TOURISM

This Englishman lived the sad date of the 17th December 1923 when 446 neighbours, the majority of a census of 695, requested from the Town Hall of Málaga the annexation of Torremolinos. It happened a month later, the 30th June 1924, arguing the serious debts with the Treasury (252,288.86 pesetas) and the little money in the cashbox of the Town Hall (5. 13 pesetas) which made impossible the future feasibility of the town. The last mayor was Don Miguel Fernández Alcauza. It was not until 64 years later that Torremolinos had its own mayor again.

That was no reason to stop activity and life in Torremolinos. It was the Englishman we already know as “el de la peseta”, who transformed his property Santa Clara in a residence for foreigners in 1930, cornerstone of the tourist paradise of the Costa del Sol.

Some neighbours followed his example. Mrs. Carlota Alessandri restored her country home Cucazorra and opened the parador Montemar in 1933. The hotel La Roca followed in 1942. It was the first hotel to promote Torremolinos in brochures where it was specified that full board was 32 pesetas, “special” lunch, 27 pesetas, a parasol on the beach for a month, 30 pesetas and 15 pesetas extra for a sun bed.

The restaurant and nightclub El Remo opened in 1948, brightening up the nights in the neighbourhood of La Carihuela. A tragedy stroke almost all families of the neighbourhood a year later when the boat San Carlos shipwrecked off the coasts of Ceuta. Twenty- four men died, of whom 12 were from La Carihuela, 3, from Bajondillo, and the rest, from Algeciras and Barbate. The only survivor, Francisco Campoy “el Cervera”, who swam to the coast, can tell you about the tragedy if you stop by at his home in La Carihuela. Of course, he will also tell you marvelous stories of boats and fishermen.

Years passed and in 1955, the hotel Los Nidos opened, and in 1959, the Pez Espada, the first de luxe hotel of the Costa del Sol. Tourism was knocking insistently at our doors in search of the sun and the unrivalled beaches.

A lot of houses were pulled down and where their orchards used to be, the foundations of new constructions were laid. New and modern buildings were built everywhere. The beaches changed their aspect and sun-beds and parasols covered them all.

Bars and restaurants served as shelters for the increasing number of visitors. It was the 50s. The singer Bonet de San Pedro sang in the Copo and people were dancing on the road. The official stall of the San Miguel Fair was on one of the streets off the Costa del Sol Square, closed to the traffic. The Pilgrimage is celebrated at the Fuente de la Salud, on the Benalmádena Coast. There are bulls next to the Loma de Canto ( opposite La Bomba). The celebration of Corpus Christi with its procession is a deeply rooted custom. Men and youngsters leave the fields; a lot of labour is needed in the hotels to work as waiters.

Torremolinos, as you already know, was a neighbourhood of Málaga from 1924 but it stood out in the tourist field for its own merits. The airport was very busy with tourists looking for sun and beaches. Famous people such as the actress Ava Gardner, empress Soraya, film director Orson Wellles, the actors Ralph Vallone, Boris Karloff , or Frank Sinatra were seen at the Café Central, in the nightclub El Mañana, en the flamenco dancing floors El Jaleo and El Piyayo. Novelists and poets wrote here their best works; Here, Michener wrote “Hijos de Torremolinos”, Juan Goytisolo finished “La Isla”, Fernando Sánchez Dragó, “El Dorado”, Souvirón , “Cristo en Torremolinos”, the bohemian Coco Blanco, “Torremolinos 1955”, Angel Palomino, “Torremolinos Gran Hotel”.

In 1979, a big civil movement started which aimed at Torremolinos being again a municipality independent from Málaga. This movement originated before the evidence that the needs of Torremolinos as tourist town were not attended properly and in the face of the fact that Torremolinos was losing its share in the tourism market, its prestige in relation to other municipalities of the Costa del Sol, the traditions, customs and peculiarities it used to have as an independent town before 1926.

It was a long and hard fight that lasted nine years because, although the citizens from Málaga understood that the vindication was fair, necessary and beneficial both for Torremolinos and Málaga, a good part of the economy of Málaga depended on tourism and its principal exponent was Torremolinos. The party that had the majority in the Town Hall of Málaga at the time opposed the initiative misusing the power they had. They kidnapped the segregation file for three years until they were forced by law to go on with the procedure.

The file, which was excellent and had been carefully gathered, happened to be unstoppable since it showed irrefutably that Torremolinos met all the requirements to be an independent municipality: it had a historic territory; the majority of the residents were clearly for the independence; and last, it had enough financial self- sufficiency.

Because of the delays that the file suffered for years, the outrage and the vindication of the people of Torremolinos increased, the demonstrations in support of independency had more and more participants, the two strikes that were called had massive positive response. Therefore, the national and international diffusion of the matter increased. The last and definitive demonstration consisted of a march of practically the whole town to Seville in a cold and rainy day in December 1987.

Finally, the Junta de Andalusia admitted all these facts and granted the independence on the 27th September 1988, a date that has become a local holiday and is celebrated every year.

All this civil movement of legal, bureaucratic, and political fight was coordinated, managed and led by the men and women who formed the Pro- Autonomy Assembly of Torremolinos, whose president during the nine years was Pedro Fernández Montes, at present the mayor of Torremolinos.

That of Torremolinos has been the most important segregation of a municipality that has taken place in Spain in the XXth century. In spite of the important interests involved and of the obstacles found in the way, the people of Torremolinos gave a marvelous example of civism and maturity and were the main actors of a fight for independence that everyone agreed to label as exemplary.

Fortunately, the frustration that many felt after the independence when they saw that the self government was not having the results that had been promised has become optimism at the face of the spectacular progress Torremolinos is experiencing in the last years.