Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
than 600 unemployed workers were sitting idle in Puerto Castilla with
more arriving by the day.
36
The United Fruit Company's decision to pull
out of Colón and dissolve the Truxillo Railroad Company precipitated a
wave of out-migration in the late 1930s. Among those who left were Feli-
ciano Núñez and Margarita Gonzales. Feliciano Núñez had first migrated
to the North Coast in the late 1920s when he worked briefly as a banana
harvester for an independent grower in the Ulúa valley before returning
to his birthplace in a mountainous region south of Tegucigalpa.
37
Around
1931, Feliciano returned to the North Coast (a ten-day journey on foot)
where he had brief stints with both Standard Fruit and the Truxillo Rail-
road Company. He subsequently turned to farming a small tract of land.
This venture ended in failure and Feliciano found himself once again har-
vesting and hauling bananas, this time for poquiteros in the Aguán valley.
In December 1938, the imminent closure of the Truxillo Railroad Com-
pany's farms and concomitant decline in rail service prompted Feliciano,
Margarita, and their two children to leave the area. Traveling aboard fruit
company trains and steamers, the family joined hundreds of unemployed
people in search of new livelihoods.
In Puerto Cortés, Feliciano and Margarita tried to find work through
agodmotherwhoseNorthAmericanhusbandwasamandadorfortheTela
Railroad Company. However, jobs were scarce and the godmother could
only arrange for Feliciano to work one day per week in the U.S. consul-
ate. On Christmas Eve, the family boarded a company train bound for El
Progreso. Feliciano recalled the grim situation on the farms: ''There was
nothing by way of work. Nothing. Everyone there was just hanging out in
the camps. One group was playing cards, another group playing maule,
another group played trompo;others played domino. They used beer and
soda bottle caps for chips.''
38
The couple's luck began to turn when they
came upon some friends who offered Margarita a position as a cook on
yet another farm. The job enabled Margarita to feed her two daughters,
but Feliciano was forced to get by on charity. He worked irregularly until
the early 1940s when he landed a position as a subcomandante (a secu-
rity guard on the payroll of the Tela Railroad Company) responsible for
keeping the peace on the company's farms. He continued to work for the
company until 1954. Over a period spanning twenty-five years, Feliciano
migrated frequentlyand engaged in a varietyof livelihoods. Heweathered
a period of prolonged unemployment and dislocation by drawing on the
support of extended family, friends and his spouse.
39
The fruit companies laid off thousands of workers during World
War II when shipping restrictions led to a sharp decline in U.S. banana
