1965
Space ship over lake
Gemini V, with astronauts Gordon Cooper and Charles Conrad on board, passed directly over Lake Chapala early one morning last week. Fred Mardus, engineer and astronomy professor at the University of Guadalajara and other local astronomers located Gemini V with the aid of timetables and slide rules.
More vehicles than ever
The city traffic department now estimates that there are more than 52,500 cars and trucks in service on the streets of Guadalajara.
Balloon racing
Globo races will be held on the Ajjic football field for the benefit of the regional Vocation School to be built here soon. Pari-mutual betting, entry fees for competitors will be donated to the school.
1975
LCS plans Patzcuaro trip
Lake Chapala Society members will travel to Patzcuaro, Michoacan September 27-29. A visit to the Santa Ana Copper Mine, a boat trip to Janitzio Island, a stop at Tzintzuntan for shopping and a pyramid climb are all part of the trip. Price is 687.50 pesos per person.
Chapala landslides
Chapala Mayor Juan Cerda Arciniega is seeking the collaboration of the Jalisco state government in solving the town’s years-old problem of landslides and earth movements on Hidalgo and Madero streets and alongside the road to Ajijic. The landslides, which have resulted in fallen homes, walls, trees and telephone poles, are caused by the existence of subterranean waters.
1985
Mexico City quake
Following the destruction caused by the most severe earthquake in Mexico City’s history, newspapers and homeless citizens in the capital are asking if the effect of the disaster could not have been reduced. Mexico city daily Uno Mas Uno has led the debate over the enforcement of building regulations in the nation’s capital, highlighting a four-year-old theater complex that was demolished by the quake.
Aid for quake victims
When the beds stopped shaking Thursday morning, September 19, and reports of the earthquake destruction flooded the media, Guadalajara’s foreign residents began responding early in the day with offers of financial and material aid to the victims. Local clubs, organizations, schools and churches had announced collection points within hours of the reports and the first truck loads of goods were on their way to Jalisco’s most needy towns by Monday September 23.
1995
US library to close
The U.S. Information Service will save US$50,000 per year by closing the Benjamin Franklin Library in Guadalajara. That’s a sum many local citizens say is a drop in the ocean compared to the benefits the library brings to both Mexico and the United States.
Cardinal pro red-light district
When Guadalajara Mayor Cesar Coll Carabias suggested that the city ought to have a clearly defined red light district, he found support from an unlikely source: the city’s archbishop, Cardinal Juan Sandoval Iñiguez, who agreed there were some vices that could not be eradicated, but could be isolated from children, youths and adults who wanted no truck with them.
Chapalita hosts Casa Chapala
In a creative move to promote the lakeside municipality, te city of Chapala has opened an office in Guadalajara’s Chapalita neighborhood Chapalita. The office will promote the area’s tourist attractions, encourage investment and foster the diffusion of its arts and culture.
Ishmael batters coast
Hurricane Ishmael roared ashore out of the Pacific some nine hours earlier than predicted September 15, killing at least 150, sinking much of the shrimp fleet at sea, devastating coastal areas of northern Sinaloa and southern Sonora, and leading to charges of government negligence in reporting the location of the storm.
2005
Chapalita victory
In a dramatic u-turn, Jalisco Governor Francisco Ramirez Acuña scrapped the 90-million-peso plan to build a flyover above Avenida Lopez Mateos where it crosses Avenida Las Rosas, in favor of a 140-million peso tunnel running underneath the busy thoroughfare. The decision was music to the ears of residents of Colonia Chapalita, who have waged a vigorous six-week campaign to get the government to change its mind.
Mexican troops in Mississippi
U.S. President George Bush met and posed for photographs with Mexican Marines clearing debris from Hurricane Katrina in Biloxi, Mississippi. More than 75 Mexican Marines worked side by side with their U.S. counterparts in devastated Gulf Coast towns last week. Nearly 200 Mexican soldiers and 150 civil personnel are assisting hurricane survivors in Texas.
Disabled citizens unite
The 20 members of the new Asociacion Internacional de Menusvalidos have set their sights on tackling government bureaucracies that make life difficult for handicapped people. The group’s focus ranges from getting effective medicines, smoothing the importation of specially equipped cars from the U.S., not having to stand in long lines to pay taxes and reducing the taxes handicapped people have to pay.
Huichols evict evangelicals
Approximately 300 Huichols were expelled from two municipalities in northern Jalisco earlier this month for joining an evangelical denomination and not participating in traditional ceremonies in which alcohol binging and peyote taking are paramount. Thugs, acting under orders of the community leaders of pueblos near the Zacatecas border, threatened residents who had joined the Seventh Day Adventist church, with firearms and arson.