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Chronicle of a clandestine dance 1

Chronicle of a clandestine dance

Milada Bazant*

97

2005

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* Email:mbazant@cmq.edu.mx
Milada Bazant 2

Summary

This research paper tells the story of a dance that made an era because it
was a party for homosexuals in which Porfirio Díaz's son-in-law was
involved: Ignacio de la Torre y Mier. In addition to the devastating account
of the press, this paper analyzes what was thought and what was known
about homosexuality during the Porfiriato.

Keywords: homosexuality, disease, madhouse, taboo, forty-one,

Porfiriato.
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
AND
n this work* the story of a fleeting, daring,
crazy episode of a “fantasy dance” (The
popular, November 25, 1901) in which 42
characters took part. Men? Women? No, it is about
some "scoundrels", "disgusting" and "depraved
fagots" who planned in advance the unusual and
daring meeting that surprised and disgusted public
opinion and alarmed more than one character. The
evening would not have had the importance it had
had it not been involved, among other famous
protagonists, the billionaire Ignacio de la Torre y
Mier, the son-in-law of the president of the
republic, married to Don Porfirio's spoiled
daughter, Amada (Tello Díaz , 1993: 42). Perhaps
she was the most beloved daughter because she
was a natural child, the only one of many others
that General Díaz had who shared the roof with
him and his family. The news fell like a bucket of
cold water on the president who, before the
amazing event, He only had time to save the name
of the uncomfortable relative, that is, there were 41
left. Since then, this number has been sealed in the
history of Mexico as a synonym for homosexual. In
addition to the dance, the costumes and the
unusual raffle that was held in the clandestine
bosom of the "sarao", what is behind the show
business of the 41? Carlos Monsiváis affirms that
on that day homosexuality was "invented" in
* I would like to thank you for the support you gave me in this in-
Investigation three people: Ricardo Orozco Ríos, General Director of
the Center for Historical Studies of the Porfiriato, Maribel Castillo and
Enrique Esqueda.
3
Mexico because "somehow [after that party,
homosexuals] no longer feel alone." In
addition to recounting the event as observed
and felt by some journalists, in this work I will
try to delve into the way in which homosexuals
were treated and what was thought about
them.1
LTHE IMAGINATION FLIES
On Sunday night, November 17, 1901, various
characters who clearly wore clothing suitable for
a great party arrived in distinguished carriages.
They were, apparently, well-known "chickens" or
"lizards" from Plateros street, today Madero
avenue, where, in addition to the cream of
Porfirio society, those "Pepitos" who did not
have to occupy themselves and used to walk.
"They were going to cap the cup and pimp
seamstresses" (The popular, November 24,
1901). According to a contemporary, the lizards
were "idle fellows who knew nothing but
spending the money their parents had earned"
and were about to lose their job.
1Due to the reorganization process of some documentary groups
of the Historical Archive of the Federal District, it was not necessary to
consult the files related to the night of November 18, especially
regarding the official documents that the district governor, Guillermo
de Landa y Escandón, surely issued. . For the same reason, it was not
possible for me to consult the Porfirio Díaz Collection at the
Universidad Iberoamericana. The word homosexual had already been
coined by this time, but it was not used. Throughout the text I use the
terminology that was used at that time.
Milada Bazant
time in Plateros and San Francisco. In 1898, the
district governor ordered the police to carry out
a second raid "against that human plague..." The
gendarmes had the order to "clear the sidewalks
of all those more or less elegant bums." (Arenas
Guzmán, 1966: 228). The intellectuals, in general,
despised these "lazy" and "criminals" and
applauded the governor's measure. (See, for
example, Laura Méndez de Cuenca,The Impartial
, February 3, 1907). The appointment for the
party was at the house number 4 on Calle de la
Paz, today Jesús Carranza, which was empty and
was rented especially for that occasion, where, in
addition to the dance, there was supposed to be
a christening of a doll? ? Or the raffle of a
handsome flesh and blood young man? This
detail alone gave excitement and excitement to
the new meeting. Half of that audience was
dressed as a woman and according to the news
released by The popularOn the 20th, "they wore
wigs, false breasts, earrings, embroidered corn,
and large circles under their eyes and colored
plates were painted on their faces." The other
half dressed as men: he wore “magnificent coats,
as well as hats and overalls with glacé corn,
Russia and fine patent leather” (The country,
November 23, 1901).
Apparently, on that evening there was a
lady who was in charge of taking care of the
"chickens" and also, apparently, she was the
commissioner to serve the food, the
champagne and the cognac, attend to the
musicians and, even more importantly, keep
an eye on if a gendarme passed by on the
street. The pantomime of the baptism, reason
enough to laugh out loud, was incredible, in
one piece: "within a cloud of curtains, there
was a very perfumed and slatted bed, on
which a child was crying... from haberdashery"
who was going to be baptized father and
mother, godfather and godmother, with all
their guests. The bolo of the celebration
consisted of a raffle for a "Pepito... with a curly
mustache like those that romantic girls like."
They were in the "mere mere of the fandango"
when the gendarmes arrived, at dawn on the
18th,
4
entertaining “dancing to the out-of-step sound
of a neighborhood murga…” (The popular,
November 20 and 24, 1901). The policeman who
later testified at the police station said that a
man "dressed as a woman, with his skirt up, his
face and lips full of shaven and very sweet and
finicky-spoken" opened the door, and then he
wanted to "undertake her." sticks and slaps with
those rascals…” (The universal,November 19,
1901).Homelandmentioned: “they did not wear a
dirty underpants under their skirts. It was
noticed that there were effeminates of all
kinds” (Homeland,November 21, 1901).
The first newspapers to publish the news,
on the 19th, wereThe TribuneandThe universal;
later, the "reporters" of other newspapers were
unleashed with articles that ranged from humor
and the most exquisite and mocking wit to the
most overwhelming censorship. The best-known
publication to date is the famousThe Street
Gazette, where Guadalupe Posada caricatured
the dance in two engravings and Vanegas Arroyo
ridiculed it with the corrido subtitled: "Here are
the fagots, very cool and flirtatious..."
A few days ago, on Calle The other half in their suit,
de la Paz, the gendarmes that is to say, masculine,
glimpsed a great singular enjoyed shaking hands
dance. Forty-one half To the famous jotitos Satin
disguised lizards and silk dresses To the last
costume
Of nice girls They danced With well-groomed wigs
like the most. And moving with chic.
(Monsiváis, 2001)
The newspaper articles kept the humorous
and immoral aspects but no one, as far as I
was able to carry out my investigations, delved
into the meaning of that unforgettable party.
Surely Don Porfirio silenced the press,
although once the news broke he could only
slow it down to a point. Of course, the name of
Ignacio de la Torre or some other memorable
character does not appear anywhere, despite
the journalists recording the fact that the
audience was "fat chickens, some rich... and
others... raised in blue diapers."He
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
Impartial,publication that lived thanks to the
official subsidy, denied what was already in the
public domain and began by stating that "there
are those who assure that among the individuals
apprehended there were capitalists and other
people of high position belonging to very
distinguished families", to later clarify that " The
truth is that in the aforementioned meeting,
excessively immoral and scandalous, there was
only a group of more than forty men, well known
for their depraved customs” (The Impartial,
November 23, 1901). With the title "A disgusting
sore",The universalcondemned: the sore was
made up of "professionals, employees, rich,
priests!" (The universal, November 23, 1901.)
Although the names were not provided, well, the
false ones were revealed, the journalists
affirmed that they were characters of the upper
class.
How did you find out, in detail, what
happened at the party? With singular ingenuity,
a writer ofThe popular, heRed Devil, built, on the
24th, the story of the events, in literary form, in a
satirical style, with dialogues. It took him three
or four days to find out what had happened and
he wrote a humorous article, in the form of a
dialogue between two wives, entitledThe dance
of the 41. The baptism of a rorro and the raffle of
a Pepito. An old woman among the chickens.
Little Curly Whiskers, "Look at me, I'm going
marching!"
Homelandbaptized the event with the name
ofthe forty one: "Forty-one guys and one old
woman at a dance where the men had fun
dressed nineteen of them in women's suits."
Wasn't it 42 and the "old" one? No, no
newspaper committed itself to number 42. The
commissioner, Miguel Palacios, determined that
the dancers be sent to the 24th battalion
headquarters, second depot for army
replacements, where they were immediately
shaved and dressed in "the coarse but honorable
garments of clothing given to recruits. With tears
in their eyes, they were stripping off all their
clothes, begging some to leave them even their
fine silk undergarments, to which the captain
opposed, because he told them that
5
there they were equal to the others”(The country,
November 23, 1901).The popularandHomeland
They mentioned that the men's clothing was sent
to the 24th Battalion headquarters and the
women's clothing to the Montada headquarters. As
part of the initial punishment they were made to
sweep the street “with their chinitos over their
foreheads, their flowing skirts and their brand new
corn, sweeping the street with crude brooms and
covering their palms with their fans or perfumed
handkerchiefs when they saw a friend. The
acquaintances, upon seeing them, began to run
like the devil takes their souls, fearing that the
elegant skaters would speak to them” (The popular,
November 25, 1901). The soldiers shouted at them:
“Where are you going with that Manila shawl?” (The
country, November 22, 1901). When the "reporters"
approached Colonel Villegas and Governor
Guillermo de Landa y Escandón to ask them to give
them the list of those involved, they replied that it
was a "delicate matter, very reserved..." And this
was the ingenious dialogue that the Red Devil
transcribed fromThe popular:
– Allow me to interview you…
– They are incommunicado.
– Well, let me photograph them. Here I bring
my instant camera.
– Everyone has tied up their faces.
– Well, even give me your address…
give me something! Everyone wants
to meet them, to know who these
famous dancers are!
– Man, don't grind! You can't, there are
notable people among them.
– Very bad note, poodle!
– Well, for that very reason.
– I ask you on my knees! See me
crying!...
And the reporters angrily tore their
license and break their pencils. One of
them tried to commit suicide with his
penknife and they gave him a shower
bath... People make tongues and a
thousand wild assumptions.
– Is it one of the forty-one dancers that
one could see in Plateros with a collar like
a shirt cuff, with a cascading hairstyle?
Milada Bazant
Taña, with the pants more stilts than
the other lizards?
– Is it the number, others ask, the one who goes
out on the balcony in the afternoons across the
street, very curly with his gardenia in his
buttonhole?
– Is it the one who walks every night with
his cape like don Juan, through the Zócalo
and the theaters?
– Could it be from the choreographic body of Paz
Fulanito who wears a corset and little panties on her
forehead, who dresses like a costume and doesn't
know what she lives on or who supports her?
– Could it be Mengano, who stood up the
girlfriend? She will be…
And plenty of people say:
I know one of them: his name is...
- It's possible??????...
And so they don't say that I'm a friend of
the gossip… full stop.
(Red Devil,The popular, November
25, 1901).
Some newspapers promised to "publish all the
details related to this scandalous matter, as
well as say frankly, who are the people,
because it is time to prevent such indecent
scenes from being repeated..." (Homelandand
The popular, November 23, 1901). On the
23rd,The popularHe released the list of the 41
“fresh” but immediately stated that the
majority had been “impersonated”. Only three
were named: Jesús Solórzano, Jacinto Luna
and Carlos Zozaya. Of the false names that
were given, there was confusion with some of
them because they were "homonyms" of well-
known characters, who wrote toThe country
clarifying the situation. For example, Mr. Ángel
Herrera explained that he was a partner in the
mercantile company; that he had his office on
Calle de Jesús, nº 16, and that, therefore, it
was not the Ángel Herrera who “appeared in
the disgusting men-only dance”. The relative
of another, Salvador Solórzano, wrote to the
director of the aforementioned newspaper
Trinidad Sánchez Santos: "I urge you, kindly,
to record that the name of Jesús Solórzano
who appears among those who attended
6
to a certain scandalous dance is not Mr. Jesús
Solórzano y Pliego; Well, regardless of not being
in this city, he would be unable to attend a
meeting of that kind ”(The country,November 23,
1901). In addition to the fact that the real names
never appeared, only 12 of the 41 were
punished, despite the fact that the newspapers
affirmed that the governor of the Federal
District, Guillermo de Landa y Escandón, had
been inflexible in the face of the demands of the
relatives of the notorious inmatesThe country
applauded the official's attitude: "That is
democracy: the equality of those responsible
before the law." However, in the same editorial
he stated that "two or three who occupy a good
position will be fined heavily" (The country,
November 21 and 23, 1901).
The authorities ordered that these 12
“dancers”, who were accompanied by a group
of 7 “piens”, were taken to Yucatán to cover
the casualties that the army of that peninsula
was having due to illness, in which they were
managing to submit to order. to the Mayan
Indians. But the press affirmed that the
prisoners did not have the necessary skills to
face the enemy:
The Army cannot receive in its ranks
individuals who have abdicated their sex,
the Nation must not honor with the chaco
or those who have degraded themselves
with the use of rouge and the dresses of
prostitutes, nor those who served as
couple (The Son of the Ahuizote, November
24, 1901).
Therefore, the dancers were assigned, as was
customary, to the construction of public works.
The relatives of four of the prisoners were
not satisfied with the punishment and took
refuge: Juan Sandoval's brother argued that the
victim had been invited to an "exotic
entertainment, to a costume ball, both in
clothing and in physiognomic features ”. The
wife of another begged for mercy, but it was all
to no avail: the law is the law, and they were all
“eliminated from the capital” (The country,
November 23, 1901).
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
When, at half past five in the morning, the
apprehended departed by train for Veracruz, the
usual list was passed and number 13, upon hearing
his name, replied: "Present, my captain, but I make
it clear that I am consigned as a thief." ; but I'm not
one of those, and he pointed to the group of
dancers. This provoked the laughter of those who
were present, because neither the thief wanted to
be confused with theperjume us, as they say to the
soldiers in the barracks” (The country, November
23, 1901). The singular group “was a pity,
lamenting their love of dancing and other
things…” (The Motherland of Mexico, November 23,
1901). The ingenious Red Devil ofThe popularhe
pointed out “…as the train left they sang in the
voice of a treble, cooing and giving the chest:
Look at me, marching I go
With my chaco to Yucatan
For being in a convoy
Dancing Jota and Can-can
Well, there they will dance more often” (
The popular, November 24, 1901).
After leaving for Yucatan, the always perceptive
Red Devil wrote a diary and some letters, both
apocryphal, that recount the misadventures of
those unfortunates. "Our special envoy", begins
by saying the editorialist ofThe popular,“
commissioned to give us an account of the travel
impressions of the unfortunate ladies of the
hybrid dance on Calle de la Paz, he has been
able, with great skill, to seize a copy of the Travel
diary of the forty-one, who have achieved the
celebrity of theThree Musketeers” (The popular,
November 29, 1901). I transmit what happened
on Monday:
Without considering our sex and the
interesting state of several young ladies,
who are victims of masculine barbarity,
they put us, balled up, in a third-class car
of the Mexican railroad, scrambling with
those meco soldiers who, from time to
time, insulted our modesty with very
dirty swear words.
Sofío fainted a few times, due to the fact
that the train made him dizzy.
7
Beatrizito complained that the seat was
very hard, because it was made of pure wood,
and it hurt the most charming section of his
personality.
Herlindo was asking for pulque and they gave
him…a kick in the back room.
Pepita began to miscarry… bad words;
but we covered her little mouth, saying:
– Shut up sweetheart, for the love of God,
because these leperotes are going to
continue treating us worse than if we were
clandestine (The popular, November 29,
1901).
An episode from Thursday:
Accustomed to perfumes, to small
children, to a feather mattress, we
suffered an atrocity. If the very men
wrinkle with dizziness, what must we
not have suffered, poorcute?
The bad thing is that this voyage will last three
days, from here to Progreso and we don't know
what those sailors will dare, knowing that we are
women and alone and with the certainty that we
do not have a mother.
In the midst of this solitude we could
entertain ourselves by playingpee and win,
to the mummy,to thebread and cheese;
but we just rolled over each other, showing
our legs and finding no comfortable place.
Damn peace dance that has given us so
much war!
And cursed are the men who thus
abandon poor girls in the middle of the
sea and subject to shipwreck! (The
popular, November 29, 1901).
Respecting the original "spelling", I transcribe
below one of the letters from the "Mimis, victims
of free love like Manon and Desgrieux". Taken
from the romance novelManon Lescaut, by
Antoine François Prevost l'Abée Prévost. tells the
love story between teenagers Manon Lescaut, a
sensitive and delicate young lady, and the
Chevalier des Grieux, a well-bred scoundrel. It is
considered as the "love bible" among the youth.
(Mar Orlan, 1959).
Milada Bazant
mea golden luiz
Pray if there is no remedy! They carry me
like a murderer, and you see that my white
hands have never been stained with blood.
I think that once this is done, let's not get
together again. Have courage and do not
go to commit suicide with a suicide that
kills me. Try to send me my peek-a-boo
panties and lace that I left on the dresser.
Take good care of my little bird.
bye. I have no courage to write to you
anymore. you wretch
lolito(The popular, 1st. December
1901).
Once the "exodus of the amphibians from Calle
de la Paz" was over, when they stepped on land
on the beach of Progreso, "the best escaped of
the Mariquitos could only walk on all fours."
Most of them were supported between two
soldiers and the "little chinos on their foreheads
had caked together until they became
carlangas." With sweat, “the rouge was mixed
with Juvencio Water and the coal dust from the
ship's engine and they all had mottled faces and
looked like Huehuenches or Lipan Indians.
Goodbye irresistible beauty! At night they were
bothered more by "the Juanes than the bedbugs,
with their chatter and words with double
meanings." In order to “lull them to sleep”, the
following was sung to them:
Ladybug, take away, take
away Take away pain and
grief Under a little shadow A
Good Night is spent.
According to the information obtained by the Red
Devil, the routine of the dancers in Progreso was as
follows: some dedicated themselves to lighting the
fire, others to scrubbing pots and chop onions, and
still others to sweeping the bedrooms. "What a pity
for a 'lady' who was used to having the maid do
everything for her!" But that was "eternal glory,"
the columnist continued with his customary
satirical humor, because when the day came when
they were going to "dismantle trees,
8
bowls and build fortifications in Chan Santa
Cruz”, then “the pouting and the puckering of
little noses were going to increase and, in a short
time, the forty-one flechadores are going to look
like sucked-up huauzontles” (The popular,
December 3, 1901).
ANDTHE DESTINATION OF42
What really happened to the “bailadores” in
Progreso? You really don't know. Rumor has it
in Chetumal that some of the best families
today are descendants of that contingent...
(one would have to investigate in the local
archives... Ayala Anguiano says that the group
went to Chetumal: 1991: 19).
As for those who stayed in Mexico City,
they continued "wearing their beautiful
figures everywhere" as if nothing had
happened (The Son of the Ahizote, December
1, 1901). They maintained the habit of
frequenting public baths, especially the
famous, recently remodeled Turkish baths of
the Gran Alberca Pane, located on Paseo de la
Reforma (Macías González, 2001). It was
already a tradition that the bathrooms were
centers of "flirt"; (Gruzinski, 1985) and they
continued to be. (Novo, 2002), known, even by
the authorities, as “flirt” centers for
homosexuals. But they also continued to live
in hiding, persecuted and socially disowned,
and feeling themselves "abnormal", as
Salvador Novo testifies (Novo, 2002: 79), -Novo
experienced the awakening of his sexuality a
decade later, but his Comments are valid for
this time as nothing had changed.
The fate of the main protagonist was the
following: as was obvious, the scandal of the 41
chilled even more De la Torre's relations with
President Díaz, which were already "visibly strained
and ceremonious." De la Torre "loved the freedom
and independence of his person to the point of
confronting his father-in-law on various
occasions" (Tablada, 1991: 211), who maintained
the custom of watching him, wherever he went. For
example, while in Paris in 1889, Díaz
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
he wrote to consul Alejandro Corney "I
suppose you will already have in your
possession the information you wanted
regarding Ignacio de la Torre y Mier." (Barceló
Quintal, 1999: 408). Although his
homosexuality was an open secret, the
appearances of his stable marriage with
Amada always endured. Despite everything,
Amada loved him, I think, because she
supported him to the end, a long and tragic
end, the product of her excesses? With the
advent of the revolution, he was apprehended
by Venustiano Carranza on the charge of
having supported the Huerta dictatorship. The
arrest report did not mention his ties to the
murder of Madero (Tello Díaz, 1993: 147),
despite the evidence that the car in which the
hero was murdered had been rented by De la
Torre –an employee of De la Torre, Francisco
Alanís, received orders from him,Governorate
Memory, 1933, T.I,: 25). In the Lecumberri
prison, Amada visited him every day, as Martín
Luis Guzmán transcribed it: “…Ten years
before I saw her arrive dressed in maroon
velvet, covered in rubies, to a lavish dance at
the School of Mining; now she was walking
alone, dressed in black, through the
courtyards and sinister corridors of a prison.
But it is certain that today it was not less nor
worth less than before. Her beautiful Indian
face, partially hidden by her simple, elegant
hat, showed no traces of pain or sadness: only
a calm, conscious, melancholic dignity so
affirmative that something of her remained in
the air and in all things. …” (Guzmán, 1995:
302). Luis Guzmán, being a Villista, was also in
jail. With great naivety, de la Torre thought
that Zapata's triumph would guarantee his
freedom. Without a doubt, his perception of
the events of the past –in relation to his
unique bond with Zapata– had been very
different from the one he had. Around 1907,
because of his rebellion, Zapata was taken
from the levy to be integrated into the army,
"made from recruits for political reasons and
officers without military nerve" (Sotelo Inclán,
1991: 174). Of the tower,
9
Owner of the most productive hacienda in the
state of Morelos, Tenextepango, he knew that
Zapata's knowledge of horses was excellent
and, being the owner of one of the best
horses in Mexico City, he convinced his father-
in-law to let Zapata leave. the ranks of the
army and went, as a knight, to his mansion in
Mexico City: El Caballito –which was a beautiful
small palace located in Plaza de la Reforma,
no. 1, today the National Lottery, in front of
the statue of Carlos IV sculpted by Manuel
Tolsá– (Womack, 1970: 306). In his book on
Zapata, Ayala Anguiano affirms that Zapata
was bisexual and, between the lines, he
affirms that this was one of the reasons why
he worked as a horseman for De la Torre
(Ayala Anguiano, 1991:18). On the other hand,
in his famous work on Zapata, Womack refers
to the homosexuality of the Zapatista hosts
when pointing out that Manuel Palafox, "due
to having doubts about his own sex, had
behaved indiscreetly and become an object of
scorn at the headquarters." After having
worked six months with De la Torre, after the
Centennial Fiestas, Zapata returned to his
land, "resentful... and commented... that the
horses in Mexico City lived better than the
peasants of the state of Morelos." . When
Zapata arrived in the capital in December
1914, he released De la Torre de Lecumberri
to… vex him, from jail to jail, in the state of
Morelos. In one of the cells of the Cortés
palace, he found out that the revolutionaries
had seized all his property. He managed to
escape at the end of 1917, already very ill due,
according to Amada, "to the result of the
treatment that the Zapatistas gave him
throughout his captivity." He finally arrived in
New York, where he died on April 1, 1918
while undergoing surgery on the sphincter
veins (Tello Díaz, 1993: 215). Undoubtedly, fate
was relentless with the main protagonist of
the party of 41.
Milada Bazant 10

TOANALYSIS OF THE FACTS: whatTOWHERE ARE WE GOING TO other ministers, but the newspaper review focused
on the extravagance of the clothing of some
STOP?
attendees: "Luis Escalante...according to the
general opinion, he was the one who wore the
The condemnation of the press to the party of
most original transvestite that consisted of an
41 was unanimous. The 41 or 42 were the talk
attire in which half was "indio pollero ” and the
of all; the fashionable restaurant,
other half of very correct etiquette; Santiago Morfi,
Chapultepec, at the foot of the castle, with its
as a dancer; Agustín Torres from “bonne d'enfants”,
exquisite terrace where diners admired the
F. Algara from “demoiselle de compagnie”… I
thousand-year-old ahuehuetes (Barceló
describe those dressed as transvestites but there
Quintal, 1999: 336), was teeming with people
were many other spectacular ones: “Ms. Bárbara
from thehigh lifegossiping about the 41 (Red
Bidet de Martínez del Río wore an original
Devil,The popular,November 25, 1901), but no
“América” suit, perfectly symbolism and made of
one else wrote on the matter. Actually, what
tissue paper…Juanita Torres Rivas wore mignon
could be said beyond what the newspapers
and a funny “blue baby” costume. The Miss. María
disapproved of? It was not new that Ignacio de
Escandón also wore a rorro… a “Seville street that
la Torre organized "faggot" parties: the group
would have driven the painter Goya and the farce
met sporadically in different places in Mexico
artist Ramón Cruz crazy; a lady from Trianon in
City and members of renowned families such
whose splendid grace the pupils of Watteau and
as Antonio Adalid and Alejandro Redo de la
Baucher would have fixed with delight; an Adriana
Vega attended (Tello Díaz, 1993 : 127-128). Nor
Slang that not even Offenbach himself dreamed
was it new for men to dress as women. There
of…etc.etc.”(The universal, September 7, 1894).
was a certain tradition in the carnival season,
in which men dressed as women and vice
One more detail: the raffle for a “Pepito”, I
versa (see the work of Verónica Zárate
would think that it would have been the most
Toscano,From rejoicing to penance or from
spectacular detail of that unique party; however, in
Carnival to Lent in Mexico City in the 18th
the memoirs of Salvador Novo, the pillar of salt,
centuryXIX). At costume balls, popular
where, in my opinion, she bravely bares her soul,
throughout the year among the Porfirian elite,
she narrates the clandestine parties organized by
men sometimes dressed as women. Disguise
Antonio Adalid where there was also a lady
as an element of amusement was common;
"procuress" (the same "old woman" from the party
the elite were transported, with their attire, to
of 41 who supplied "Pepito"?) who He sought the
times of the past: to the Middle Ages, to the
assistance of youngsters and where, also, was
Roman Age or they simply simulated a fairy
there a raffle? Was it sold to the most handsome?:
tale (Barceló Quintal, 1999: 347). For example,
under the titleA singular drag dance of the Toña la Mamonera [Antonio Adalid] was the soul
Governor of the District. Decoration and of those parties… One night Toña came down
costumes. the concurrence,the newspaperThe the grand staircase wearing a sumptuous
universalreviewed the "true mundane event ballerina dress. The crowd applauded her grand
that has set the cream of our society in motion entrance; but at the bottom of the stairs, the
for many days... that heterogeneous mixture mute reproach of two eyes froze him, stopped
of the luxurious and the ridiculous, of the him. He seemed to apostrophize it. Ridiculous

funny and the surprising, was a legitimate
reason to drive the less curious." The
president and
old man! Toña went back up, went to take off her
disguise, went down to look for the handsome
boy who had rebuked her in silence. At that
moment he put the auction to the highest bidder
the possession of that young man. Anthony
bought it.
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
His name was also Anthony. He
was not quite twenty years old.
Whether at the famous dance of the 41s, or at
another, the scandal broke out. Don José
Adalid disinherited this degenerate son, a
stain on the family who fled bewildered,
stunned, invalid... (Novo, 2002: 109). Novo did
not live this particular party, since he was
born in 1904. It is possible, he affirms, that
the "old woman", the "procuress" was the
Madre Meza that he knew, the one "who
never went to bed with the merchandise she
procured for her buyers, refined survivors of
the porfirismo”.
Specifically, in light of its time, the
organizational details of the 41 ball were not
so original or so unique. On the other hand, it
was a matter of scandal that a dance of rich
“jotos” came to light in which, in addition, the
president's son-in-law was involved. However,
beyond the popular condemnation of the
party, beyond the partisan reaction of the
authorities and their action towards poor
sinners who were treated as criminals, what
was behind homosexuality in Mexico? What
was thought of the "effeminate"?
LTO ARISTOCRACY OFSODOMA AT NA SERVICE-
TIONAL
Until well into the centuryXIX, colonial legislation
continued to permeate the conduct of Mexican
society. Although since independence there have
been some federal and state efforts to enact
new codes, the results have been unsuccessful,
given the political anarchy and economic chaos.
It was not until the seventh and eighth decade of
the centuryXIXwhen the modern Mexican
encoding process was consolidated. Regarding
the topic of this paper, this indicates that,
according toThe Seven Games, a compilation of
Spanish legislation initiated by Alfonso the Wise
in 1256, sodomy was a sin that offended God
and was judged as a crime committed against
nature and against the king: the
eleven
punishment was the stake. over the century
seventeenth,
the case of fourteen homosexuals
who perished in the flames was heard
(Gruzinski, 1985:260). There are no more
studies on this subject, so luckily there is no
knowledge of the extent to which the law was
complied with. With independence, a legal
scholar affirms that judicial discretion was the
key to attenuate the rigor of a criminal law
that was, to a large extent, "stifled, rigid and
inhumane" (Téllez, 2001). the laws of the
century16ththey could not be the same ones
that governed Mexican society three centuries
later. In practice, the judges quoted the laws
verbatim but at the time of sentencing, they
reduced the penalties. I was able to verify this
in a study that I carried out on the crime of
bestiality, from 1800 to 1856, which was
judged in the same way as sodomy. None of
the defendants died at the stake. Most had
committed the crime under the influence of
alcohol, considered in the legislation as an
important mitigation to reduce the sentence.
However, the Penal Code of 1871 did not
consider, as the press rightly stated, sodomy as a
crimeagainst naturebut was it against public
morality? The third book, sixth title,Crimes against
family order, public morality and good customsIt
points out in its chapter II: "the penalty of major
arrest and a fine of 25 to 500 pesos will be imposed
on those who violate public morality or good
customs, executing an impudent action in a public
place, whether or not there are witnesses, or in a
place private in which the public can see it... Any
action that in the public concept is classified as
contrary to modesty will be considered
impudent..." And, what was an attack against
indecentness? Chapter III, art. 789, states: "the
name of indecent assault is given to any impudent
act that may offend him, without reaching carnal
copulation and that is executed in the person of
another without his will, regardless of his
sex" (Dublan and Lozano, 1879, T. XI: 680-681). On
the other hand, the regulations of the Federal
District, for tax purposes, established that anyone
who organized a "public dance", whether paid or
not, had
Milada Bazant
the obligation to obtain a prior license, under
penalty of a fine. The employer or organizer of
"public entertainment" including theatrical
performances, circuses, conjuring functions,
horse races, dances and in general all shows
that admitted the public "for the purpose of
entertainment" had to notify the government
of the District so that police measures could
be taken, and the authorities may prevent or
suspend any show when it is contrary to the
law or morality. I consulted the regulations of
"February 19, 1873", "February 5, 1875",
"February 19, 1879", "February 16, 1890" and
"February 15, 1901" (AHDF, Laws and Decrees
Series , box 71, exp. 29). The differences
between them are minimal (“General
Municipal Income Law”, in Dublin and Lozano,
1876-1912, vol. 27:
In accordance with the above, the
attendees of the party of the 41 could not be
legally penalized –since it was a private party, a
matter of private morality– but, as is well known,
one thing is the law and another very different,
his practice. as arguedThe Son of the Ahuizote,“
once the filthy sore was shown to society and
whatever arbitrariness was resorted to to
remove that disgusting cancer, honest men with
sound principles would applaud it”, in such a way
that the authorities used the prison sentence to “
chastise his fellow men." However, on the other
hand, this newspaper stated that it was not
logical to honor theSodom aristocracy,“giving
them the title of soldier, even if they went to
build public works. Nor was it fair to condemn
the poor and free the rich because just as the
governor “violated the law with general
applause, he should have pulled evenly…”; on
the contrary, the "wealthy" were even asked for
an apology: "excuse the mistreatment we have
given you, we are very sorry for having confused
you with that lepero..." And the moral goes like
this: "The song says that in the poor it is
drunkenness and in the rich it is joy, when it
comes to the trumpets, and in this case, in the
poor it is filth and in the rich it is refinement of
flirtation and good tone... you
12
brother…because you are poor and you have no
influence…they smear you hopelessly” (The Son of
the Ahuizote, November 24, 1901). This is what an
inmate said about the application of justice in
Mexico: "they see that they have money, they do
justice, and the one they see as poor, they try to
grind him down more" (Roumagnac, 1904:
289-290). Some studies on the administration of
justice in Mexico, among which Elisa Speckman's
stands out, affirm that judicial practice was more
tolerant with the privileged classes. Judges
condemned low-income groups more because they
thought they were prone to committing crimes;
The racial and class prejudices of yesteryear
weighed on them in such a way that they
transgressed the principle of equality in justice and
that of free will that claimed that all human beings
have the same capacity and possibility to choose
between good and evil ( Speckman, 2002: 306-309
and Piccato, 1997: 78-81).
One of the ideas that arose in the press
about the causes of the "perversity" of the
nefarious dance.The nefarious crime - was the
one that went against nature, and comes from
the Latinne-fandus, “what cannot be
said” (Gruzinski, 1985: 261); “terrible,
repulsive” (Suárez Escobar, 1994)—, was related
to the close link between leisure and sin (The
ImpartialandThe universal, November 23, 1901):
Many of them are simple lazy,
scoundrels who, eager for pleasure and
repugnant to work, find it more feasible
to give in to the infamous caresses of a
corrupt senile to wear rich clothes and
wander from party to party in daily
idleness, than to take in their hands the
tool of any trade and earn your bread
with the honorable and ennobling
fatigues of work… Work is strength and
it is health and it is life. And strong and
healthy and vigorous beings are exempt
from the cerebral lesions that give rise
to disgusting actions... (The universal,
November 23, 1901).
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
The postulate of leisure, as the worst of social
ills, was immersed in the politicians, educators
and educators of the Porfiriato who saw work
and progress as the only way out for Mexico to
move towards the concert of civilized nations.
Textbooks and educational programs were filled
with the concept of work as the optimal path for
social welfare. The leisure-depravity nexus was
shared by the liberal and conservative press, but
while for the latter, liberalism “authorized”
licentiousness: “one abyss calls another abyss” (
The country,November 22 andThe Tribune,
November 29, 1901) for the last one, "the
deviations, vices, crimes of men are not always
attributable to the political or religious creed
they profess...everywhere beans are cooked...",
and he gives as an example the case of the
founder of the newspaper with wide circulation
in the country,The Guadalupan Kingdom, Don
José Terrazas who, in 1889, was
excommunicated by the archbishop for wanting
to exercise an apostolate of the laity outside of
any subjection to the Episcopate (The Impartial,
November 25, 1901). Archbishop Pelagio Antonio
de Labastida y Dávalos warned him several times
to modify the tenor of his articles, since Terrazas
compared himself mystical to Santa Teresa and
affirmed: "I am the only hope of salvation for
Religion and the Homeland". In 1901 he
published a pamphlet,2which surely came to
light in November sinceThe ImpartialHe alluded,
on the 23rd, to the fanaticism of Terrazas, "old
and square." The ingenious columnist Ángel del
Campo, “Ticktack”, of the mentioned newspaper
wrote the following day “Educational advice: the
Flower of the Family. The Extremes or the
Terrace System”. Below I select some of the rec-
2Terraces is not disgusting!He shouted that he would launch
every honest conscience in view of the reasons and documents
that the latter publishes regarding the Alarcón-Icaza issue and its
precedents in the Labastida-Terrazas issue, who presents for the
consideration of scholars and the Church his true ideas about of
chastity asking for a delegate to the Supreme Pontiff to do
justice and correct the deficiencies of the ecclesiastical
government in Mexico (Porrúa Dictionary, 1976, T.II: 1737).
13
very timely and useful recommendations for that
moment:
Accustom a boy to sleep with a candle, the
slits covered; let him wash himself with
lukewarm water and cologne, he eat
breakfast in bed; he will not give you air
until the day is hot.
Ask him to draw monograms for
napkins; to act as an angel with
petticoats at half mast at mystical
school functions; she curls her
eyelashes with bobby pins.
Instill in him that cracked lips heal with
cocoa butter and hands broken by the
cold are very ugly; that the shower bath
sickens the heart; that gymnastics
impedes mental development and
cycling causes palpitations.
Lecture her that she must play dolls
with her cousins; knowing how to
distinguish a relindo from a randa and a
poplin from a nansu; put it strong in the
science of draping, patterns, molds and
other crochet work...
Let him perfume himself, wear red
socks, entertain his sad hours, putting
fringes on clogged tables and
embroidering in white.
Applaud him when he sings with a
woman's voice, that song:
"I am the swallow...
that speeds up to the seas”; and give her
if she accompanies her with mandolin a
second class medal of melodic merit.
Grown up, praise him for being blond
but well formed and authorize a
manicurist to fix his nails.
See that he sleeps in the same room as his
nanny until his second teeth have
developed and avoid strong emotions; pay
attention to him whenever he cries and try
to make him read sweet things... and
believe in Coco and La Llorona...
Put it in schools of select people, but
anemic; and tell him – if you have the
means of fortune – that every manual
trade is degrading; that a well-brought-up
child should have a flat dog and embroider
its shirts; educate canaries and learn
Milada Bazant
der to throw them out; prepare milk sweets
and form labels with anisitos…
And so they continue, endlessly, the educational
advice of the "Terraces system"; really very
eloquent.
ORNA CONGENITAL DISEASE:THE HOMOSEXUE-
LITY
When I began to analyze the facts of this work, I
thought that a good clue would be the
reflections that the press produced regarding
the trial of Oscar Wilde practiced a few years
ago, barely in 1895. However, to my surprise, the
few opinions did not go beyond classify him as a
"maniac dominated by the hysterical desire to
attract attention"; condemned "his eagerness to
seek intellectual stimulants in the monstrous, in
the abnormal... his case was a literary pathology,
more than a social pathology" (The National,
May 3 and 8, 1895. I did not find much news in
other newspapers). In essence, the fact of
prosecuting a consecrated writer like Oscar
Wilde did not motivate any Mexican journalist or
high-ranking writer, and many of them, to come
out in his defense or express an opinion about
his "illness" or his homosexuality. Then, it was
necessary to track down other paths.
To delve into the subject of homosexuality
during the Porfiriato, there are no medical
treatises, specialized studies or any type of
documentation that addresses the issue and this
does not mean that Mexico was not aware, to
the extent possible, of the most modern
scientific currents that they came from Europe,
especially from Italy, France and Germany. In
this country, the term homosexual was born in
1869, and here, too, people began to talk about
homosexuality as a congenital disease, no
longer as a vice. In 1882 the studies of Jean
Martin Charcot appeared in France,3teacher
3Professor of pathological anatomy at the Sorbonne and a
clinic for diseases of the nervous system. Founder of modern
neuropathology (Charcot, 1825-1893 andSalvat Encyclopedic
Dictionary, 1957, T. IV: 823.)
14
Freud4in the use of the hypnotic method, who
considered sexual inversion as a "syndrome"
of a process of hereditary degeneration and
compared it with other "morbid obsessions"
such as dipsomania, kleptomania, etc.
(Martínez, 1947:56-57, 71-72.). The "inverted"
for him, was a victim of "moral insanity", of
"genital neurosis" and as a consequence of
"relentless degeneration" (Aries and Duby,
1991: 289.). In the Mexican specialized spheres
the clinical works of Charcot were mentioned,5
but there are no allusions to that “disease”. On
the contrary, there is mention of the "crime of
incontinence" among which is "pederasty"6
which indicates that it was still considered in
scientific circles as a crime? My impression is
that there was some confusion and of course
stigma towards a taboo subject since the term
incontinence refers, literally, to a "vice", in this
case, that of carnal passions (Illustrated
Encyclopedia,1956, T.II: 489).
To try to find out about homosexuality at
that time, the researcher has to do it
indirectly; that is to say, to go to the archives
of the jail or the asylum. There is no
documentation on homosexuals "out of prison
or the asylum." For example, in the Archives of
the Ministry of Health, in the General Asylum
Fund —the first is San Hipólito, a hospital for
insane men since the 19th century.XVIII; El
Divino Salvador, a women's hospital founded
in the 18th century16th; and then La Castañeda,
inaugurated in 1910— are the records of the
mentally ill. They included general data such
as name and place of birth, background
4Freud met Charcot when the first one came to Paris on a
scholarship, in 1885.Hachette Castell Encyclopedic Dictionary,T.
5, 1981, p. 961.
5An example of these can be found in theMedical Gazette of
Mexico, newspaper of the prestigious National Academy of
Medicine, volume XXXIII, no. 19, October 1, 1896. Another source
that mentions it is José Vasconcelos, who studied high school
and university during the Porfiriato, mentions in his memoirs
having consulted Charcot's texts (Vasconcelos, 1935).
6In this article, the doctor Antonio Careaga acknowledges the
value of physicians in the help they provide in legal matters
related to incontinence crimes.
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
relatives, level of education, "degree of
intelligence" and, finally, the diagnosis issued
by a doctor. Within the range of mental
illnesses, there was that of "moral madness",
much explored by the pillar of the Italian
criminal anthropology school, Cesare
Lombroso, who referred, for example, to the
insane person who suffered "perversions"
within the which was considered to have
sexual relations with people of the same sex
or to walk naked exposing oneself to
everyone's sight, to name a few (Lombroso,
1887: Caps. III and XIII). These data, although
scarce, are interesting because they indicate
that homosexuality was still considered as a
"perversion" as well. (AHSS, General Asylum
Fund, Files Section, Box 13). It would be
interesting if the files said why this or that
patient was admitted to the asylum, not
simply point out the diagnosis. The diagnoses
were as follows: acute erotic mania, early
dementia, mental alienation, degeneration,
moral perversion, etc. For this research I only
carried out a sampling. You can also consult
the Public Charity Fund, Hospital
Establishments Section, San Hipólito Hospital
Series. It was evident, as the director of the
asylum pointed out in 1909, that the District
government sent him too many individuals
diagnosed as "insane" and they were generally
drunk. Lombroso already pointed out the
strong connection between the consumption
of alcohol “which irritated nerve cells” and
crime (Lombroso, 1887: 22; and Public Charity
Fund, Hospital Establishments Section, San
Hipólito Hospital Series, file 10, exp. 6).
Knowledge of homosexuals “in prisons” is
much broader because it was believed that
they were more prone (as well as indigenous
people, for example) to commit crimes. For
fifteen
To know the etiology of crime, two currents of
thought prevailed in our country: the
aforementioned Italian school of Lombroso, which
focused on the body of the criminal, and criminal
sociology, which originated in France and devoted
the greatest weight to social and environmental
factors. environment (Speckman, 2002: 93-94).
Scholars of crime and sexuality have based
themselves on the rich source of Carlos
Roumagnac, who in his now classiccriminals in
mexicoHe contributed a very interesting
investigation based on interviews that he himself
carried out with the prisoners of the Belem jail. In
fact, he says, it is still not "resolved" which of these
two schools of thought is right; for him, "it is not
possible to understand the individual absolutely
independent of social influence, nor society ruling
tyrannically and inexorably over the
individual" (Roumagnac, 1904: 26-27). Following
Lombroso,7Roumagnac makes a "signal file" of
each individual whom he treats anonymously —
Pedro A., for example— and takes the
measurements and particularities of the head,
ears, eyes, forehead and nose. However, the most
interesting thing, in my opinion, is not only the
interview about how and why each prisoner
committed the crime, but also theenvironmentin
which the delinquent developed as a child, as an
adolescent, as an adult: who were their parents,
what were they like —the majority were alcoholics
—, where did they live, did they go to school and
what did they learn, what trades did they and their
families practice, how they conceived God, sin, if
they had repented, etc. It is a book, also
fascinating, to study the daily life of the lower social
strata (Lombroso, 1887 and 1888).
A very important part of the interviews
carried out by Roumagnac were aimed at
questioning the prisoners about their sexual
habits, precisely because the close link
between sexual deviation and criminality was
known. I quote below three scholars of
homosexuality "in prison." OK
7Although his works are scientifically superior since he was a
doctor, a specialist in criminology, they do not contain the interesting
interviews that Roumagnac conducted with criminals.
Milada Bazant
with Nesvig most of the inmates practiced
pedophilia in a similar way;8however, this was
conceived differently between adults and young
people. Buffington argues that among the
former "open homosexuality was an accepted
practice (within certain limits)"; On the other
hand, among the second, the one who played
the active, sometimes aggressive role of
"mayate", was just as "vicious" as the second, the
"horse", but at least showed some resistance like
this: "For a guardian of the public order,
passivity and the will to rehabilitate could not
but constitute positive characteristics, while
aggressive immorality was a challenge… against
political and moral authority.” (Buffington, 2001:
195-196).9What seems incredible is that,
according to Pablo Piccato, "criminals, according
to Porfirian commentators, enjoyed life in prison
and the company of their peers, sometimes even
more than the society of those who lived outside
of it." jail” (Piccato, 1997: 100). Those interviewed
by Roumagnac would seem to prove it, since
none of them showed the desire to flee; They
accepted their punishment of months or years in
prison or capital punishment with singular
stoicism and, surprisingly, they did not feel
regret (Roumagnac, 1904). Without exempting
them from their criminal guilt, a doctor of the
time wondered, as a matter of hygiene and
morality, about the unnaturalness of sentencing
many years in prison to
8The author (Nesvig, 2000: 15) affirms that Roumagnac
reached this conclusion indirectly, because violent pedophiles
were sent to the "bartolines", solitary confinement cells, but "I
am sure" says Roumagnac and I quote from his text: "of that if it
were essential to separate all those who in the floating
population of Belem - from 3 to […] 4,000 individuals - give
themselves up to vices against nature, the bartolinas that the
prison has would not be enough. This was also done to prevent
the spread of venereal diseases. For some time, pedophiles who
caused fights out of jealousy and love between men and men,
were sent to a department calledCAR, where “these sexual
degenerates paraded, passed in front of the other detainees,
without blush or shame, on the contrary, flaunting effeminate
voices and manners, lavishing themselves with womanly
nicknames, and often carrying rag dolls in their arms or
pretending to carry them, and making allusions to their recent
deliveries”. (Roumagnac, 1904: 77).
9The word "mayate" comes from Nahua, which refers to a
kind of iridescent green beetle; also from Classic Nahua, “bestial
person [...] sexual or lascivious” (Buffington, 2001: 195).
16
men and women "in the full force of their age"
because this led them to commit the vice of
sodomy. Therefore, he urged the government to
reconcile the prisoners' sentences with their "well-
being and their needs" (Flores, 1888, T. III: 707).
Precisely because of this problem, in the army
prisons, among the troops and officers, they were
already taking women because "that was becoming
a bunch of fagots and forty-somethings and they
rightly thought that the army is always the army,
no matter how this; and that it was better that the
pizcapochas had free entry…” (Urquizo, 2003: 159).
ANDPREFACE AND CONCLUSIONS
As I mentioned before, in addition to the
extensive journalistic review, the dance of the 41
did not cause any scholar of that time to delve
into the matter. It is possible that no one dared.
He only encouraged the publication of a "social-
critical" novel in 1906,the forty one(Castrejon,
1906),without literary value, in my opinion, but
full of funny details about the clothing and
makeup of the "jotos"; the decoration of the
room where the event took place, the
nicknames, etc. When the centenary was
celebrated, there were several celebrations and
some intellectuals considered the importance of
the "Club of 41". The most prominent, Carlos
Monsiváis, wrote in the articleThe 41 and the
Great Raid, that the Redada "invented"
homosexuality in Mexico. After this dance,
“which already betrays a minimal but solid social
organization”, the homosexuals, says Monsiváis,
“no longer feel alone”; the “existence of the
tribe” was already born (free letters,April 2002,
Year IV, number 40, p. 27). Alejandro Brito,
director ofLyrics, Health, Sexuality, AIDSHe
stated that as a result of the exhibition that this
publication organized with the Museum of
Mexico City, “Very cool and flirtatious. The raid of
the 41. A hundred years after an offense", the
repression suffered by those men became "the
response that prevailed throughout the century
until the sixties and seventies, when the
Chronicle of a clandestine dance
first gay groups10(the day, October 29, 2001).
In addition, a gay-themed novel and poetry
were publishedhyacinth of jesusnovel by Hugo
Villalobos and an anthology of poetry selected
and prefaced by Víctor Manuel Mendiola (the
day, November 17, 2001), a commemorative
plaque was unveiled and a pantomime similar
to that of a century ago “From a surprise
dance to a surprise dance” was performed,
conceived “not as a period dance but as a
dance that make time”. Dressed as a hundred
years ago, with elegant and extravagant
evening dresses, the distinguished actors
went down the steps of the Museum, who on
their way to the stage, placed in the center of
the courtyard, were cheered as if it were a
parade of fashions or the delivery of an award.
Then, all gathered together, the "christening"
of the doll "Porfirio Vicente" was carried out,
they went to the dance, with music of the time
and a man was "raffled". The police also
arrived but [...] this time there was a lot of
whining and he ran away [...] (the day,
November 17 and 19, 2001).
If at the age of one hundred, that memorable
dance was celebrated with guei pride, the number 41
remained, a few years after that 1901, imprinted in
the collective memory as a synonym for homosexual
but with a certain tone of mockery.eleven
To date, 41 has a biting charge, so biting
10"Guei", used like this in Spanish, is the one who chooses to
be a guei and feels proud to be so in front of the one who hides
and is the one from the "closet". The word guei does not come
from English as "synonymous with happy but exclusively in the
sense of the new alternative identity based on the positive
acceptance of one's own non-conformist sexual orientation." It
originates when, “at the end of the Second World War and with
the end of the shortage of personnel, the US armed forces once
again apply their exclusionary policy against those who more
openly manifested their non-conformist sexual orientation.
Those who had first tasted…the taste of an open life…were no
longer willing to lead a clandestine double life. Many of them
emigrated to big cities like San Francisco, New York and Los
Angeles. At that time this group coined the word gay to
designate itself. The American novelist Gertrude Stein is
considered to be the first to use the term in its current (Internet)
sense.
It seems that it spread throughout the republic. For example,
eleven
in the newspaperThe opinionVeracruz, on August 12, 1915, the
following note was published:
17
Given that in the army, according to General
Urquizo, there was no division, regiment or
battalion that carried that number or payroll that
had it, or else, if the number was forced on a street,
there was no other choice but to label it a "40 Bis
”(Urquizo, 1965: 67). When taking roll in schools or
obtaining that number in a raffle, it is common for
41 to call out “Sappho”, without perhaps knowing
that this name alludes to Sappho, the Greek
poetess who gave herself up to homosexuality. All
this indicates that FORTY-ONE evokes, at a very
general level, only one thing and, curiously, few
people know the origin.
This unique event was recorded by a press
that can be described as exceptional due to its
ironic, scathing and frankly mocking overtones.
The event itself had a lot of fabric to cut from but
the journalists, the "reporters" of that time, who
went hunting for news especially of a
sensationalist type, showed off with special
creativity making up the report by recreating
dialogues, letters and clothing between the 41.
Which journalist handled irony and sarcasm
better? Each one in their own style, but all the
newspapers, liberal and conservative, with all
their aspects, censored the event. Given the
circumstances, the news was dosed: nothing was
said about 42, that is, about the uncomfortable
relative, but the public knew, by far, what was
being hidden. In addition to the fact that the
main person involved was the president's son-in-
law, The fact also attracted attention because it
was a taboo subject or simply because it was
morbid. In essence, there was no legal reason to
punish the “dancers”. The Penal Code of 1871
had established that sodomy was not a crime,
the legislation regarding public morality did not
penalize impudent actions in places that were
not public; however, like that
[...] an individual who was dressed as a woman was
apprehended, but it was useless for him to say that he did
not "belong to 41 or its annexes."
And the news ends:
“We believe that such […] will be severely punished: if he is a
scoundrel so that he will be punished, if a degenerate so that he
will be repressed and if he is only a clown so that he does not
degrade the dignity of the man by dressing as a woman”.
Milada Bazant 18

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