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Eva Perón

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Political People

   Eva Perón
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   Eva Perón speaking from the balcony of Argentina's government house,
   Casa Rosada, 1950.
   Born May 7, 1919
   Junín, Buenos Aires, Argentina (see below)
   Died July 26, 1952
   Buenos Aires, Argentina
   Occupation actress, philanthropist, first lady
   Spouse Juan Perón

   María Eva Duarte de Perón ( May 7, 1919 – July 26, 1952) was the second
   wife of Argentine President Juan Domingo Perón (1895–1974) and the
   First Lady of Argentina from 1946 until her death in 1952. She is often
   referred to by the Spanish language diminutive Evita, which translates
   into English as "Little Eva".

   In 1951, Evita launched a campaign to be allowed to run for the office
   of Vice-President of Argentina. The nation's military, elite, and Juan
   Perón himself all opposed and ultimately prevented Evita's candidacy.
   In 1952, Evita was given the official title of "Spiritual Leader of the
   Nation".

   Though she was never an officially elected political figure, most
   scholars agree that by her husband's second term in office Eva Perón
   had come to exercise more power and influence within the government
   than anyone but her own husband. This power derived from her leadership
   roles within the Pro-Peronist trade unions, the Eva Perón Foundation,
   and the Female Peronist Party. Many scholars agree that Evita was the
   most powerful woman in the history of her nation, and some claim that
   at the time of her death she was one of the most powerful women on
   earth.

Early life

   Iln the biography Evita: The Real Life of Eva Perón Marysa Navarro and
   Nicholas Fraser write that Eva Perón was born on May 7, 1919, in Los
   Toldos, a small town in the Pampas, one hundred and fifty miles from
   the capital of Argentina. Fraser and Navarro claim that Eva Perón's
   birth certificate and baptismal records have not survived, but that
   those who claim to have seen them before they were destroyed say that
   the first names entered on the certificates were Eva María and the
   surname was listed as Ibarguren. Tomás de Elia and Juan Pablo Queiroz,
   editors of the photobiography Evita: An Intimate Portrait of Eva Perón,
   agree that Eva Perón was born in Los Toldos. Eva Perón's own
   autobiography, which was originally published in Argentina in 1952
   under the title La Razón de mi Vida (subsequently published in English
   speaking countries under the titles My Mission in Life and Evita by
   Evita), contains no dates, no reference to childhood occurrences, and
   does not list the location of Eva Perón's birth nor her name at birth.

   Eva Perón spent her childhood in Junín, Buenos Aires Province, then a
   village in the Pampas. Her parents, Juan Duarte and Juana Ibarguren
   (often referred to as doña Juana), never married. Duarte was a rancher
   from nearby Chivilcoy, where he already had a wife and family. Fraser
   and Navarro claim that the "second marriage" that Duarte maintained
   with Ibarguren was not uncommon in rural Argentina and may in fact be
   related to the history of the region: "The circumstances of war, the
   imperatives of the frontier and the complete absence of records meant
   that in nineteenth-century rural Argentina settlers took Indian women
   and left them and their children behind as they moved onwards, from
   settlement to settlement and region to region."

   In 1920, when Eva was one year old, Duarte returned to his legal
   family, leaving Juana Ibarguren and her family of five children
   impoverished. As a result of the impoverishment, Ibarguren and her
   family moved to the poorest area of Junín. As a means of supporting
   herself and her children, Ibarguren sewed clothes for neighbors. The
   family was stigmatized by the abandonment of the father. After Eva
   Perón became powerful, it would be claimed that during this period of
   their lives Ibarguren had run a brothel in which Eva Perón herself was
   a prostitute. Even Jorge Luis Borges, arguably Argentina's most
   celebrated writer, endorsed this belief. Most biographers, such as
   Tomas Eloy Martinez, write that such claims are not true.

Father's death

   In 1926, Juan Duarte was killed in a car accident in Chivilcoy. Juana
   Ibarguren attended the funeral with her five children. Due to the
   conventions of early 20th century Argentina, the presence of Ibarguren
   and her children at Juan Duarte's funeral was seen as an affront.
   Legally, Ibarguren and her children did not exist for Duarte's married
   family. When the Ibarguren family arrived at the funeral, write Fraser
   and Navarro, a violent argument broke out between Ibarguren and
   Duarte's legal wife regarding the right of Ibarguren and her children
   to attend the funeral. It was only after the intervention of the wife's
   brother, Mayor of Chivilcoy, that Ibarguren and her children were
   allowed to view the body of Juan Duarte. After the wake, the Ibarguren
   family was not allowed to walk with the Duarte family behind Juan
   Duarte's hearse, but was required to walk with the undifferentiated
   crowd that followed the procession of the legally recognized family.

   Much has been made about the importance of this episode in the
   development of the character of Eva Perón. The usual interpretation is
   that this incident implanted in Eva Perón a dislike, even hatred for,
   the middle and upper classes, and set her up for her future role as
   champion of the poor and lower classes of Argentines. For example, in
   the Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice musical Evita the title character
   sings: "Screw the middle classes/I will never accept them and they will
   never deny me anything again/My father's other family were middle
   class/And we were kept out of sight, hidden from view at his funeral."
   The closest Eva Perón herself ever came to referring to this incident
   was to write in her autobiography: "As far as I can remember the
   existence of injustice has hurt my soul as if a nail was being driven
   into it. From every period of my life I retain the memory of some
   injustice tormenting me and tearing me apart." Fraser and Navarro write
   that Eva Perón was likely too young at the time to understand why her
   mother would want the family to attend the funeral or why their
   presence was controversial, but that it was likely the first time Eva
   Perón had ever seen her family through the eyes of others. Fraser and
   Navarro speculate that rather than instilling in her an anger toward
   the upper classes, this incident may have instilled in Eva Perón an
   anger toward her own mother for putting the young Eva in a position
   where she would be subjected to such hostility. Though she would never
   write or speak about it publicly, Eva Perón is said to have been
   uncomfortable with her " illegitimate" birth.

     "Neither Evita nor her sisters could ever confront the question of
     illegitimacy. As late as 1972 Erminda, the second youngest, would
     write that her mother and father were happily married, that he
     kissed her and her younger sister Eva María goodnight the night
     before he left the village on a business trip, and died. As for the
     'legitimate' Duartes, Erminda simply suggests that they were her
     step-sisters and that they 'were more sad than we were, because with
     the death of their father they were orphans, since they had lost
     their mother some years before.'"

Move to Buenos Aires

   At approximately the age of 15, Eva Duarte traveled to Buenos Aires.
   There is some disagreement about how she arrived. The most common
   account holds that Evita was taken to the capital city by the traveling
   tango singer Agustín Magaldi. This version was popularized in the
   musical Evita in which Magaldi is referred to as "the first man to be
   of use to Eva Duarte". Of Eva Duarte's arrival in Buenos Aires, De Elia
   and Queiroz write, "The most persistent legend involves the tango
   singer Agustín Magaldi, who would have accepted responsibility for the
   aspiring young artist, but the more plausible story is the one told by
   her family: Doña Juana took her daughter to Buenos Aires to audition at
   a radio station, and Eva arranged to stay on at the home of family
   friends, the Bustamontes." Biographers Fraser and Navarro also doubt
   that Magaldi and Eva Duarte ever had a relationship. Fraser and Navarro
   write that there is no record of Magaldi making an appearance in Junín
   the year that Eva Duarte is said to have met him; Magaldi, who was
   devoted to his mother, was known to tour with his wife; and it would be
   difficult to understand what a famous tango singer would see in the
   skinny 15-year-old. Whatever the means by which she arrived in Buenos
   Aires, most biographers agree that Eva Duarte did so in the early
   months of 1935.

     "Buenos Aires in the 1930s was the continent's most cosmopolitan and
     elegant metropolis and soon became known as the 'Paris of South
     America.' As in any great European capital, the centre of the city
     was filled with cafés, restaurants, theaters, movie houses, shops,
     and bustling crowds. Eva was one of many people from the provinces,
     attracted by the process of industrialization, who came to the
     capital during the 1930s. When she arrived in 1935 with little more
     than a cardboard suitcase containing her few possessions, the bold
     teenager must have felt a wrenching sense of vulnerability and
     solitude. In direct contrast to the glamour of the city, the 1930s
     were also years of great unemployment, poverty, and hunger in the
     capital, and many immigrants from the interior were forced to live
     in tenements, squalid boardinghouses, and in outlying shantytowns
     that became known as villas miserias."

   Upon arrival in Buenos Aires, Eva Duarte was faced with the
   difficulties of surviving without formal education and without
   connections. After years of struggle, she eventually found work as a
   radio and film actress, being credited as Eva Duarte. Eva Duarte later
   had leading roles in B-grade movie melodramas. She also became a
   leading radio soap opera actress for Radio El Mundo, which Fraser and
   Navarro claim was the most important radio station in the country. She
   regularly appeared on a popular historical-drama program Great Women of
   History in which she played Elizabeth I of England, Sarah Bernhardt and
   the last Tsarina of Russia. Eventually, Eva Duarte came to co-own the
   radio company. By 1943, Eva Duarte was earning five or six thousands
   pesos a month, making her one of the highest paid radio actresses in
   the nation during this time period. Pablo Raccioppi, who jointly ran
   Radio El Mundo with Eva Duarte, is said to have not liked Eva Duarte
   but to have noted that she was "thoroughly dependable".

Early relationship with Juan Perón

Juan Perón's military career

   Juan Perón was born on October 8, 1895, in Lobos, Argentina. He spent
   his childhood in the desert of Patagonia at the southern tip of
   Argentina. He entered military school at age 16. He joined the
   Argentine Army in 1915. After graduation, Perón was posted to various
   garrisons in the interior of Argentina. In 1926, Perón was promoted to
   captain and moved to Buenos Aires. He played a minor role in the 1930
   coup. Fraser and Navarro claim that the 1930 coup established a new
   relationship between the Army and the government. Within the military
   there was some debate as to whether military intervention in politics
   was appropriate, and whether it should impose the corporate state on
   Argentina.

   Perón was appointed military attache to Chile in 1936. (His first wife,
   Aurelia Tizón, would die of cancer in 1938.) In 1939, shortly before
   the outbreak of World War II, Perón was sent to Europe, where he would
   travel through Hungary, Austria, Germany, Spain, and Portugal. Fraser
   and Navarro claim that during this era Perón was exposed to the
   theatrics of Mussolini's pseudo-imperial Rome. Perón returned to
   Argentina in 1942. Fraser and Navarro also claim that Perón, along with
   much of Europe during this period, believed that the only real choice
   for Europe was the choice between communism and fascism.

     "As a nationalist, of course, he welcomed the defeat of Britain, and
     he hoped the Axis powers would win the war. Yet he was not in the
     strictest sense a fascist, though he would frequently be called
     that; nor was the military lodge he helped found shortly after
     returning to Buenos Aires, the GOU (Grupo de Oficiales Unidos),
     concerned with strict implementation of fascism in Argentina along
     German or Italian lines. Its members, including Perón, at this stage
     were concerned with what they thought was a more practical question,
     namely what would happen after the war. Perón believed that
     Mussolini's Italy demonstrated that the interests of capital and
     labour could be reconciled by the state and it was this principle
     that he urged on his colleagues."

San Juan earthquake

   On January 15, 1944, an earthquake struck the town of San Juan,
   Argentina. Six thousand people were killed. In response, Perón, who was
   the Secretary of Labour, established a fund to raise money to aid the
   victims. Perón devised a plan to have an "artistic festival", which
   included radio and film actors. As part of the festivities, actors
   walked through the streets of San Juan with collection boxes to
   encourage locals to donate money to aid the victims of the earthquake.
   After a week of fundraising, all participants met at a gala. It was at
   this gala, on January 22, 1944, that Eva Duarte first met Juan Perón.
   Evita referred to the day she met her future husband as her "marvellous
   day". In his own memoir, Juan Perón recalls his first impression of his
   future wife:

     "There was a woman of fragile appearance, but with a strong voice,
     with long blonde hair falling loose to her back and fevered eyes.
     She said her name was Eva Duarte, that she acted on the radio and
     that she wanted to help the people of San Juan. I looked at her and
     felt overcome by her words; I was quite subdued by the force of her
     voice and her look. Eva was pale but when she spoke her face seemed
     to catch fire. Her hands were reddened with tension, her fingers
     knit tightly together, she was a mass of nerves."

   Fraser and Navarro, however, claim that Juan Perón's memoirs are not
   always trustworthy. For example, Evita was not yet a blonde when she
   met Perón at the San Juan gala. Fraser and Navarro write that whenever
   Juan Perón spoke of his political life he was always concerned with
   placing himself in the best possible light, and this was certainly the
   case with Evita, who would become his most important political
   follower. Fraser and Navarro write that Juan Perón and Evita left the
   gala together at around two in the morning.

   Shortly after meeting in San Juan, Eva Duarte and Juan Perón moved in
   together. This move is said to have scandalized some in Juan Perón's
   inner circle. During this time period in Argentina actors and
   politicians were seen as two distinct classes of people. Additionally,
   it was considered improper for an unmarried couple to live together.
   But Juan Perón introduced her to his inner circle of political
   associates and advisors. Juan Perón even allowed Eva Duarte to sit in
   on his meetings with close advisors and members of government.

     "She would stay through the meeting, making the coffee, emptying the
     ashtrays or watching the guests in silence. Her presence among these
     educated men — graduates of the War College, doctors from the
     university or lawyer politicians — would not have been entirely
     accepted if she had been married to Perón; as it was, it was quite
     incomprehensible. Evita had little education, and the sort of work
     she did on the radio was not considered respectable.... But to allow
     her to be part of his life in this way was damaging for him as a
     soldier and as a politician. As a soldier his prospects for
     promotion would be curtailed; as a politician he would be involved
     in scandal."

   Fraser and Navarro claim that Eva Duarte had no knowledge or interest
   in politics prior to her meeting of Juan Perón. Therefore, Eva Duarte
   never argued with Perón or any of his inner circle but merely absorbed
   what she heard. Juan Perón would later claim in his memoir that he
   purposefully selected Eva Duarte as his pupil and set out to create in
   her a "second I". Fraser and Navarro, however, suggest that Juan Perón
   allowed Eva Duarte such intimate exposure and knowledge of his inner
   circle because of his age. Juan Perón was 48 when he met the
   24-year-old Eva Duarte. He had come to politics late in life and was
   therefore free of preconceived ideas of how his political career should
   be conducted.

   In May of 1944 it was announced that broadcast performers must organize
   themselves into a union, and that this union would be the only one
   permitted to operate in Argentina. Shortly after the union was formed,
   Eva Duarte was elected its president. Fraser and Navarro speculate that
   Juan Perón made the suggestion that performers create a union, and the
   other performers likely felt it was good politics to elect his
   mistress. Shortly after her election as president of the union, Eva
   Duarte began a daily program called "Toward a Better Future" which
   dramatized in soap opera form the accomplishments of Juan Perón. Often,
   Perón's own speeches would be played during the course of the program.
   When she spoke, Eva Duarte spoke in ordinary language as a regular
   woman who wanted listeners to believe what she believed about Juan
   Perón.

October 17, 1945

   Demonstration for Perón's release, on October 17, 1945.
   Enlarge
   Demonstration for Perón's release, on October 17, 1945.

   By early 1945, the GOU had gained considerable influence within the
   Argentine government. President Pedro Pablo Ramírez became wary of Juan
   Perón's growing power within the government but was unable to curb that
   power. On February 24, 1944, Ramírez signed his own resignation paper
   which Fraser and Navarro claim was drafted by Juan Perón himself.
   Edelmiro Julián Farrell, a friend of Juan Perón's, became President.
   Juan Perón returned to his job as War Minister. Fraser and Navarro
   claim that by this point Perón was the most powerful man in the
   Argentine government.

   Shortly before his marriage to Eva on October 23, 1945, Juan Perón was
   arrested by his opponents within the government who feared that due to
   the strong support of the descamisados, the workers and the poor of the
   nation, Perón's popularity might eclipse that of the sitting president.

   Eva has often been credited with organizing the rally of thousands that
   freed Juan Perón from prison on 17 October 1945. This version of events
   was popularized in the movie version of the Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd
   Webber musical "Evita". Most historians, however, agree that this is
   not likely. At the time of Perón's imprisonment, Eva was still merely
   an actress. She had no political clout with the various labor unions
   that supported Perón, and it is claimed that she was not well liked
   within Perón's inner circle, nor was she liked by many within the film
   and radio business at this point. When Juan Perón was imprisoned, Eva
   Duarte was suddenly disenfranchised. (Biographers Marysa Navarro and
   Nicholas Fraser claim that letters between the two during Juan Perón's
   imprisonment indicate that the couple actually considered leaving the
   country after Perón's release.) In reality, the massive rally that
   freed Perón from prison was organized by the various unions, such as
   General Labor Confederation, or CGT as they came to be known. To this
   day, the date of October 17th is something of a holiday for the
   Justicialist Party in Argentina (celebrated as Día de la Lealtad, or
   "Loyalty Day").

Juan Perón's first presidential campaign

   After his release from prison, Juan Perón decided to campaign for the
   presidency of the nation. Evita campaigned heavily for her husband
   during his 1946 presidential bid. Using her weekly radio show she
   delivered powerful speeches with heavy populist rhetoric urging the
   poor to align themselves with Perón's movement. Although she had become
   wealthy from her radio and modeling success, she would highlight her
   own humble upbringing as a way of showing solidarity with the
   impoverished classes.

   Along with her husband, Evita visited every corner of the country,
   becoming the first woman in Argentine history to appear in public on
   the campaign trail with her husband. (Incidentally, she was also the
   first woman in Argentine public life to wear trousers.) Eva's
   appearance alongside her husband often offended the establishment of
   the wealthy, the military, and those in political life. However, she
   was very popular with the public, who knew her from her radio and
   motion picture appearances, and therefore proved effective in getting
   attention from the poor and working class voters of Argentina. It was
   during this phase of her life that she first encouraged the Argentine
   population to refer to her not as "Eva Perón" but simply as "Evita",
   which is a Spanish diminutive or nickname roughly equivalent to "Little
   Eva".

European tour

   After Juan Perón's first election to the presidency on March 28, 1946,
   Evita gradually took a prominent political role in the government,
   eventually overshadowing even the vice-president of the nation in all
   but military affairs.

   In 1947, Evita embarked on a much-publicized "Rainbow Tour" of Europe,
   meeting with numerous heads of state, including Francisco Franco. It
   was aimed at being a massive public relations coup for the Perón
   regime, which in the post-World War II world was increasingly being
   viewed as fascist. She was well-received in Spain, where she visited
   the tombs of Spain's first absolutist monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella.
   Francoist Spain had not recovered from the Spanish Civil War (the
   autarkic economy and the UN embargo meant that the country could not
   feed its people). During her visit to Spain, Evita handed out 100-
   peseta notes to every poor child she met on her journey. Evita later
   met the Pope in Rome, and then travelled to Paris. In France and Italy
   she received mixed reactions. Some Italian protestors claimed that she
   represented a new form of fascism.

   The European tour was originally intended to include a trip to England
   to visit the royal family. Fraser and Navarro write that Evita called
   off the trip to England due to a sense of hurt vanity. When it was
   announced that the royal family was not able to meet Evita at the time
   she preferred, and that Evita's visit would not be treated by the royal
   family as being as important as the official state visit of United
   States First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, Evita called off the trip to
   England. The official reason for not visiting England was exhaustion.

   During her tour to Europe, Eva Perón was featured in a cover story for
   Time Magazine. The cover's caption — "Eva Perón: Between two worlds, an
   Argentine rainbow" — was a reference to the name given to Evita's
   European tour, The Rainbow Tour. This would be the first time in the
   periodical's history that a South American first lady appeared on its
   cover, and she remains the only South American first lady to have
   appeared there. However, the 1947 cover story was the first publication
   to mention that Evita had been born out of wedlock. In retaliation, the
   periodical was banned from Argentina for several months.

Charitable and feminist works

   After returning to Argentina from Europe, Evita would never again
   appear in public with the complicated hairdos of her movie star days.
   She would henceforth appear with her hair pulled back into a bun.
   Additionally, her style of clothing became more simple after the tour.
   No longer would she wear the elaborate couture of the European fashion
   houses. Perhaps in an attempt to make herself appear as more of a
   serious political figure, Evita would henceforth appear in public
   wearing modest business dress suit combinations.

   Evita came to be powerful within the Pro-Peronist trade unions. She
   also founded the Eva Perón Foundation, a charitable organization that
   built homes for the poor and homeless, and also provided free health
   care to citizens. Biographers Nicholas Fraser and Marysa Navarro write,
   "Under the auspices of the Foundation, Evita built 1,000 schools in the
   poorest areas of the country and handed these over to the State to
   operate." Fraser and Navarro counter claims that Evita's Foundation was
   wasteful, though effective:

     "Evita's social works have been persistently criticized for being
     wasteful, ill-conceived and unrelated to people's needs. The
     conservative military government that succeeded Perón concluded that
     the institutions of the Foundation were 'disproportionate to the
     aims, culture, and customs bringing about moral and family
     deviations.' However, although the Foundation adopted 'luxury' as a
     matter of policy, it did function better than many more rational and
     more frugal institutions. For the first time, there was no
     inequality in Argentine health care.... The work of the Foundation
     was deeply practical and personal, far more so than it might have
     been had it been bureaucractically exercised."

   Eva Perón also created the Female Peronist Party, which was the first
   large female political party in the nation. Navarro and Fraser write
   that by 1952, the party had 500,000 members and 3,600 headquarters
   across the country. In the election of 1952, this base of support won
   Perón the election by sixty-three percent. Navarro and Fraser also
   write that Evita has often been given credit for gaining for women the
   right to vote, but that this is not the case. Nor was Evita, even by
   her own admission, truly a feminist. And yet her impact on women in
   Argentina, write Navarro and Fraser, was great.

     "Yet Evita's effect on the condition of women in Argentina and on
     their political life was decisive; what she accomplished here was as
     important as anything else she did. A mass of women who cared little
     about women's rights and were indifferent to the concerns of
     middle-class feminists had entered politics because of Evita. They
     were the first Argentine women to be active in politics, they gave
     Perón a large majority in 1951 and they remained loyal to him and
     what they saw as the principles of Peronism long after their
     inspiration and figurehead had died."

   Evita also helped to create a personality cult around her husband, whom
   she elevated to nearly divine status, often comparing him to Christ and
   saying that all Peronists must be ready to die for Perón. Nicholas
   Fraser and Marysa Navarro say that this apotheosis was what ultimately
   corrupted Perón and debased the Peronist movement. In light of Evita's
   often verbose praise for her husband, the slightest criticism of Juan
   Perón was easily interpreted as unpatriotic. Evita even stated
   explicitly that only the Peronists were truly Argentine, and anyone who
   was anti-Peronist was not truly Argentine.

     "Perón is the heart, the soul, the nerve, and the reality of the
     Argentine people. We all know that there is only one man in our
     movement with his own source of light. We all feed off of that
     light. And that man is Perón!" — 1951 speech by Eva Perón

   Eventually, Evita became the centre of her own vast personality cult
   and her image and name soon appeared everywhere, with train stations, a
   city ("Ciudad Evita"), and even a star in the sky being named after
   her. Despite her dominance and political power, Evita was always
   careful to never undermine the important symbolic role of her husband.
   Evita was always careful to justify her actions by claiming they were
   "inspired" or "encouraged" by the wisdom and passion of Perón. And
   though she has often been interpreted as having been singularly
   ambitious in her own right, Navarro and Fraser claim (op. cit.) that
   everything Evita did was ultimately subordinate to the larger goals and
   aims of her husband's political agenda.

Campaign for vice-presidency

   A crowd of an estimated two million gathers in 1951 to show support for
   the Perón-Perón ticket.
   Enlarge
   A crowd of an estimated two million gathers in 1951 to show support for
   the Perón-Perón ticket.

   In 1951, Evita set her sights on earning a place on the ballot as
   candidate for vice-president. This move angered many military leaders
   who despised Evita and her increasing powers within the government.
   According to the Argentine Constitution, the Vice President
   automatically succeeds the President in the event of the President's
   death. The possibility of Evita becoming president in the event of Juan
   Perón's death was not something the military could accept.

   Evita did, however, receive great support from the working class, the
   unions, and the Peronist Women's Party. The intensity of the support
   she drew from these groups is said to have surprised even Juan Perón
   himself. Fraser and Navarro write that the wide support Evita's
   proposed candidacy generated indicated to him that Evita had become as
   important to members of the Peronist party as Juan Perón himself was.

   On August 22, 1951 the unions held a mass rally of two million people
   called "Cabildo Abierto". (The name "Cabildo Abierto" was a reference
   and tribute to the first local Argentine government of the May
   Revolution, in 1810.) The Peróns addressed the crowd from the balcony
   of a huge scaffolding set up near the Casa Rosada, the official
   government house of Argentina. Overhead were two large portraits of Eva
   and Juan Perón. It has been claimed that "Cabildo Abierto" was the
   largest public display of support in history for a female political
   figure . At the mass rally, the crowd demanded that Evita publicly
   announce her official candidacy as vice president. Evita pleaded for
   more time to make her decision. The exchange between Evita and the
   crowd of two million became, for a time, a genuine and spontaneous
   dialogue, with the crowd chanting, "¡Evita, Vice-Presidente!". When
   Evita asked for more time so she could make up her mind, the crowd
   demanded, "¡Ahora, Evita, ahora!" ("Now, Evita, now!"). Eventually,
   they came to a compromise. Evita told the audience that she would
   announce her decision over the radio a few days later.

   Eventually, Evita declined the invitation to run for vice-president,
   saying her only ambition was that in the large chapter of history that
   would be written about her husband, she hoped that in the footnotes
   there would be mention of a woman who brought the "hopes and dreams of
   the people to the president", who eventually turned those hopes and
   dreams into "glorious reality". In Peronist rhetoric, this event has
   come to be referred to as "The Renouncement", portraying Evita as
   having been a selfless woman in line with the Hispanic myth of
   marianismo. Most biographers, however, postulate that Evita did not so
   much renounce her ambition but rather caved to pressure from her
   husband, the military, and the wealthy, who preferred that she not
   enter the race.

   By 1951, it had also become evident that her health was rapidly
   deteriorating. In early 1950, Evita fainted in public and underwent
   surgery few days later. Although it was reported that she had undergone
   appendectomy, Evita had developed advanced cervical cancer. Fainting
   continued through 1951 (including the evening after "Cabildo abierto"),
   with extreme weakness and severe vaginal bleeding. Although her
   diagnosis was withheld from her by Juan, she knew she was not well, and
   a bid for the vice-presidency was not practical in light of her
   condition. Only a few months after "the Renouncement," Evita underwent
   a secret radical hysterectomy in an attempt to cure her of her advanced
   cervical cancer.
   The Peróns take part in Buenos Aires parade to celebrate Juan Perón's
   second inauguration on June 4, 1952.
   Enlarge
   The Peróns take part in Buenos Aires parade to celebrate Juan Perón's
   second inauguration on June 4, 1952.

   On June 4, 1952, Evita rode with Juan Perón in parade through Buenos
   Aires in celebration of his re-election as President of Argentina.
   (This was the first election in which Argentine women had been allowed
   to vote. Evita had organized women voters into the first truly powerful
   female political party in the country's history.) Evita was by this
   point so ill that she was unable to stand without support. Underneath
   her oversized fur coat was a frame made of plaster and wire that
   allowed her to stand. She took a triple dose of painkillers before the
   parade, and took another two doses when she returned home.

   In an official ceremony a few days after Juan Perón's second
   inauguration, Evita was given the official title of "Spiritual Leader
   of the Nation".

Death

   Despite having undergone hysterectomy by the preeminent American
   surgeon, George T. Pack, MD, Evita's cancer returned rapidly. She
   developed lung metastasis and was the first Argentinian to undergo
   chemotherapy (a novel treatment at that time). Despite all available
   treatment, she became emaciated, weighing only 36 kg by June of 1952.
   Evita died at the age of 33, at 8:27 p.m. on July 26, 1952. The news
   was immediately broadcast throughout the country, and Argentina went
   into mourning: all activity in Argentina stopped: movies stopped
   playing, restaurants were closed and patrons were shown to the door. A
   radio broadcast interrupted the broadcasting schedule, with the
   announcer reading, "It is my sad duty to inform you that today at 8:25
   p.m. Eva Perón, Spiritual Leader of the Nation, entered immortality".
   Eva Perón was granted an official state funeral. Evita's time of death
   was officially stated as 8:25 p.m. because it was felt that this time
   would be easier to remember.

   According to a Time magazine article published on Aug. 11, 1952 titled
   "In Mourning", the Peronist government enforced the beginning of daily
   periods of five minutes of mourning, following the daily radio
   announcement. This article also published the following list which it
   referred to as the "extravagant tributes" offered during the mourning
   period:

     * "The Union of Workers and Employees of the Food Industry cabled a
       request to Pope Pius XII to canonize Evita.
     * "Minister of Public Health Ramon Carrillo ordered a 220-lb. candle,
       the height of Evita (5 ft. 5 in.), to be installed in the ministry
       and lighted for an hour on the 26th day of every month (the day
       Evita died). Carrillo thought the candle would last 100 years or
       more.
     * "Schoolkids got prizes for poems and essays praising Evita. They
       were also told that she "got sick because she kissed the ill, the
       lepers, the consumptives."
     * "Carlos Aloé, super-Peronista governor of Buenos Aires province,
       fired an employee who refused to wear a black tie. A Buenos Aires
       youth was arrested for laughing on a streetcar. "Attitudes like
       this are antisocial," said Aloé.
     * "Eva's political cronies in high office, who stand to retain power
       if they can keep her memory alive, formed an "Association of
       Friends of Eva Perón" and asked, "What would Christ have been
       without his disciples?" (Eva's disciples, presumably, will be
       wanting to look after the more than $100 million which annually
       pours into her Social Aid Foundation, a "charity" which is
       Argentina's biggest business and keeps no accounting of funds.)
       Deprived thereafter of her tremendous popularity and imposing
       presence, the regime was increasingly forced to resort to
       repressive measures to compensate for the lost magnetism and
       popular support that Evita generated." (From )

   Upon her death, the Argentine public was told that Evita's age was only
   30. The discrepancy was meant to dovetail with Evita's earlier
   tampering with her birth certificate. After becoming the first lady in
   1946, Evita had her birth records altered to read that she had been
   born to married parents, and placed her birth date three years forward,
   making herself younger.

   Shortly before Evita's death, Dr. Pedro Ara was approached to embalm
   the body. Fraser and Navarro write that it is doubtful that Evita
   herself ever expressed a wish to be embalmed and suggest that it was
   most likely Juan Perón's decision. Dr. Ara was a professor of anatomy
   who had studied in Vienna and maintained an academic career in Madrid.
   His work was occasionally referred to as "the art of death". His highly
   advance embalming technique consisted of replacing the blood of the
   cadaver with glycerine, which retained all organs including the brain
   and created a very lifelike appearance, giving the corpses the
   appearance of "artistically rendered sleep". Dr. Ara was known in
   Buenos Aires society for his work. Among the people he had embalmed was
   Spanish composer Manuel de Falla. Dr. Ara claims that his embalming of
   Evita's corpse began on the night of her death and that by the next
   morning "the body of Eva Peron was completely and infinitely
   incorruptible" and therefore suitable for display to the public.
   The public procession of Evita's coffin through downtown Buenos Aires
   The public procession of Evita's coffin through downtown Buenos Aires

   In the book Perón and the Enigmas of Argentina, biographer Robert D.
   Crassweller claims that the Anglo Saxon nations of North America and
   Europe largely misunderstood Argentina's response to the death of Eva
   Perón as well as the ornate funeral she was granted. Crassweller
   attributes this misunderstanding to the unique cultural makeup of the
   Peróns and Argentina itself.

     "Almost lost among the memories of Evita that have caught the
     imagination of the world there was another that has been little
     noted but whose importance is considerable: the legacy of
     incomprehension. Her brief and dazzling years were so successful
     because, in good part, she was so profoundly of the ethos. 'I have
     the body and the soul and the blood of the people.' But it was the
     ethos of the old, Hispanic- Creole tradition, born in the interior
     out of Lima and nurtured on the Pampas. Like Perón, she was wholly
     indigenous in origin and formation and spirit; like him, she was
     distrusted and misunderstood in the Argentina of the Liberal System
     and in the outside world that knew only that Argentina."

     "The same was true with regard to Evita's dramatized death during
     her last ten months, the dying in public that she sought as
     confirmation of her devotion. Such an attitude toward mortality is a
     variation of the old Hispanic preoccupation with death and with the
     dignity and splendor associated with it. It had by then faded away
     in most of the European Catholic societies and it is unknown in the
     Anglo-Saxon nations. Therefore, many saw her ordeal and the
     responses of Perón and the vast public as elements in an essentially
     political passion play, an attempt to milk some sympathy and benefit
     out of what should have been a private tragedy."

Disappearance and return of corpse

   Shortly after her death, plans were made to construct a monument in
   Evita's honour. The monument, which was to be a statue of a man
   representing the " Descamisados", was projected to be larger than the
   Statue of Liberty. Evita's body was to be stored in the base of the
   monument and, in the tradition of Lenin's corpse, to be displayed for
   the public. Before the monument to Evita was completed, Juan Perón was
   overthrown in a military coup, the Revolución Libertadora, in 1955.
   Perón hurriedly fled the country and did not make arrangements to
   secure Evita's body.

   A military dictatorship took power in Argentina. The new authorities
   removed Evita's body from display and its whereabouts remained a
   mystery for years. From 1955 until 1971, the military dictatorship of
   Argentina issued a ban on Peronism. It became illegal not only to
   possess pictures of Juan and Eva Perón even in one's home, but to even
   speak their names. After sixteen years, the military finally revealed
   the location of Evita's body. It had been buried in a crypt in Milan,
   Italy, under the name "María Maggi". In 1995, Tomás Eloy Martínez
   published " Santa Evita", which detailed many previously unknown facts
   about the escapades of Evita's corpse, such as the fact that many wax
   copies were made of the corpse. Martínez claimed that the corpse was
   damaged with a hammer and that one officer even committed necrophiliac
   acts on one of the copies of the corpse.
   Eva Perón's tomb in La Recoleta Cemetery in the Buenos Aires district
   of Recoleta
   Enlarge
   Eva Perón's tomb in La Recoleta Cemetery in the Buenos Aires district
   of Recoleta

   In 1971, Evita's body was exhumed and flown to Spain, where Juan Perón
   maintained the corpse in his home. In 1973, Juan Perón came out of
   exile and returned to Argentina, becoming president for the third time.
   Perón died in office in 1974. Isabel Perón, who had been elected
   vice-president, thus became the first female president in the world. It
   was Isabel who had Evita's body returned to Argentina and (briefly)
   displayed beside Juan Perón's. The body was later buried in the Duarte
   family tomb in La Recoleta Cemetery, Buenos Aires. Extra measures were
   taken by the government to secure Evita's tomb. There is a trapdoor in
   the tomb's marble floor, which leads to a compartment that contains two
   coffins. Under the first compartment is a second trapdoor and a second
   compartment. That is where Evita's coffin rests. Biographers Marysa
   Navarro and Nicholas Fraser write that the claim is often made that
   Evita's tomb is so secure that it could withstand a nuclear attack. "It
   reflects a fear," they write, "a fear that the body will disappear from
   the tomb and that the woman, or rather the myth of the woman, will
   reappear."

Legacy

Popular culture

   In the epilogue for the 1996 reissue of Evita: The Real Life of Eva
   Perón Nicholas Fraser commented on Evita's late 20th century
   reemergence as a figure in popular culture:

     "'I will come again, and I will be millions,' Evita had said in one
     of her apocalyptic last speeches just before her death; but even she
     could not have foreseen her sudden transformation, from Latin
     American politician and religiose national cult figure to
     late-twentieth-century popular culture folk heroine."

   By the late 20th century, Eva Perón had become the subject of numerous
   articles, books, stage plays, and musicals, ranging from the biography
   The Woman with the Whip, to the B-grade film "Little Mother" , and a
   1981 TV movie called "Evita Peron" with Faye Dunaway in the title role.
   The most successful rendering of Eva Perón's life has been the musical
   production Evita. The musical began as a concept album co-produced by
   Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber, with Julie Covington in the title
   role. Elaine Paige would later be cast in the title role when the
   concept album was adapted into a musical stage production in London's
   West End. In 1980, Patti LuPone won the Tony Award for Best Leading
   Actress in a Musical for her performance as the title character.
   Nicholas Fraser claims that to date the musical stage production has
   been performed on every continent (except Antarctica) and has generated
   over $2 billion in revenue.

   As early as 1978, the musical was considered as the basis for a movie,
   with everyone from Patti LuPone, to Liza Minnelli, to Michelle
   Pfeiffer, to Meryl Streep, being considered for the title role. After a
   nearly 20-year production delay, Madonna was cast in the title role for
   the film version of the musical. Madonna would later win the Golden
   Globe Award for "Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy". In response to
   the movie starring Madonna, and in an alleged attempt to offer a more
   politically accurate depiction of Evita's life, an Argentine film
   company released "Eva Perón: The True Story". The Argentine production
   starred actress Esther Goris in the title role. This movie was the 1996
   Argentine submission for the Oscar in the category of "Best Foreign
   Film".

     "In her own country her story is at last part of history, arousing
     the sort of peaceful controversy one might expect from so
     astonishing a career. In the rest of the world, however, she has
     attained the condition of apotheosis — becoming a deity in the new
     world pantheon of electric celebrity."

   Nicholas Fraser suggests that Evita is the perfect popular culture icon
   for our times because her career foreshadowed what by the late 20th
   century had become common. During Evita's time it was considered
   scandalous for a former entertainer to take part in public political
   life. Her detractors in Argentina had often accused Evita of turning
   public political life into show business. But by the late 20th century,
   Fraser claims, the public had become engrossed in the cult of celebrity
   and public political life had become insignificant. Former actors and
   entertainers, from Ronald Reagan to Sonny Bono, Arnold Schwarzenegger,
   and Glenda Jackson, have often taken public political offices. In this
   regard, Evita was perhaps ahead of her time. Fraser also writes that
   Evita's story is appealing to our celebrity obsessed age because her
   story confirms one of Hollywood's oldest cliché, the rags to riches
   story.

   In the book Eva Perón: The Myths of a Woman, cultural anthropologist
   Julie M. Taylor claims that Evita has remained intriguing to people in
   Argentina and around the world due to the combination of four unique
   factors. Taylor writes:

     "In the images examined, the three elements consistently linked —
     femininity, mystical or spirituality power, and revolutionary
     leadership — display an underlying common theme. Identification with
     any one of these elements puts a person or a group at the margins of
     established society and at the limits of institutional authority.
     Anyone who can identify with all three images lays an overwhelming
     and echoing claim to dominance through forces that recognize no
     control in society or its rules. Only a woman can embody all three
     elements of this power."

   The fourth element in Evita's appeal, claims Taylor, is related to her
   status as a dead woman and the power that death holds over the public
   imagination. Further, Taylor claims that Evita's embalmed corpse is
   analogous to the incorruptibility of various Catholic saints, such as
   Bernadette Soubirous, and therefore holds powerful symbolism within the
   largely Catholic cultures of Latin America.

     "To some extent her continuing importance and popularity may be
     attributed not only to her power as a woman but also to the power of
     the dead. However a society’s vision of the afterlife may be
     structured, death by its nature remains a mystery, and, until
     society formally allays the commotion it causes, a source of
     disturbance and disorder. Women and the dead — death and womanhood —
     stand in similar relation to structured social forms: outside public
     institutions, unlimited by official rules, and beyond formal
     categories. As a female corpse reiterating the symbolic themes of
     both woman and martyr, Eva Perón perhaps lays double claim to
     spiritual leadership."

   Tomás Eloy Martínez suggests that Eva Perón has remained an important
   cultural icon for the same reasons as fellow Argentine Ché Guevara:

     "Latin American myths are more resistant than they seem to be. Not
     even the mass exodus of the Cuban raft people or the rapid
     decomposition and isolation of Fidel Castro's regime have eroded the
     triumphal myth of Che Guevara, which remains alive in the dreams of
     thousands of young people in Latin America, Africa and Europe. Che
     as well as Evita symbolize certain naive, but effective, beliefs:
     the hope for a better world; a life sacrificed on the altar of the
     disinherited, the humiliated, the poor of the earth. They are myths
     which somehow reproduce the image of Christ."

Allegations of fascism

   In the book Evita: The Real Life of Eva Perón authors Marysa Navarro
   and Nicholas Fraser write, "Around no historical figure in modern times
   are there such complicated myths as those that exist around Eva, second
   wife of Juan Domingo Perón." One of the most complicated aspects of Eva
   Perón's legacy regards her alleged connection to nazism, fascism, and
   her alleged role in aiding Nazi war criminals in escaping prosecution
   and living in anonymity in Argentina. Some authors and biographers have
   claimed that these allegations are true, while others claim they are
   merely among the many complicated myths to which Navarro and Fraser
   refer.

   The book The Real Odessa: Smuggling the Nazis to Perón's Argentina
   depicts Eva Perón on the cover along with Juan Perón. The 1980
   made-for-TV movie Evita Peron, starring Faye Dunaway, also portrays Eva
   as a Nazi conspirator. Movie critic Roger Ebert wrote, "(Eva Perón) let
   down the poor, shirtless ones by providing a glamorous facade for a
   fascist dictatorship, by salting away charity funds, and by distracting
   from her husband's tacit protection of Nazi war criminals." It has been
   claimed that Eva Perón's alleged support for Nazism is largely
   responsible for the negative portrayal of Eva Perón in the Broadway
   version of the musical "Evita" . When the musical debuted in London on
   June 21, 1978, the portrayal of Evita was comparatively sympathetic. By
   the time of musical's debut in New York City in 1979, the structure of
   the production had been reworked considerably, with some songs being
   omitted entirely. In literature about the production of the musical it
   has been speculated that this reworking of the musical to portray Evita
   as a villain rather than as a heroine was in large part done in
   response to the fear of reprimand, perhaps even boycotts, by the large
   Jewish population of New York City. (In contrast to London, New York
   City has one of the largest Jewish populations in the world.) The
   producers were perhaps fearful that if they portrayed Evita too kindly
   in the musical then they would be accused of glorifying a supporter of
   nazism and fascism.

   In 1997, Time Magazine published an article by Tomás Martínez, Director
   of the Latin American program at Rutgers University, titled "The Woman
   Behind the Fantasy: Prostitute, Fascist, Profligate — Eva Peron was
   Much Maligned, Mostly Unfairly". In this article, Martínez writes that
   Eva Perón was not a nazi or a fascist and that she played no role in
   aiding Nazi criminals escape post-war prosecution:

     "She was not a fascist—ignorant, perhaps, of what that ideology
     meant.... The difficulty in understanding Peronism and its two
     protagonists — Perón and Evita — stems above all from the fact that
     Perón sympathized with the Axis powers in 1944 and 1945, when he was
     a colonel and Minister of War. That blunder made him unacceptable to
     the U.S. The seeds of the idea that Evita shared his sentiments were
     also planted during that time. But Evita was more or less Perón's
     clandestine lover then and thought only of holding on to her man and
     surviving. She lacked not only any political ideology but also
     influence and power in either Perón's household or the political
     life of Argentina.... It is true that Perón facilitated the entrance
     of Nazi criminals to Argentina in 1947 and 1948, thereby hoping to
     acquire advanced technology developed by the Germans during the war.
     But Evita played no part."

   Lawrence Levine, the former president of the U.S.-Argentine Chamber of
   Commerce, writes that in contrast to Nazi ideology, the Peróns were not
   anti-semitic. In the book Inside Argentina from Perón to Menem:
   1950-2000 from an American Point of View, Lawrence Levine writes:

     "The American government demonstrated no knowledge of Perón's deep
     admiration for Italy (and his distaste for Germany, whose culture he
     found too rigid). Nor did they appreciate that although
     anti-Semitism existed in Argentina, Perón's own views and his
     political associations were not anti-Semitic. They paid no attention
     to the fact that Perón sought out the Jewish community in Argentina
     to assist in developing his policies and that one of his most
     important allies in organizing the industrial sector was Jose Ber
     Gerbald, a Jewish immigrant from Poland."

   Historian Robert D. Crassweller, author of Perón and the Enigmas of
   Argentina, does not address the allegations of Eva Perón's involvement
   with Nazi war criminals. However, Crassweller does address the
   allegation of Peronism's ties with nazi and fascist political ideology.
   Crassweller writes, "Peronism was not fascism", and "Peronism was not
   nazism." Crassweller also refers to the comments of U.S. Ambassador
   George S. Messersmith. While visiting Argentina in 1947, Messersmith
   made the following statement: "There is not as much social
   discrimination against Jews here as there is right in New York or in
   most places at home..."

   In his dissertation titled "The Jews and Perón: Communal Politics and
   National Identity in Peronist Argentina, 1946-1955", Lawrence D. Bell
   writes, "Despite the claims of Perón's detractors in the United States
   and elsewhere that he was anti-Semitic and in sympathy with European
   Fascism, Perón in fact demonstrated a considerable amount of pragmatism
   in his dealings with Argentina's 250,000 strong Jewish population."

   Nicholas Fraser and Marysa Navarro claim that Perón's detractors forged
   documents that were circulated around Argentina and England during
   Peron's first term. These documents made it appear that Evita had met
   with Nazis in Patagonia to arrange for the smuggling of Nazi loot into
   the country. Fraser and Navarro claim that the allegedly forged
   documents address a period of Evita's life when she was still an
   actress and Perón's mistress, and therefore any political action of any
   type was unlikely for Evita.

In Argentina

   In the book Eva Perón: The Myths of a Woman cultural anthropologist
   Julie M. Taylor notes that the precise nature of Eva Perón's power in
   Argentina is difficult to define because Eva Perón never held an
   official political office. Taylor also claims that Eva Perón's
   continuing importance in Argentine politics is directly related to her
   unofficial and uninstitutionalized position. Taylor suggests that
   because she was not an officially elected political leader, Eva Perón's
   power is often interpreted as existing not within the domain of
   politics but is often seen as aligned with, and deriving from, her very
   womanhood. Taylor argues that within Argentina Eva Perón has become the
   screen onto which many constrasting and complicated archetypes of
   womanhood are projected. For Argentines Eva Perón is often interpreted
   not as a politician but as either a corruption of, or the very
   embodiment of, "the feminine ideal". For Peronists, Eva Perón is often
   depicted as a mother figure, while anti-Peronists, such as Jorge Luis
   Borges, often claimed that Eva Perón was a prostitute.

   Fraser and Navarro claim that because Eva Perón died at the peak of her
   popularity, her myth has remained intact and she remains one of the
   most important symbols of Peronism. Though it is not an official
   government holiday, the anniversay of Evita's death is marked by
   Argentines every year. Additionally, Eva Perón has been featured on
   Argentine coins, and a form of Argentine currency called "Evitas" was
   named in her honour.

   On July 26, 2002, the 50th anniversary of Eva Perón's death, a museum
   opened in her honour called "Museo Evita". The museum, which was
   created by her great-niece Cristina Alvarez Rodriquez, houses many of
   Eva Perón's clothes, portraits, and artistic renderings of her life. It
   has become a popular tourist attraction. The museum was opened in a
   building that was once used by the Eva Perón Foundation.

Trivia

     * In 2003, The Simpsons parodied the musical Evita in an episode
       called " The President Wore Pearls". In this episode, Lisa Simpson
       seeks to be the president of the Springfield Elementary student
       body. The episode contains five songs, all of which are parodies of
       songs from Evita. For example, one song Lisa Simpson sings is
       called "Don't Cry for Me, Kids of Springfield," which is a parody
       of Evita's most famous song " Don't Cry for Me, Argentina". The
       episode ends with the following disclaimer: "On the advice of our
       lawyers, the producers would like to stress that they have never
       heard of a musical based on the life of Eva Perón."

     * On his official website, psychologist David Keirsey PhD. suggests
       that Eva Perón was the Extraverted Sensing Thinking Perceiving
       personality type. Dr. Keirsey, author of the book Please Understand
       Me, one of the most popular books on typology, refers to the ESTP
       personality type as "The Promoter". Dr. Keirsey suggests that pop
       singer Madonna is the same psychological type as he believes Eva
       Perón to have been.

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