Modernização urbana de Campo Maior-PI no período áureo da cera de carnaúba (1930-1947).

Abstract

In this work we propose to investigate the urban modernization of the town of Campo Maior, Piauí, regarding it as favored by the golden period of Carnaúba wax extraction in the state during the 1930s and 1940s. We observe that the time in which the wax came to prominence was the beginning of World War I, being exported to some belligerent countries, since it was possible to extract from the product an explosive component named picric acid, used in the making of gunpowder. This fact became the wax the main support of the economy of Piauí and Campo Maior, consolidating its importance from the conflagration of the second world conflict. To investigate the urban growth we analyzed some modern equipment, as well as public places and buildings that were implanted and were pointed out in the official speeches of the local rulers that represented the town as one of the most modern and progressive of Piauí. We emphasize yet that the modernization period coincides with the epoch in which Getúlio Vargas was the Brazilian president. In Piauí we had intervenors Landri Sales (1931-1935) and Leônidas Melo (1935-1945). The state and national governments had their bases in authoritarianism and the idea of progress and modernization that had a strong resonance in Campo Maior. Notwithstanding, we propose to highlight some lower-class people who took advantage of the urban reforms carried out in Campo Maior, highlighting their subjectivity as ordinary individuals that also translated their look upon the town, through chronicles, memoirs or even interviews. We intend to understand the sensitivities of these people about this “new town” in which they were living, how they were benefited or marginalized from the modernizing urban structure. Finally, we want to highlight the new social skills that developed in the new spaces.