by Raisa Martín Lobo

Surrounded by mountains, rivers and a blue sea, Guantanamo is a  land inhabited by people of all colors: whites, blacks, Indians and half-breeds… all in a mixture of traditions and customs.

Guantanamo emerged in the XIX century with the help of Haitian-French immigrants who settled in the ranch Santa Catalina, a territory with few population but with fertile, mountainous lands, good for the cultivation of coffee and cotton what was substituted later for the sugar company. This agricultural development brought about several immigrants from Catalonia, Spain.

In El Saltadero, one of the sides of Guaso River begins the emergence of a village and a community which main purpose at its beginning was to become a port for the collection of fruits, taking into account the navigable conditions of the river. Such was the beginning of the first urban center at the sides of Guaso River, heart of the commerce, in which the Catalans constructed their store houses. Today this is the surrounding of February 24th park.
The streets were few, only four from north to south and more less the same from east to west, and they had as natural limits Guaso River, Rafart stream and the abundant vegetation for the north side.

The village was growing and then some part of the population asked for the construction of a catholic temple and the staying of a priest, because the church services were done very sporadically. With such purpose three landholders, a Cuban and two French gave a property  which is now the most important part of the city, Jose Marti park, the former Arms Square.

The construction of the square and the church began in 1836, but was stopped for two years for a protest that stated that they were too far from downtown. So, with this second urban center the village began to extend to the north and by the end of 1840 the geometrician Jorge Sanz made the plan of the city.

The number of streets increased in number and extension, the last one was San Rafael that limited with the cemetery, territory occupied nowadays for the junior high school Pedro Agustin Perez.

With the passing of time, the village passed for different stages, in which influenced not only the increasing population but also the structure of the city that got some independence and got the title of village in 1870