers whose books I have do not address these practical issues. Rather, they concentrate on giving descriptions of Mexico: a Mexico of nostalgia and stereotypes. A Mexico in which the native was often presented as lazy, dirty, and prone to drunkenness but also as childlike and docile. Most accounts described how people dressed. Males were depicted wearing the typical white trousers and puffy blouses made out of manta, the ubiquitous straw sombrero, the machete hanging off their belt, and leather open toe sandals (huaraches). Women always wore long, colorful dresses, with a shawl tied around their waist at the ready in case the air turned chilly or wrapped around their head protecting the long loose hair that was let grow long. They, too, would have their feet slipped into a pair of leather sandals.
The cities were described in glowing terms; the climate was considered to be perfect; flowers bloomed all year round; streams flowed crisp and clean. This is, indeed, a bygone era. These books introduced to the reader a Mexico that beckoned, offering adventure and a different way of life just on the other side of the border. A journey, they assured, that would be tantalizing yet safe.

However, two books written by women several years earlier, present a totally different view of Mexico. These books were written during one of the many turbulent political times in Mexico, pre 1930, when a revolutionary war was being fought throughout the country. These are two fascinating autobiographies chronicling feats that even today would be considered astounding. The first book, Tempest Over Mexico was written by Rosa King who, as a recent widow, said this to herself as she was visiting in Cuernavaca: ”Here I shall bring my children and make my home, where all is peace and beauty, and nothing has ever changed or ever will.” Oh, how she came to see how un-prophetic these words were! Mexico was in store for great changes and Rosa was thrown into the middle of it all. However, before the Revolution started, she had opened a tearoom because as she observed: “At that time there was no place in Cuernavaca, or indeed Mexico City, where one might stop in the afternoon for a cup of tea and a pleasant chat.” Her tearoom was so successful that within five years she had purchased the whole building and remodeled it into a lovely and popular hotel which eventually became the headquarters for the Revolutionary forces stationed in Cuernavaca. She found herself living in the eye of the storm. This account takes us with her as she flees to protect herself, as one refugee among many, on a journey that very nearly ended in her death.

The other woman whose life did end in death was Rosalie Evans. She was born in Texas but lived with her parents in Puebla, Mexico where she met her future husband, an Englishman, whom she married in 1898. They eventually purchased a 300 year old hacienda, San Pedro Coxtocan, with 2000 acres of fertile wheat growing land. The revolution hit in 1910 and they abandoned the hacienda to go live in Mexico City where it was considered to be safer. From there they left the country. Her husband returned in 1917 but died shortly thereafter. When she decided to return to manage the hacienda herself her story unfolds in letters she writes to her sister in the States.
Her return proved eventually to be a fatal mistake. She was a feisty and headstrong woman who fought for 6 years to save her holdings against all odds. Her diary chronicles her pleadings with the president not to confiscate the land, her confrontations on horseback, pistol drawn, with workers in the fields, her train rides to Mexico City as the lone woman on troop transports, the common sight of seeing men hanging by their necks from trees as the train passed through what was, otherwise, picturesque countryside. She simply refused to budge, even after rebels ransacked and torched the hacienda's buildings, and paid no heed to friends who urged her to cut her losses and surrender her hacienda. In the end, however, she died in her carriage as a volley of bullets hit her buggy on a country road.

By any standards and in any era these were courageous, albeit fool-hearty, women who led fascinating lives.
These accounts make me smile when I hear from friends about how brave I must be to live alone in Mexico today!
It only takes opening a book to transport us to a different time and reality and to bring perspective to our own lives. I treasure these books for what they give me and encourage you to take a step into the past as you turn the pages of words written decades ago.