Word: pati
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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High up in the thin, cold air of the Bolivian Andes, shrewd Mestizo Simón I. Patiño built for himself and his family an empire of tin. It was founded on the peon labor of mountain Indians whose lowly wage offset the high cost of transporting Patiño's ores to world markets. The mines Patiño developed from the original holding he acquired from a debt-ridden Portuguese made him one of the richest men in the world. But last week the manner in which he got his wealth returned, to plague...
...Around Patiño's tin Bolivia grew; by tin, today, Patiño's empire and Bolivia's foreign trade must stand or fall. Symbols of Patiño's eminence are the three palaces he built, but never occupied, in the mountains. A symbol of the foundations on which his empire rests are silicosis-ridden miners who, when their health is shattered, creep back to their tribe's huts...
Last week Patiño's Indians went on strike, and the tin empire and Bolivia trembled. A week after the deadline for re-enactment of an enlightened labor code, workers at the Catavi mines walked out, demanding a 100% wage increase, a Christmas bonus, which they claimed was theirs by law, and the end of the company stores (virtually their only source of food and clothing) which kept them constantly in debt...
...Government took immediate and drastic measures. Worried President Enrique Peñaranda del Castillo declared a state of siege throughout Bolivia, clamped martial law on the five tin-mining areas of the Patiño holdings. At week's end it was announced that a plot by Leftist Revolutionaries had been nipped in the bud. The plan, said the Government, was to cause the forces of the Bolivian army to be dispersed throughout the mining areas, then in provincial capitals, to create disturbances which would end in revolution. This week the Government announced the arrest of two Bolivian leaders...
From Paris many years ago, after a "Communist-inspired" strike in his mines had been put down by soldiers, Bolivian Ambassador Patiño cabled to an assistant in La Paz: "Arturito, cause to be opened the doors of my house. I want the people to see the beauties it contains." The stolid Indians looked at the sculptured halls, the marble bathtubs, the Renaissance gilding, the tapestry-hung walls. They grew angry, scribbled insulting verses, pointed caricatures. The palace doors were closed and have remained shut since...