“I’ll distract those things,” said Marina. “You two get out of here.” She handed Maite a small object. “Meet me here.”
“Non?” asked Maite, looking at the object in her hand. It looked like one of those die Dungeons and Dragons players used, except there were no markings on the faces. “How do we use this…?” she began, but Marina was already gone, rushing through the crowd, knocking people over as she dashed to the other side of the hall. The spheres, red lights flashing and reflecting against the ceiling and walls, gave chase.
The Adventures of Maite and Kepa is a weekly serial. While it is a work of fiction, it has elements from both my own experiences and stories I’ve heard from various people. The characters, while in some cases inspired by real people, aren’t directly modeled on anyone in particular. I expect there will be inconsistencies and factual errors. I don’t know where it is going, and I’ll probably forget where it’s been. Why am I doing this? To give me an excuse and a deadline for some creative writing and because I thought people might enjoy it. Gozatu!
“Orain!” hissed Kepa. “Now! Goazen!”
Kepa grabbed Maite’s hand and pulled her through the door and into the hall. Scanning the room, he noticed a large entryway that seemed to lead to a tunnel. People were flowing in and out of the opening. Marina had gone in the opposite direction, drawing the spheres away.
“This way!” he said, tugging on Matie’s arm. “It must be the exit.”
They weaved their way through the crowd, deliberately trying not to bump into too many people to avoid a scene and draw the attention of the spheres. They heard a crash behind them. Turning, they saw Marina at the far end of the hall, standing on a table or something, smashing one of the floating monitors. The spheres were converging on her.
Kepa stopped. “We have to help her!”
“Ez!” barked Maite. “Marina will be fine. Her vessel…” Maite shrugged. “She knows what she is doing.”
The crowd had begun drifting toward the end of the hall where Marina was making a scene. Kepa and Maite continued to make their way upstream, toward the exit. Reaching the large circular opening, they stepped on a sparkling white conveyor belt that took them out of the hall.
“Are you sure she’ll be ok?” asked Kepa.
Maite nodded as she looked at the small dodecahedron in her hand. “We just need to figure out where we are supposed to go.”
The conveyor belt took them through a glass tunnel through which they could see outside. The strange buildings, with their organic shapes that seemed to meld with trees and vines, towered over them. The tunnel above them ended as the conveyor belt dumped them onto a small plaza. The ground seemed to be made of solid stone rather than the bricks or concrete they were used to from their time. People rushed around them, moving in all directions. Kepa watched as one particularly large man approached what looked like to him a large, human-sized egg. The man simply walked through the shell and moments later the egg shot into the sky, carrying the man with it. Another egg seemed to form out of nothing to take its place.
Kepa shook his head. “Can we find somewhere to sit down a moment?”
If you get this post via email, the return-to address goes no where, so please write blas@buber.net if you want to get in touch with me.
The late 1700s were a turbulent time for Europe, with the United States declaring independence and Napoleon trying to conquer the continent. It was also a time in which scientific enlightenment was crescendoing, leading to many people having both distinguished military and political careers as well as making important contributions to science. According to Julio Caro Baroja, Cosme Damián de Churruca, a sailor from Gipuzkoa, symbolized “in a most perfect way the studious and hard-working life of the sailor with scientific affinities.”
Cosme Damián de Churruca y Elorza was born on September 27, 1761, to Francisco de Churruca and María Teresa de Elorza in Mutriku, Gipuzkoa, very close to where the Bizkaian-Gipuzkoan border hits the Atlantic Ocean. He was born to a noble family and, as the third son, was destined for a life away from home (his eldest brother inherited the family property while the second became a priest). He himself studied to be a priest as well, but during his schooling a passion for the life of a sailor was awakened within him. He wasn’t the first of his family to become a sailor – his ancestor Antonio de Gaztañeta had blazed that trail before him.
As he studied to become a naval officer, his interest in science and math also grew. In particular, he noted and envied the knowledge of the big sea-faring nations, writing to his father that he wished that he knew English and French since all of the great books were written in those languages and bemoaning the fact that he could not find such books on “arithmetic, geometry, trigonometry, cosmography, geography, astronomy, algebra, tactics, navigation, maneuvering, artillery or drawing” where he was. He later studied algebra, calculus, and mechanics, achieving the top place in his class.
In 1788, along with Ciriaco de Ceballos, he was sent to the Strait of Magellan to complete mapping the region. They studied sea currents, winds, and the topography of the strait, both for a more basic understanding of the area as well as to enhance the commercial and political benefits of the strait. He was also involved in the completion of the Atlas of North America. Based on the island of Trinidad, he spent three and a half years directing expeditions to map the region.
In 1805, he married María Dolores Ruiz de Apodaca, niece of Juan Ruiz de Apodaca. Only a few months later, he found him self in the Battle of Trafalgar, part of the combined Spanish and French fleets fighting the British in the War of the Third Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars. This battle, off the southern coast of Spain, was decisive in thwarting Napoleon‘s plans to invade Britain and was one of Britain’s greatest naval victories but cost them the life of Horatio Nelson. Under Churruca’s command, the San Juan Nepomuceno found itself alone in a fight with six British ships. Churruca ordered that the ship’s colors be nailed to the mast, meaning that they would fight to the end. The ship fought admirably, but Churruca took a cannonball to the leg and died. The British displayed his ship in Gibraltar for several years. His enemies so admired his bravery and skill that, when they captured his ship, they demanded that anyone entering his cabin remove their hat, as if he were still alive. His name was emblazoned with gold letters above his cabin.
During his life, in addition to publishing many cartographic works, he published a manual on military instruction aboard his ship, another on the geometric analysis of the keel of broken ships, and a manual on marksmanship. He served briefly as mayor of Mutriku. In remembrance of their native son, a statue was raised in Mutriku in the late 1800s.
“Zer?!?” exclaimed Maite. “De Lancre is here too?”
Marina, or at least the woman whom Marina was possessing, nodded her head. “Bai. And he’s been here a while. He’s somehow worked himself up in the government. He’s an advisor to the lehendakari.”
“The Lehendakari?” asked Kepa. “We still have our own president?”
The Adventures of Maite and Kepa is a weekly serial. While it is a work of fiction, it has elements from both my own experiences and stories I’ve heard from various people. The characters, while in some cases inspired by real people, aren’t directly modeled on anyone in particular. I expect there will be inconsistencies and factual errors. I don’t know where it is going, and I’ll probably forget where it’s been. Why am I doing this? To give me an excuse and a deadline for some creative writing and because I thought people might enjoy it. Gozatu!
Marina nodded again. “Yes, though it’s a bit more complicated than that. I’ll fill you in later but, first, we need to get you out of here.”
“What’s the rush?” asked Maite.
“I assume you saw all of the video screens and cameras out there?” responded Marina. “I’m sure de Lancre is watching and he’ll be sending his thugs after you.”
“How would he know it is us?” asked Kepa as he looked down at his near-naked form, blushing again. “My own mother wouldn’t know it was us.”
Marina shook her head. “I’m not sure. But, he always seems to be one step ahead of me in this time.”
“Hold on a minute,” said Maite as Marina was about to open the door. “How did you find us so fast?”
Marina smiled. “I knew I would like you,” she said. “You are always thinking, always questioning.” She paused a moment. “The zatiak. The ones you already absorbed? They act as a beacon for me.”
“And you just happened to be right here when we arrived?” questioned Maite.
“Well, no,” admitted Marina. “But, in this future, the number of descendants of my blood line are quite extensive. Even a drop of blood lets me inhabit them and this one happened to be here, near where the beacon, and you, popped up.”
“Won’t de Lancre be able to find us the same way?” asked Kepa.
Marina shook her head. “Ez. This is a special connection between you and me, because of those first zatiak I gave you. If he were able to find me in the same way, I’d be able to sense him too. And a number of our encounters would have turned out completely differently.”
Marina opened the door, just a crack. “Arraioa! Damn it! They are already here.”
Kepa peaked out the door as Marina stepped back. He could see several black spheres hovering over the crowd, moving randomly back and forth, pinpricks of laser light shooting from every angle of their surface, touching every person in the large hallway.
“What are they doing?” asked Kepa.
“Scanning the room, looking for anomalies,” replied Marina.
“Wait a minute,” interjected Maite. “How are we anomalies? When we arrive in these bubbles, we take on a local identity, right? We effectively belong in this time. They won’t know the difference.”
Marina sighed. “But, he knows you are here. Somehow he knows. I don’t know how, but he always knows.”
“However he knows,” interrupted Kepa, “those balls are coming this way.”
If you get this post via email, the return-to address goes no where, so please write blas@buber.net if you want to get in touch with me.
Though my dad grew up in Bizkaia, because I lived in Donostia when I spent my year abroad in the Basque Country, I never really got to know the capital of his home province. Bilbo always seemed a bit foreboding, a bit too big for me to grasp during a day excursion. Of course, I’ve wandered the Casco Viejo and took in the Guggenheim. (I took my dad’s sisters there once. When we left, I asked what they thought and they shrugged. “The frames were nice.”) My friend Aitor even took us to see the “cathedral” – San Mamés, where Athletic Bilbao plays – though I still haven’t seen them play myself. However, I’ve never really gotten to know the city, despite its central importance to Basque history and economy.
A view of Bilbo from Monte Artxanda, taken from Wikimedia.
Bilbo is the Basque spelling of the more familiar Bilbao. In the letter of its founding, back in 1300, the city is referred to as Biluao. Bilbo as the spelling dates back to at least 1794. Though the origins of the name are debated, with multiple theories, one possibility is that it comes from the words bilbe ‘weave’ and aho ‘boca,’ meaning something like the ‘the mouth, the entrance of the weave,’ referring to how the streams of the original site weaved together. Around 1600, Shakespeare used the word ‘bilbo‘ to refer to a sword – inspired by Bizkaian iron – in one of his plays, suggesting that it was a common word at the time.
By the 12th century, a center of population had grown up around what is today Bilbo, built around the monasteries, such as Begoña. The city proper was founded in 1300 by Diego López V de Haro, though there is some evidence suggesting a previous, but failed, founding of a city in the same location. In 1310, López de Haro’s niece, María Díaz I de Haro, refounded the city, strengthening its commercial position by making it a required stop for traffic from Castile. In 1602, Bilbo was made the capital of Bizkaia, a position previously held by Bermeo.
The city became the economic heart of the Basque Country in the 18th and 19th centuries, a time that saw the railroad arrive in the city, the Bank of Bilbao founded, and the Bilbao Stock Exchange begin. Steelmaking was one of the key industries of the city. In just the 20 years from 1880 to 1900, the city’s population grew from 11,000 to 80,000.
The city also saw a great deal of conflict. It was besieged during the First and Third Carlist Wars, as well as the Spanish Civil War. It was also bombed during the Spanish Civil War, with at least 100 bombs dropped on September 25, 1936. After the Civil War, a huge amount of immigration from other parts of Spain fed the developing economy, often leading to poor conditions for workers and the development of social movements in response.
Beginning in 1861, Bilbo began annexing nearby neighborhoods, beginning with Abando and Begoña. It continued to grow, absorbing more nearby localities: Deustu, Uribarri, Otxarkoaga-Txurdinaga, Casco Viejo, Rekalde, and Basurtu-Zorrotza. These now form various districts within Bilbo.
Bilbo was built on mining, steel manufacturing, and shipbuilding. However, by the mid 1980s, the so-called “Great Crisis” took its toll, with Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa having the highest unemployment in all of Europe. Some of the historic companies of greater Bilbo closed their doors. Further, Bilbo was simply dirty, a consequence of all of that industry. However, governments across various levels undertook a revitalization plan, which included the restructuring of the port, the construction of the Metro, and the demolition of industrial ruins.
This revitalization is perhaps no better symbolized than by the Guggenheim Museum, which opened in 1997 on the grounds of the old port. Designed by Frank Gehry, it was first criticized as the “McDonaldization” of culture. However, even some of its most ardent critics have come to recognize the revitalizing force that the museum and the related efforts brought to the city.
Kepa threw his arms around the taller woman. “Am I glad to see you!” he said. “I didn’t want to have to do another one of these alone.”
Maite gave him a cold stare.
“You know what I mean,” said Kepa. “Alone, just the two of us. It would be nice to have more help this time.”
The Adventures of Maite and Kepa is a weekly serial. While it is a work of fiction, it has elements from both my own experiences and stories I’ve heard from various people. The characters, while in some cases inspired by real people, aren’t directly modeled on anyone in particular. I expect there will be inconsistencies and factual errors. I don’t know where it is going, and I’ll probably forget where it’s been. Why am I doing this? To give me an excuse and a deadline for some creative writing and because I thought people might enjoy it. Gozatu!
Maite sighed. “I know what you mean. And, yes, it would be nice to have more help.”
“Which Maite and Kepa are you?” asked Marina.
“What do you mean?” asked Kepa.
“Ah,” interjected Maite before turning to Kepa. “We’re in the future, right?” Kepa nodded. “Well, while for us, this is our third bubble, for Marina it could be our hundredth. She’s probably encountered other versions – future versions – of us in other bubbles.”
Marina nodded. “We’ve had, or will have, a number of adventures together.”
“Oh,” replied Kepa. “I guess that makes sense, but it’s all so damn confusing.” He then turned back to Marina. “How are we doing in the future?”
“Like I told you at the beginning,” replied Marina, “we can’t know what happens to our own history before it happens to us. I’ve certainly seen future versions of you, that much I remember. But what I saw, that part has faded away.”
“So,” mused Maite, her hand stroking the pink and green fur that covered her chin, “when we are done with this bubble, we’ll know we were in the future, we’ll know if we were successful in finding the zatia, but we won’t know the details?”
Marina nodded. “Bai. You’ll remember your interactions with me and de Lancre, at least impressions of them. But, you won’t remember any details about this time. It’s as if time itself is protecting itself from any kind of… what’s the word?”
“Paradox,” inserted Maite. “Otherwise, the time stream itself might break, if we were able to learn things in the future that we could use to change the past.”
“Precisely,” said Marina with a smile. “I have to say, recruiting you two has been one of the best things I’ve done since all of this started.”
“So what now?” asked Kepa. “Do you know where the zatia is?”
Marina shook her head. “Ez, not yet. But neither does de Lancre.”
If you get this post via email, the return-to address goes no where, so please write blas@buber.net if you want to get in touch with me.
It’s Super Bowl Sunday, the culmination of the National Football League’s season, which saw star quarterbacks like Tom Brady, Patrick Mahomes, Kyler Murray, and Dak Prescott light up the field (yeah, these last two are on my fantasy football team, so I might be biased; and I’m rooting for the Bengals!). However, there’s another league, a bit further to the north, in which the son of Basque sheepherders was once the brightest star. He is one of the greatest to ever play in the Canadian Football League: Sam “The Rifle” Etcheverry.
Sam Etcheverry, quarterback for the Montreal Alouettes. Photo from the Toronto Star.
Sam “The Rifle” Etcheverry was born on May 20, 1930 in Carlsbad, New Mexico. His parents were Jean Baptiste “Jim” and Florence (nee Arreguy) Etcheverry, Basque sheep ranchers. Jim had been born in Urepel, Nafarroa Beherea. Born in Texas, Florence’s father was from Anhaux, Nafarroa Beherea, and her mother was from Mexico.
Sam attended high school in Carlsbad and, upon graduation, went to the University of Denver. He still holds many of the passing records for the Denver Pioneers. But, his career really shined when he joined the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League (then known as the Interprovincial Rugby Football Union) in 1952.
In Montreal, he was named an all-star six times and once was awarded the Schenley Award for most outstanding player of the Canadian Rugby Union. He once passed for 586 yards in a game, in 1954, a single-game passing record that stood for 39 years. He led the CFL in passing for six years and was the first professional quarterback in any league to throw for more than 4,000 yards. He took his team to the Grey Cup, the Canadian version of the Super Bowl, 3 times, losing each time to Edmonton. However, his 508 yards in the 1955 Grey Cup still stands as the record.
When he was traded to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats in 1960, he opted instead to leave the CFL and join the National Football League, playing two years with the-then St. Louis Cardinals. However, he didn’t receive much playing time and in 1963 asked to be released from his contract.
In 1964, he returned to Canada, this time as head coach of the Quebec Rifles of the United Football League. After that league folded, he coached at the college level for a couple of years before being hired as the coach of the Alouettes. In his first season as coach, he took his team to the Grey Cup, where they beat Calgary in horrid conditions. He coached a few more years before retiring after the 1972 season.
The Adventures of Maite and Kepa is a weekly serial. While it is a work of fiction, it has elements from both my own experiences and stories I’ve heard from various people. The characters, while in some cases inspired by real people, aren’t directly modeled on anyone in particular. I expect there will be inconsistencies and factual errors. I don’t know where it is going, and I’ll probably forget where it’s been. Why am I doing this? To give me an excuse and a deadline for some creative writing and because I thought people might enjoy it. Gozatu!
Without waiting, the figure strode through the crowd. Maite looked at Kepa who simply shrugged. They took off after the figure, who was weaving and dodging the various people in front of it almost as if it anticipated where they would be. Maite and Kepa had a hard time keeping up, but at least the figure was easily discerned in the large crowd. The figure stopped in front of a large metal door and, after a moment’s pause, opened it.
“Get inside,” hissed the figure again.
With a wary look at Kepa, Maite entered what was a small room. A table sat in the middle, with chairs on either side. It looked like some kind of interrogation room, which made Maite nervous. There was no obvious source of light, no bulbs or fixtures, but the whole room seemed to glow.
She turned to the figure as it closed the door behind them. “Look,” she began, “we haven’t done anything…”
Before she could finish, the cloth that shrouded the figure somehow rolled up into the wide hat above it, revealing the figure of a beautiful woman. Dark sunglasses hid her eyes. Long hair that had streaks of every color of the rainbow cascaded down and across her shoulders, framing her face, falling almost to her waist. She wore a sleek white jacket that seemed like it was made of leather, with silver accents that made the colors of her hair stand out in contrast. Her pants were a dark black that reflected the light from the room, dancing across her body and accentuating her muscles as she moved. She wore black gloves and white boots.
She reached up and took off her glasses, revealing blue, almost completely pale, eyes.
“I’m glad I found you so fast,” began the woman.
“Found us?” exclaimed Maite. “You were expecting us?”
“More hoping that you would come,” said the woman.
Maite saw Kepa staring at the woman, his eyes glued to her body, his face scrunched up in thought. She sighed, wondering if he ever stopped thinking about…
Before she could complete her thought, she heard Kepa ask “Marina?”
The woman smiled. “Bai. It’s good to see you two.”
If you get this post via email, the return-to address goes no where, so please write blas@buber.net if you want to get in touch with me.
This article originally appeared in Spanish at El Diario on October 9, 2019.
A young Etchepare in a French uniform in 1928. Photo courtesy of the Iturriria family.
“Echoes of two wars, 1936-1945” aims to disseminate the stories of those Basques and Navarrese who participated in two of the warfare events that defined the future of much of the 20th century. With this blog, the intention of the Sancho de Beurko Association is to rescue from anonymity the thousands of people who constitute the backbone of the historical memory of the Basque and Navarre communities, on both sides of the Pyrenees, and their diasporas of emigrants and descendants, with a primary emphasis on the United States, during the period from 1936 to 1945.
THE AUTHORS Guillermo Tabernilla is a researcher and founder of the Sancho de Beurko Association, a non-profit organization that studies the history of the Basques and Navarrese from both sides of the Pyrenees in the Spanish Civil War and in World War II. He is currently their secretary and community manager. He is also editor of the digital magazine Saibigain. Between 2008 and 2016 he directed the catalog of the “Iron Belt” for the Heritage Directorate of the Basque Government and is, together with Pedro J. Oiarzabal, principal investigator of the Fighting Basques Project, a memory project on the Basques and Navarrese in the Second World War in collaboration with the federation of Basque Organizations of North America.
Pedro J. Oiarzabal is a Doctor in Political Science-Basque Studies, granted by the University of Nevada, Reno (USA). For two decades, his work has focused on research and consulting on public policies (citizenship abroad and return), diasporas and new technologies, and social and historical memory (oral history, migration and exile), with special emphasis on the Basque case. He is the author of more than twenty publications. He has authored the blog “Basque Identity 2.0” by EITB and “Diaspora Bizia” by EuskalKultura.eus. On Twitter @Oiarzabal.
Josu M. Aguirregabiria is a researcher and founder of the Sancho de Beurko Association and is currently its president. A specialist in the Civil War in Álava, he is the author of several publications related to this topic, among which “La batalla de Villarreal de Álava” (2015) y “Seis días de guerra en el frente de Álava. Comienza la ofensiva de Mola” (2018) stand out.
The bertsolaris Fernando Aire Etxart “Xalbador” from Nafarroa Beherea and Mattin Treku Inharga of Lapurdi arrived in the United States in June 1960 to participate for a month in the Basque festivals of La Puente, Bakersfield (both in California), and Reno (Nevada), as well as the festival hosted by the French association Les Jardiniers Français de San Francisco (California), which was brought together, among others, a large number of Basques and Bearnais. On June 19, to the dismay of the artists and their compatriots and before an audience of 2,500 people, the power to their microphones was cut off during the performance of the two berstolaris at the Les Jardiniers event. Some said it was intentional and while others called it an accident.
Be that as it may, the reaction of the youngest in attendance, mainly of Nafarroa Beherea origin, was immediate. They decided to establish, before the end of June, their own organization under the leadership of Claude Berhouet, a native of Donazaharre (Nafarroa Beherea) and owner of the Hotel de France in the city of San Francisco. The Basque Club of California was born. Its bylaws include its purpose and objectives: “to promote the well-being of all people in the Basque region of France and Spain by birth or descent, and to promote their social, recreational, intellectual, cultural, physical, and moral well-being.” Among the founding members of this new Basque diaspora association was Baptiste Etchepare, a veteran of the US Army of World War II (WWII). Born in 1908 in Mendibe, Nafarroa Beherea, he immigrated to the United States at the age of 23. At the time of his enlistment he was working as a lumberjack in Standard, California. Life in the barracks was not strange for Baptiste as he had served in the French army before emigrating. He obtained US citizenship at Chanute Air Force Base, Illinois, in 1943 with the “slight” anecdote that his name was officially changed to “Baptis Etche.” He was discharged with honors on October 10, 1945 with the rank of Private First Class and received the Medal of Good Conduct.
Just before the end of the war, Baptiste married Mary Rita Iturriria Gamboa, born in Patterson, California, in 1919, to Nafarroa parents, José Ignacio “Joe” Iturriria and Josefa “Josephine” Gamboa, from Erratzu and Sunbilla, respectively. As a result of the Great Depression, after finishing high school Rita decided to leave her hometown for San Francisco, where she met her future husband at a dance in 1942. Then the war broke out and the sunsets darkened as blackouts were imposed due to fear of air raids by the Japanese imperial forces, a situation that Steven Spielberg captured in his film 1941. Still life went on.
Baptiste Etchepare and Rita Iturriria in San Francisco in 1944. (Photo courtesy of the Iturriria family.)
After the war, Baptiste worked as a truck driver and after a few years the family moved from San Francisco to the nearby town of Millbrae, where they raised their sons James and Robert. While the couple spoke Basque, the main language in the house was English. Rita — whom the co-author of this blog, Pedro J. Oiarzabal, interviewed in 2015 within the framework of NABO’s Oral History Program “Memoria Bizia” [1] — described the world of her childhood and youth, mostly agricultural in small towns that has largely disappeared, in which the emigrants, both Basque and Navarrese from both sides of the Pyrenees were gradually integrating socio-economically into American society through great effort, sacrifice, and self-improvement. Basque and Navarrese emigration to California had flourished from the mid-19th century to the mid-20th century. WWII became perhaps one of the most important elements driving the incorporation of non-Anglo-Saxon immigrant communities into postwar American society.
Rita’s father immigrated to the United States in 1912, at the age of 23, and her mother arrived in 1916 at the age of 19. Her parents met in Los Angeles, California, where they worked on the same citrus ranch owned by a Basque family. After Rita’s parents married in 1918 in Los Angeles, they moved to Patterson in 1919. Her father and his childhood friend from Erratzu, Juan Felipe Maya Salaburu, established a dairy farm in 1919. Rita’s three younger siblings were also born in Patterson and raised on their parents’ dairy: Graciano “Gracian” was born in 1920, Manuel John in 1921 and Felipe “Philip” in 1922.
Rita, like many of the children of non-English-speaking migrant parents, typically only knew their parents’ language until they were in school. She remembers how in her house they only spoke Basque, although her siblings had a bit more luck going to school since she was able to teach them some English. Even as a child she learned Portuguese to be able to communicate with her Portuguese neighbors.
During WWII, the family business suffered a major setback. The federal government confiscated their cows, under pretext, and they were slaughtered in order to feed the troops. The war not only dragged Rita’s boyfriend into military service, but also her three brothers and the son of her father’s partner, Joseph John Maya Gortari, born in Patterson in 1922. His parents, Juan Felipe Maya and Amalia Pía Gortari Ylzauspe from Azpilkueta, Nafarroa, had emigrated to the United States in 1910 and 1914. Joseph was working on the family farm when he enlisted in the Air Force on September 30, 1942, serving at Marfa Air Force Base in Texas.
Joseph Maya with his father Juan Felipe and sisters, from left to right Frances, Janet and Mary, at their home in Patterson in 1944. (Photo courtesy of the Maya family.)
Six days earlier, his childhood friend Manuel Iturriria had also enlisted in the Air Force. However, Manuel was sent to England, where he served as crew chief and tail gunner on a bomber in the European theater of operations. Manuel barely survived the downing of his plane in which the rest of his crew died. They were too close to the ground to be able to use the parachutes, so Manuel waited until the plane was low enough to jump before crashing. He was injured in the jump, but survived. He had participated in more than twenty missions. Manuel and his brother Gracián, both stationed in Europe, met in England before being repatriated to the US from France. Gracián had enlisted in the army in August 1942 and participated in the invasion of Normandy on D+1 (the day after D Day). Finally, the youngest of the Philip brothers was drafted into the army in July 1946 as a replacement after demobilization of the troops with the end of the conflict. As the third child and with two brothers who were already serving in the military, he was not sent abroad. Asked about the end of the war, Rita concluded: “We all survived.”
Manuel Iturriria in his Air Corps uniform. (Photo courtesy of the Iturriria family.)
Gracian Iturriria participated in the invasion of Normandy on D Day+1. (Photo courtesy of the Iturriria family.)
Philip Iturriria served to his country at the home front. (Photo courtesy of the Iturriria family.)
After more than two decades in the country, in 1955, Baptiste returned with Rita to Europe for the first time to visit his relatives. Her husband’s parents had already passed away. “I think we’re brothers,” one of his brothers told Baptiste. Everything had changed. Baptiste passed away in 1988 at the age of 80, Manuel in 1999, Philip in January 2008, and Gracián seven months later. Joseph Maya died the youngest in 1985.
Rita Etchepare with her children, James (left) and Robert, at the Basque Cultural Center in August 2019. (Photo courtesy of Pierre Etcharren.)
Rita was honored in August of 2019 at the Basque Cultural Center in South San Francisco on the occasion of her 100th birthday. Rita represents a world that has vanished. She is the living memory of a generation, her parents’ generation, that was forced to leave their homes in search of a better life, like the one they gave her. Both generations established the pillars that sustain the Basque-Navarrese communities of today and the organizations that germinated with them. Away from any self-exclusive ideological conflict that dominates the Basque and Navarrese political panorama, the Basque-Navarrese diaspora in the US lives its multiple and complex identities in an immigrant society with great ease, without questioning the fact of being Basque or Navarrese as incompatible concepts. It is especially this WWII generation that chiseled the contemporary diaspora and helped build a country that would become one of the great super powers on the planet. The debt to them remains unpayable, and that is why it is urgent to make their stories visible. That and no other is the objective of our blog: to bring to light the stories of this generation.
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If you want to collaborate with “Echoes of two wars” send us an original article on any aspect of WWII or the Civil War and Basque or Navarre participation to the following email: sanchobeurko@gmail.com
It is now well established that the Basques, if not the very first Europeans to set foot on the North American continent, were among the first. Of course, there were already a large number of thriving peoples living there when they arrived, and the Basques certainly interacted closely with them, even developing trading pidgins. None of the words commonly used by the various visitors to identify and distinguish the different tribes were what those people used to call themselves. Rather, they came from a variety of sources, most of which are lost today. Peter Bakker has argued in one of his papers that several of those names may have a Basque origin. While it is near impossible to definitively prove these possible links, they do provide a new perspective on their possible origin.
Roger Williams and the Narragansetts, a 19th-century engraving after a painting by A. H. Wray, from Wikipedia.
Iroquois: The Iroquois, or the Haudenosaunee as they call themselves, lived in the North American northeast. The first record of the word Iroquois comes from 17th century French documents. When the French first landed on the continent and interacted with the native peoples, they found them speaking a Basque-Mi’kmaq pidgin in which the Mi’kmaq called their neighbors the Iroquois. While many etymologies of the word have been proposed, Bakker suggests it comes from the negative attitudes the Mi’kmaq had of their neighbors and derives from the Basque word hil with the suffix koa, or hil-koa, meaning “killer people.”
Tarrantine: The Tarrantine were a Mi’kmaq tribe living in what is now northern New England. The name Tarrantine has been proposed to come from the Basque tarantari, meaning “babbler, chatterer,” though other origins have also been proposed.
Etchemin: This one seems so obviously Basque – it has the word etxe in it – but even so, its origin is not so certain. The Etchemin language is part of the Algonquin language family and some derive the word Etchemin from a French modification of the Algonquin words for canoe, or the native word used for another local tribe. They were first mentioned in 1603 by Samuel de Champlain. His scout noted that these people lived in long houses, as opposed to their more southern neighbors. Bakker suggests that the word might come from the Basque words for house and pine, indicating their houses were built from pine trees, with the ‘p’ being changed to ‘m’ for unknown (though seemingly common) reasons. Thus, he suggests Etchemin comes from etxe-pinu, meaning “houses of pine.”
Algonquin: The Algonquin languages, which are a branch of the much larger Algonquian language family, is spoken by the AlgonquinFirst Nations of Quebec and Ontario. The first record of the word Algonquin comes again from Champlain in 1603 in the form of Algoumequin. Bakker notes the similarity of this word to the Basque arkumeki, meaning “lamb meat.” Why anyone would name a group of people after meat Bakker is at a loss to explain, except that trading meat was common in relationships between the Native peoples and European traders. He admits this is a rather challenging etymology.
Bakker also notes that there are several other names used to denote the geographical origin of a given people that end in the suffix quois, which suggests to him a strong connection to the Basque koa. These include Canadaquois (someone from Canada and very similar to modern Basque Kanadakoa), Samaricois (a Breton, from sanmalo-koa, named after Saint Malo port in Brittany), and Gasptiquois (someone from the Gaspe area, or Mi’kmaq). He goes into a few of these in more detail.
Souriquois, another name for the Mi’kmaq, comes from the Souricoua River (which itself could be Basque, coming from zuri (white) and koa).
Armouchiquois seems to come from the Mi’kmaq word lmu:s or lmu:j, meaning dog, and the Basque suffix koa, meaning “dog people.”
Charioquois is an early word used for the Wyandot people (also called the Hurons). While the suffix koa appears again, it isn’t clear what the root of this word means. Bakker suggests a few possibilities, but none are very definite.
Primary source: P. Bakker, Amerindian Tribal Names in North America of Possible Basque Origin, in X. Artiagoitia, R. P. G. De Rijk, P. Goenaga, & J. Lakarra (Eds.), Erramu boneta: Festschrift for Rudolf P.G. de Rijk. Anejos del Anuario del Seminario de Filología Vasca Julio de Urquijo (pp. 105–116). Bilbao: Universidad del País Vasco.
“The future?” exclaimed Kepa, an edge of panic in his voice. “What do you mean, the future?”
“Well, why not?” asked Maite, rhetorically. “Our time is the future for Marina and de Lancre, and they’ve both gone there. Why wouldn’t there be zatiak in what we would consider our future?”
“But, but,” began Kepa. “At least for the other bubbles we’ve visited, we had some historical context. We had some sense of what was going on. Here, we have nothing. We’re complete strangers.”
The Adventures of Maite and Kepa is a weekly serial. While it is a work of fiction, it has elements from both my own experiences and stories I’ve heard from various people. The characters, while in some cases inspired by real people, aren’t directly modeled on anyone in particular. I expect there will be inconsistencies and factual errors. I don’t know where it is going, and I’ll probably forget where it’s been. Why am I doing this? To give me an excuse and a deadline for some creative writing and because I thought people might enjoy it. Gozatu!
Maite nodded, turning her full attention to Kepa. “I agree.” She paused for a moment, really looking at Kepa for the first time since they arrived in this new bubble. “Ehm, what are you wearing?”
Kepa looked down at himself. He was essentially naked, a thin, clear film covering his body, adding a shine to it as it reflected the ambient light. It hugged his arms, legs and chest, following the curves of his muscles. The only part that wasn’t transparent was a strategically placed black circle, almost like the fig leaf of old paintings, covering his groin. He looked up at Maite and blushed.
“Why am I wearing this when you are wearing that?” he asked.
Maite could get glimpses of herself in the reflections off of Kepa’s skin-tight suit, but all she could really discern was a flurry of colors. She looked down at her body. She was covered in fur that almost seemed a part of her until she tugged at it and realized it was fabric. The costume went all the way past her hands, ending in gloves that had sharp claws at the tips. She turned, and noticed a tail that seemed to sway to her thoughts. The fur itself looked like the stripes of a tiger, but the colors shifted randomly every few seconds, leading to some very strange color combinations. She felt the top of her head. Pointy ears stuck up.
“What does my face look like?” she asked hesitantly.
Kepa smiled. “Looks like you are all ready to go to a Halloween party.”
Maite sighed. “What have we gotten ourselves into this time?”
At that moment, a woman walked up to them. She was wearing a pure white suit that billowed out at her forearms and calves. Above her arms and legs it was skin tight. The jacket flared out as it passed her hips. It was accented with black seams that ran the course of her arms and legs. She wore a wide brimmed hat that was also white with black edging and, to top it off, she wore dark sunglasses with a white frame. The white of her clothes contrasted with her dark skin.
The woman began talking to them, seemingly asking a question, but in a language that neither Kepa nor Maite had ever heard before. After a few moments, the woman paused. Kepa and Maite looked at one another.
“Ez dugu ulertzen,” said Maite in Euskara. “We don’t understand,” she repeated in English.
The woman just stared at her in disbelief, gesticulating and raising her voice. She kept pointing to her ear, where Maite noticed some kind of earpiece. Maite simply pointed to her ear, shaking her head, and repeating “No, we don’t have one.”
The woman walked away, clearly frustrated, shaking her head.
“What was that about?” asked Kepa.
“I don’t know,” replied Maite, “but it seems that those earpieces translate for you.”
A tall figure suddenly materialized behind them. It stood at least a head taller than either of them. Like some of the others they had seen, it wore a flat black headpiece with fabric that fell to the floor, hiding whoever was inside.
“Indeed, they do,” replied the figure in perfectly recognizable Euskara.
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