Figure 1.--Here we see Chilean children in a Viña del Mar park for some sort of activity. It is a Magic Lantern slide. We had thought that Magic Latern slides were mostly taken in the late-19th and early-20th century. This one, however, looks more like the 1930s.

We have little information on boyhood activities in Chile at this time. Our Chilean archives is very limited. This probably reflects the fact that Chile has a relatively small population. We notice children enjoying an urban park in Chile. Latin American cities and towns tend to have a central park known as the plaza, The church is on on side and the city hall on the other. The lpalza has a circumference walkway and interior walk ways with garden planyings. Benches are sactered around the plaza. There are not a lot of activities for children, but teenagers like to walk around. The major cities like Santiago have a number of interesting parks. Chile along with Argentina and Uruguay have European influebces beyond the Spanish/Portuguese influces thst dominant much of the rest of the region. And we see that in some of the parks. We have one park sacene from Viña del Mar. The most imprtant of course was school. Chile had one of the best education stytems in South America. Chile was a primarily Catholic country and religion played an important role in the lives of children. Sports are popular, but largely dominated by soccer known as futbol. Youth groups are of a lesser imporance. We do have some information on Chilean Boy Scouts. Membership was fairly limited.

Created: 3:46 AM 10/30/2018
Last updated: 3:46 AM 10/30/2018