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Mayagüez, Puerto RicoMayagĂĽez (pronounced Mah-yah-GWEHZ) is the third largest city of Puerto Rico. Also known as "La Sultana del Oeste" (The Western Sultana) or "Ciudad de las Aguas Puras" (City of Pure Waters), MayagĂĽez is located in the western part of the island of Puerto Rico. Its area is of 197 km2 with an estimated population of just over 100,000. MayagĂĽez is located 2 hours by automobile from San Juan. Natives of MayagĂĽez are known as mayagĂĽezanos.  
HistoryMayagĂĽez was founded in 1760 by Faustino MartĂnez de Matos, Juan de Silva and Juan de Aponte, at a hill located about one kilometer inland from MayagĂĽez Bay and the outlet of the YagĂĽez River. "YagĂĽez" was the indigenous name for the local river (the word means "clear water" in the language of its original inhabitants, the TaĂno tribe). "MayagĂĽez" is a variation on this name, which means "Land of the Clear Waters" and eventually gave the city its nickname. The Taino's had settled the area for hundreds of years before the town's founding, at the nearby settlement of YagĂĽeca (also spelled Yagueca or Yaweka), which sits near a larger river, the RĂo Grande de Añasco. The Spanish Crown granted the founders the right to self-government in 1763, formally separating the town from the larger Partido de San Germán. Originally the settlement was named “Our Lady of the Candelaria of Mayaguez”. Most of the town's settlers, including its founders, came originally from the Canary Islands, whose patron saint is the Virgin of Candlemas (Candelaria), hence the name. In 1836, the settlement was elevated to the royal status of villa — at the time the principal industry was agriculture. The famous patriot, educator, sociologist, philosopher, essayist, and novelist Eugenio MarĂa de Hostos was born in MayagĂĽez in 1839. In 1841 a fire nearly destroyed the villa. The town was rebuilt with some of its main roads widened as to prevent any future fires to spread quickly. The Spanish military governor of Puerto Rico, Gen. Santiago de MĂ©ndez Vigo raised funding through a subscription fund to rebuild the entire city; as a result one of MayagĂĽez's two main thoroughfares was named after him. MayagĂĽez later became the cultural and political center of the western part of Puerto Rico. Due to its physical isolation from the rest of the island (the city was founded on a coastal valley surrounded by mountains) and its need for self-sufficiency from Puerto Rico's main government (which, some of its current inhabitants claim, lasts to this day) MayagĂĽez developed a peculiar local culture and a strong sense of regional pride that tends to distinguish its inhabitants from the rest of Puerto Rico's. Some historians claim that this strong, fiercely independent culture was responsible for breeding not only liberal thinkers such as Eugenio MarĂa de Hostos, but also radical ones such as Dr. RamĂłn Emeterio Betances, the father of the Puerto Rican independence movement and founder of MayagĂĽez's Municipal Hospital (currently known as Hospital San Antonio), Segundo Ruiz Belvis, the father of the Puerto Rican Abolitionism movement and a former city administrator, and JosĂ© de Diego, first president of the Puerto Rico House of Representatives and founder of the local College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts. The Grito de Lares, Puerto Rico's first major pro-independence revolt, was planned at a farm in the outskirts of town. The September 23, 1868 revolution was chiefly remotely organized by Dr. Betances who, twelve years earlier, had literally saved the town from exticntion by a cholera epidemic that killed over 30,000 people in the island and decimated the town's population. The Escuela Libre de MĂşsica or Free Music School was founded in 1894 and directed by Don Fernando Callejo. In 1896, a statue was raised in the main plaza to honor Cristopher Columbus. That same year the villa formally received its city charter from the Spanish Royal Crown and given its current formal title, "Excelente Ciudad de MayagĂĽez". On August 11, 1898, during the Spanish-American War, U.S. troops entered MayagĂĽez. Spanish troops encircled the city however. the battle never occured. In 1911, the College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts was founded in MayagĂĽez. Today it is known as the University of Puerto Rico - MayagĂĽez Campus (UPRM) — the Caribbean's leading science and engineering institution. The city of MayagĂĽez was nearly destroyed again on October 11, 1918 by an earthquake and a tsunami. In June 20, 1919 a fire nearly destroyed the Teatro YagĂĽez, the town's main theater, killing 92 people. The Teatro was later rebuilt and remodeled twice; it is now MayagĂĽez's municipal theater. The city's main Roman Catholic church, “Our Lady of the Candelaria” was rebuilt in 1922. The original redesign by architect Luis Perocier sought to restore the building to its original splendor (not only the 1918 earthquake had destroyed the temple's ceiling, but a lightning bolt also struck and tore down a wedge-shaped corner of one of its two bell towers), but lack of proper funding and the extent of the damage in the original structure forced the actual rebuilding of the church to be scaled-down considerably. Pope Paul VI authorized the founding of the Diocese of MayagĂĽez on April 30, 1976, which led to the rededication of the church as a cathedral soon after. The first bishop of the city, Mon. Ulises Casiano Vargas led the drive for the cathedral's remodeling to Perocier's original plan; the remodeled cathedral was reopened on January 1, 2004. Between 1962 and 1998 MayagĂĽez was a major tuna canning and processing center. At one time, 80% of all tuna products consumed in the United States were packed in MayagĂĽez. MayagĂĽez was also a major textile industry hub; until very recently, almost a quarter of all drill uniforms used by the United States Army were sawn in the city. On May 12, 1975 a unit of the Cambodian Khmer Rouge seized a container ship, the USS MayagĂĽez, on the Gulf of Siam. The botched recovery of the ship's crew by the U.S. Marine Corps off the island of Koh Tang -which occurred on May 15- became known as the MayagĂĽez Incident, considered by historians as one of president Gerald Ford's foreign policy setbacks. The container ship was actually part of the then government-owned Navieras de Puerto Rico, which explains why the city's name became entangled in such a major military international incident. MayagĂĽez todayAlthough the city has seen its share of natural disasters, today it faces an economic downturn due to the closure of the needle factories and tuna industry, which where the principal industries of the city for the most part of the century. The city still continues to play an important role in the western part of the island. Today, MayagĂĽez has become a major college town, due in part to UPRM, the Eugenio Maria de Hostos Law School and the Pontiff Catholic University of Puerto Rico, among other educational institutions located in the area. wow MayagĂĽez is also home to the MayagĂĽez Zoo. MayagĂĽez's BSN professional basketball team, the Tainos de MayagĂĽez, are named in honor of the city's Indian heritage. Its LBPPR baseball team, the Indios de MayagĂĽez, honor both their Indian heritage and the home town's CervecerĂa India. MayagĂĽez's airport, the Eugenio Maria de Hostos Airport, has had airline services for a long period of time. In the 1970s it had domestic service from Prinair. After 1985, both American Airlines (with American Eagle) and Eastern Airlines (with Eastern Metro Express) started flights there, but Eastern went bankrupt in 1991 leaving American as the only operator. Nowadays, Pan Am was said to be planning to start MayagĂĽez's first jet service ever, with Boeing 727s flying between MayagĂĽez and Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, but the plans were never carried out. In addition, Fina Air flies from there to the Dominican Republic. Well-known "mayagĂĽezanos" include: singer (Armando HipĂłlito) Chucho Avellanet, his nephew, former Menudo Roberto Avellanet, late former governor Roberto Sánchez Vilella, late former Speaker of the Puerto Rico House of Representatives Ernesto Ramos Antonini, and the late former MayagĂĽez Mayor, Benjamin Cole, whom served for 24 years in a row as mayor of the city. Two major Latino television stars in the United States, singer and show host Rafael JosĂ© (Diaz) and anchorwoman MarĂa Celeste Arrarás, were raised in MayagĂĽez. The current mayor of MayagĂĽez is JosĂ© Guillermo RodrĂguez of the PPD. MayagĂĽez is served by Eugenio MarĂa de Hostos Airport.
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