From the first five years of the seventeenth century, the creoles from Camaguey would seek to break the colonial commercial and administrative siege, which barely allowed Havana-Cádiz traffic, and to make way for development in order to reconfigure the economy of the macro-region of Camaguey; geographically extended to the west with the Hatibonico river and up to Jobabo and Las Cabreras to the east of the island-archipelago.
Disagreements with the government would increase in that century. A century later, the contradictions with the creole elite from Havana, privileged by the capital’s government, would pose new challenges to the creoles from Camaguey. The free trade in hides was the privileged option that would open up regional borders on a large scale, with the objective that this irregular activity would contribute to achieve the regional development.
Camagüey would achieve it with a lot of effort and work, despite the stubbornness of the centralizing and absolutist Spanish government, which left no opportunity for prosperity and greater freedoms for the region of Camagüey. However, the 19th century would make it easier to squander the wealth accumulated over the centuries by the cattle oligarchy, the lobbyists and the wealthy merchants, all related by family and in an administrative way. That would be the favorable effect of the transfer to the town of the Real Audiencia from Santo Domingo; the emergence of the Camagüey branch of the Economic Society of Amigos del País; of the subsidiary of the Real Compañía de Comercio; the attempts of the French Jean Louis Cabanis to create the Botanical Garden, the Astronomy classroom and the Medical College; the creation of the Philharmonic; the opening of the Teatro Principal, the Popular Society of Santa Cecilia, the College of Practical Jurisprudence; the inauguration of the Calasancio College; the intention to open the first University; to install the third episcopal chair or catholic bishopric…; and the creation of the Institute of Application of Camagüey.
A little bit about history: the creation of the Institute
On June 1st, 1864, the Island’s Board of Public Instruction, according to the Royal Order of January 19th of that same year, approved the creation of the Application Institute in Camaguey city. Later, on October 30th, 1865, it would be granted the appointment of Institute of Secondary Education in order to expand the Application studies.
On October 10th, 1864, the first 29 pupils entered the classrooms at the corner house on San Diego and Reina Street, a school run by Dr. Delmonte y Garay. But the school would soon interrupt its classes for leaving several of its students and teachers to fight in the Ten Years’ War. In the Neocolonial Republic, given the progress and importance of secondary school studies, the Government would assign a budget to build a new building. Despite the inconveniences and delays of the project, it was finally inaugurated on the old grounds of Campo de Marte, near the Casino Campestre Park. This new enclosure would be inaugurated on October 10th, 1928.
A revealing speech…
Precisely because of its strategic and historical importance and because of its future projection, it is worth mentioning some excerpts from the inaugural speech delivered at the solemn opening session of the Institute of Application of Camagüey (on October 10th, 1864), the Graduate in Jurisprudence and professor of Political Economy, Commercial and International Law, Fernando Betancourt y Betancourt; oratorical piece that was published by the «El Fanal» printing office:
“(…) I believe it was my duty to speak up to dispel some doubts that exist (sic.) Among us regarding the nature and purpose of the Institute, and to listen to the opinions so that all contribute to the good that offers us the Supreme Government.
By the old laws our system of public instruction was reduced to a few schools of first letters in the city, chairs of Latin and Philosophy in convents, the Seminaries and the Royal and Pontifical University of the Island (Havana), where students learned Philosophy, Theology, Jurisprudence, Medicine, etc. Over time, elementary and higher education schools expanded, reaching rural areas, where children of both sexes could receive an elementary education.
The intermediate education establishments were missing at the time, those establishments that are not reduced to teaching the multitude to read, but to doing so that not a single talent is missed, putting each one in its place and giving it the corresponding level of instruction. In another part of the speech the enlightened from Camagüey referred to: “Because Public Education is not for the sole good of the family, but for the good of the country, subject to the general good of humanity. Otherwise the order would be disturbed, and that much desired good would be damaged.
The current system of civilization calls for men capable of fulfilling their duties at all times, and of deserving the title of citizens. To achieve this, it was necessary for the intermediate education establishments to be as extensive as required by the local circumstances of each town or province; because intermediate education is directed to the body of societies; to all those who have no vocation or possibility to be lawyers, doctors, etc. In this Institution is focused on the study of living languages and natural sciences: Literature, Moral Philosophy, General History of the country, Political Economy, local institutions; in short, everything that can form a good citizen, everything that can help to improve our industry, perfect our agriculture, expand the spirit and fertilize the understanding. For this reason this Institution must be adapted according to the intellectual and natural faculties of each province”.
This void left by the old laws on public instruction is the one that the new Royal Decree comes to fill with the establishment of the Application Institutes in the main cities of the Island. For this purpose, these Institutes have been provided with Chairs to teach French and English, languages so necessary nowadays, as Greek and Latin were once for the entire civilization(…) The Institute also has chairs in Geography and History, Geography and Statistics, Theoretical natural history and practical Agriculture, Physics and Chemistry, Industrial Mechanics and Applied Chemistry, Pure and Mixed Mathematics, Bookkeeping, Accounting and Commercial Operations, Political Economy, Commercial and International Legislation; abilities that open new doors to the youth, careers in consonance with the century and local needs.
Thus, the Institute will not provide our population with lawyers or doctors, but it will provide agronomists who will perfect our bad agricultural system, chemical experts, who, analyzing the natural productions of the soil, will indicate their properties and the utility they can bring; intelligent mechanics that will facilitate the operations of the toughest jobs; surveyors who will demarcate our properties and regularize not only our public roads, but also our urban and rustic ones; quantity surveyors who will ensure the complete execution of our buildings with all the security measures and finishing touches needed; finally, men who know that all property has as its origin the natural law of work, that without it cannot be accumulated wealth, a constant desire of every society; finally, men, who, knowing their duties and the extent of their rights, will know how to respect those of their associates ”.
The founding professor of the Camagüey Institute, Fernando Betancourt, concluded: “(…) the aim of achieving the moral and intellectual improvement of my brothers, so that when from other points people shout:“ progress, advance, wealth ”; They, following the education they have received, answer: “duty, virtue, honor …”
A forging Institute of Good Men
He was not mistaken; professionals in all branches of knowledge and work would emerge from their classrooms; and with enough courage to undertake the liberating revolution that was needed in the colonized nation. For this reason, dozens of his students would march to the battlefield in the Ten Years’ War; they would also follow that same course in the War of Independence, in 1895, after the call of José Martí and Salvador Cisneros; in the Neocolonial Republic they would come forward to overthrow the bloody dictatorships that would cast a shadow over the country; and to finally conquer the new, dignified, free, sovereign, prosperous and independent homeland of imperial protection.
Translated by: Aileen Álvarez García
