Author Joe Sanchez Mexican History Research Presentation at the Weslaco Museum

The Weslaco Museum at 500 S. Texas will present a program by Joe Sanchez about the Mexican conquest by Hernan Cortes and his translator, La Malinche, on Saturday, February 20, at 2 p.m.  The program is free and the public is invited 

Sanchez, author, retired educator, and longtime Mayor of Weslaco, will share some of the fascinating details learned from his extensive research on this period of Mexican history. 

He will tell how Bernal Diaz Del Castillo, who was a conquistador with Cortes, recorded the battles and other events regarding the march from Vera Cruz to Tenochtitlan, which became the site of Mexico City.  This created an eyewitness account of the fall of the great Aztec city of Tenochitlan, one of the most magnificent cities in the world at the beginning of the 16^th century.   

La Malinche, who was born to Aztec nobility, was sold by her mother as a slave to the Mayans, where she learned their language.  Later she became a slave and interpreter for Hernan Cortes.   

Caught between two worlds, she was still a teenager when she became a slave to Cortes. Little did anyone know that she would change the course of history.  Speaking three languages, she moved within the Aztecs, the Maya and the Spanish worlds.  

Was she a traitor or a heroine?   History still wonders almost 500 years after her death.  In modern Mexico City, her house is still used near the site of one of the greatest battles in the world. 

The Weslaco Museum at 500 S. Texas is open Tuesday-Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.   The current exhibit until March 6^th is “The Art of Lenard Brown,” which commemorates Black History Month.   

-----------------

General admission is $3 adults, $2 senior citizens, $1 children ages 5-17, with free admission for museum members and children under age 5.  For further information, call the museum at 956-968-9142