Monday, January 2, 1933

Went over to Aunt Minnie’s today. Stayed a little while. Tomorrow school starts again after holidays.

*On January 2, 1933, the 5th Marine Regiment, United States Marines Corps, withdrew from Nicaragua. It trained and left behind a powerful National Guard in a country beset by struggle between liberal and conservative forces centered respectively in the cities of León and Granada.

Founded by the Spanish in the early 1550s, the two cities became competing poles of power. Their militant rivalry often left Nicaragua subject to outside interests even after the country gained independence from Spain in the early 1800s.

British and U.S. interests in Nicaragua grew during the mid-1800s because of its strategic importance as a transit route across the Central American isthmus. With the advent of the California gold rush, Nicaragua proved a popular interoceanic shortcut. Cornelius Vanderbilt's steamship company transported supplies and prospectors from the Atlantic, along Nicaragua's San Juan River, then across Lake Nicaragua to the Pacific.

Source: Library of Congress