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A Pueblo Divided

STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

Contents

List of Illustrations and Tables...........................................ixAcknowledgments............................................................xiIntroduction...............................................................11. The Culture and Commerce of Mexico's Vanilla............................52. The Tecolutla River Basin...............................................343. The Vanilla Economy.....................................................804. The End of Communal Landholding.........................................1075. The Experience of Condueazgo...........................................1576. Division and Rebellion..................................................187Epilogue...................................................................281Appendix: Mexican, U.S., and French Vanilla Trade Data.....................287Notes......................................................................301Bibliography...............................................................351Index......................................................................373

Chapter One

Throughout the nineteenth century, and indeed for a good part of the eighteenth and twentieth centuries, the history of Papantla was inseparable from the history of its vanilla economy. To understand Papantla's past, one must understand vanilla. These pages trace the unexpected and somewhat fortuitous emergence of vanilla as a valuable spice of international commerce, showing how Papantla's vanilla economy acquired the characteristics that would define it in the nineteenth century. As will be seen, an historical examination of the economic botany, utilization, and commercial development of vanilla reveals the raison d'tre not only of aspects of production as diverse and fundamental as ownership of the crop, division of labor, capital inputs, scale of cultivation, timing of the harvest, and credit and purchasing mechanisms, but also of the geography of production-within and outside Mexico-and the structure of export markets.

While ordinarily this information might be obtained by recourse to previous scholarship, the case of vanilla presents special difficulties. For one, precious little is known about the historical development of Mexico's vanilla industry. Remarkably, even though until at least the 1850s virtually all of the vanilla ever consumed in Europe and the United States came from Mexico, Alexander von Humboldt was the first to report any details about its cultivation, preparation, and commerce. Its earlier history remains obscure. Witness the Abb Raynal's rambling Histoire philosophique et politique des tablissemens et du commerce des europens dans les deux Indes, which managed only to deplore the dearth of information about the vanilla economy of New Spain, flatly stating, "We are equally ignorant how many different species there are of it [vanilla]; which are the most valuable; what is the soil which suits them best; how they are cultivated; and in what manner they are propagated." As Humboldt pointed out, Raynal was not able even to name the districts where vanilla was produced, indicating only that it "grows in the inaccessible mountains of New Spain." One hundred years after Mexico achieved independence from Spain (1821), the literature on the Mexican vanilla business had outgrown Humboldt's Ensayo only slightly. Even though the international vanilla economy changed profoundly between 1820 and 1920, only three slim grower's manuals-by Rossignon (1859), Fontecilla (1861), and Lpez y Parra (1900)-date back to this period. Each described planting and curing techniques, but for the most part disregarded the social organization of the industry. Likewise, the natural and horticultural histories of vanilla have received scant attention. Although the notably complex economic botany of vanilla has undergone significant historical transformations, popular writings have tended to reduce it to a simple series of exotic vignettes; not surprisingly, various aspects of its development remain the subject of long-standing confusion. In sum, there is little to rely on by way of previous studies.

Out of necessity, therefore, a fresh effort has to be made here to map out and integrate the intricate botanic and economic histories of vanilla. This chapter is devoted to that task. It examines the production and reproduction of vanilla, its uses and markets, and its transformation from fruit to spice. The ensuing panorama will make it possible to understand the historical development of Papantla's rural economy.

Out of the Wilderness: Production and Reproduction

The spice commonly known as "vanilla" is the cured and fermented fruit of a tropical orchid native to the Americas. The "vanilla" used commercially is a flavoring extract made by combining glycerin, sugar, and alcohol with chopped or ground processed vanilla. In Spanish and in English the word refers both to the plant and to the fruit. In French, however, vanillier is the name of the plant and vanille is reserved for the fruit. As will be seen, this is a useful distinction, setting apart the agricultural and the processing stages of vanilla production.

There is not just one kind of vanilla plant, but many. Numerous species of the genus Vanilla (Orchidace family) are known to botanists, but according to a prominent student of the genus "only three ... (V. planifolia Andrews, V. pompona Schiede and V. tahitiensis J. W. Moore) are of commercial importance as sources of vanilla." In the process of curing, all three species develop vanillin, "the substance chiefly responsible for the peculiar fragrance and flavor of the vanilla bean." However, the planifolia produces by far the best vanilla for flavoring, and this has long been recognized. As such, merchants always preferred and sought out V. planifolia, and the modern vanilla trade has concentrated almost exclusively on this species. Yet before the late nineteenth century, when commercial standards were at last successfully enforced, it was quite common to sell other kinds, especially V. pompona, mixed in with and disguised as the legitimate sort, V. planifolia. Much of the early botanical research on vanilla in Europe was sparked by the desire to describe and classify the coveted "true vanilla of commerce," then synonymous with "the true Mexican vanilla of commerce," eventually labeled Vanilla planifolia.

It was in Mexico that the conquering Spaniards first came in contact with vanilla and learned its various local uses, and vanilla from the Viceroyalty of New Spain was, for the most part, all that could be had anywhere in Europe until the mid-nineteenth century. This largely uncontested monopoly within the Americas is remarkable, considering that V. planifolia is indigenous not only to Mesoamerica but also to a good part of South America and perhaps the Caribbean. V. planifolia is a climbing green vine whose aerial roots cling to neighboring trees for support; it is not, however, a parasitic plant, but rather an epiphyte. The supporting trees and shrubs shelter the vine from unfiltered sunlight and strong winds, which can impair growth or damage the delicate shoots, flowers, and fruits. The vine's...