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Show Mexico Takes 12,000 Spanish War Refugees Across-the-fence goes on wherever there are housewives. These Spanish women are chatting outside their homes in Santa Clara. One of the first pictures to come out of Mexico's Santa Clara colony for Spanish war refugees shows the characteristic types of men living thereJ afeCfV . -...I- -vv-.-vv;: The first connected and detailed de-tailed accounts of how 12,-000 12,-000 Spanish war refugees are faring in their new homes in Mexico are now beginning to trickle into the United States. In a nation of 20 million population, 12,000 refugees are no negligible neg-ligible factor and Mexico has faced many problems which may prove valuable object lessons to America, who soon will open the gates to some 2000 European Euro-pean political refugees. The first large delegation of Spanish refugees, 1620 of them, arrived in Mexico in midsummer of 1939. They were supporters of the republican re-publican regime and hence blacklisted and in danger from the triumphant Fran co. All had been .selected by Mexican consular officials offi-cials and were enthusiastically enthusiasti-cally greeted by the Mexican Mexi-can government and people. peo-ple. Although officials hoped to import farm laborers, who would stay with the soil and hqlp to build Mexican Mex-ican agriculture, it was soon found these refugees were lawyers, writers, teachers, journalists and intellectuals, intellec-tuals, who not only refused to stay on farms, but hied themselves immediately to Mexico's capital, Mexico City. Nonetheless. 1500 of them have formed the village of Santa Clara, where 7000 acres are now cultivated and 1000 cattle flourish on former desert land. Many Santa Clara colonists, are employed on new roads being built to the colony. This is one of their camps. |