Pichilemu - History

History

Pichilemu was inhabited by Promaucaes, a pre-Columbian tribal group, until the Spanish conquest of Chile. They were hunter-gatherers and fishermen who lived primarily along the Cachapoal and Maule rivers. The remaining Promaucaes were assimilated into Chilean society through a process of hispanicization and mestization after the conquest of Chile.

Aureliano Oyarzún, professor of pathology at University of Chile, investigated pre-Ceramic middens from Pichilemu and Cahuil. His book Crónicas de Pichilemu–Cáhuil (Chronicles of Pichilemu–Cáhuil) was published posthumously, in 1957. Tomás Guevara published two volumes of Historia de Chile, Chile Prehispánico (History of Chile, Pre-Hispanic Chile) in 1929, which discusses the indigenous center of Apalta, the Pichilemu middens, the Malloa petroglyphs, a stone cup from Nancagua, and pottery finds in Peralillo.

José Toribio Medina (1852–1930), who was a writer and historiographer, spent most of his life in Colchagua Province, and completed his first archeological investigations in Pichilemu. In 1908, he published Los Restos Indígenas de Pichilemu (English: The Indigenous Remains of Pichilemu), in which he stated that the Indians that were inhabiting Pichilemu when the Spaniards arrived at Chile were Promaucaes, part of the Topocalma encomienda, given on January 24, 1544, by Pedro de Valdivia to Juan Gómez de Almagro, therefore establishing Pichilemu.

During the colonial and Republican periods, agriculture was promoted by the government. Many Chilean haciendas (estates) were successful during this time, including the Pichileminian Hacienda San Antonio de Petrel. Part of the land where San Antonio de Petrel was created was given by the Captaincy General of Chile to Bartolomé de Rojas y Puebla in 1611, who later acquired more lands in order to establish it. San Antonio de Petrel produced leather, jerky, soles, tallow, and cordovan, as well as other products which would later be exported to Peru, or sold in Santiago and Valparaíso. San Antonio de Petrel was bordered by properties of Lauriano Gaete and Ninfa Vargas, and Pedro Pavez Polanco.

The area around Pichilemu was very densely populated, especially in Cáhuil, where there are salt deposits that were exploited by natives. Pichilemu has had censuses taken since the 17th century.

In 1872, President of Chile Aníbal Pinto commissioned the corvette captain Francisco Vidal Gormaz to perform a survey of the coast between Tumán Creek and Boca del Mataquito. He concluded that Pichilemu was the best place to construct a ferry. The family of Daniel Ortúzar, inheritors of the hacienda San Antonio de Petrel, constructed a dock in 1875, which served as a fishing port for a few years, and would be decreed as a "minor dock" by President José Manuel Balmaceda in 1887. Homes were built along the dock on what currently is the Daniel Ortúzar Avenue (Avenida Daniel Ortúzar). The name Pichilemu comes from the Mapudungún words pichi (little) and lemu (forest).

During the 1891 Chilean Civil War, Daniel Ortúzar and the priest of Alcones were transferred as prisoners from Pichilemu to Valparaíso via the dock, which was later burned. The dock was later reconstructed and used until 1912, but it never reached "port" status.

The inheritors of Lauriano Gaete and Ninfa Vargas, who were proprietaries of the land which is currently Central Pichilemu, founded the town in late 1891 after conceiving the design of the city with engineer Emilio Nichón. By decree of President Jorge Montt and his Interior Minister, Manuel José Irarrázabal, the city was officially established as an "autonomous commune" on December 22, 1891. José María Caro Martínez became the first mayor of the city in 1894, and regularized and improved the design of the city the same year. Caro Martínez held the mayor office until 1905.

Agustín Ross Edwards, a Chilean writer, Member of Parliament, minister, and politician, bought a 300-hectare (740-acre) tract of land, and named it La Posada, in 1885. At the time, it was merely a set of thick-walled barracks.

Agustín Ross turned Pichilemu into a summer resort town for affluent people from Santiago. He designed an urban setting that included a park and a forest of over 10 hectares (25 acres). He transformed La Posada into a hotel, named Gran Hotel Pichilemu, which has since been renamed to Hotel Agustín Ross. He built the Ross Casino (currently a cultural center), several chalets, terraces, embankments, stone walls, a balcony facing the beach, and several large homes with building materials and furniture imported from France and England. However, Ross was not able to build the dock he had planned for the city. He died in 1926 in Viña del Mar. Agustín Ross' inheritors donated all of his constructions (streets, avenues, squares, seven hectares of forests, the park in front of the hotel, the perrons, the balcony, and the terraces) to the Municipality of Pichilemu, on the condition that the municipality would hold them for recreation and public access. The Agustín Ross Casino, constructed in 1905, and the Agustín Ross Park, constructed in 1885, have since become an important part of the city, and have been declared Monumentos Históricos (Historic Monuments) by the National Monuments Council.

After the creation of the Cardenal Caro Province, by decree of General Augusto Pinochet on October 3, 1979, Pichilemu became its capital. The province is named after the first Chilean Catholic Cardinal, José María Caro Rodríguez, who was born in Pichilemu.

Pichilemu was severely affected by the February 27, 2010, Chile earthquake and its subsequent tsunami, which provoked massive destruction in the coastal zone. On March 11, 2010, at 11:39:41 (14:39:41 UTC), a magnitude 6.9 earthquake occurred 15 kilometres (9 mi) northwest of Pichilemu, killing one person.