State Support and Private Initiative: Patterns in the Development and Promotion of Tourism, 1930–1935

Abstract

In 1930, Editorial Mercurio, a publishing house in Mexico City managed by Francisco Borja Bolado1 that was responsible for producing such magazines as Social and MAPA,2 sent out a questionnaire about tourism to fellow Mexicans. It asked readers to return a one-page response to the following questions: “Do you think that recent events in Europe present Mexico with an opportunity to take immediate action to develop tourism on a grand scale? If so, what action should be taken?”3 More than a public opinion poll, this questionnaire aimed to create a community of tourist supporters. As the Great Depression lay heavy on Mexico’s economy and on those around the world, especially between the years 1931 and 1934, the momentum with which the state and private groups gained during the earliest promotion and development of tourism had almost entirely petered out. Unbeknown to tourist pioneers, especially Borja, it was not organizations, but individual tourist promoters—new and old, in Mexico and the United States—who kept the industry’s wheels turning during these years of economic crisis.