Jesus Garcia: An unlikely hero from the past

I have visited the convenience store on Jesus Garcia St. dozens of times without much thought as to how it got its name. A little-known revolutionary? A forgotten writer or artist? Perhaps a young man visited by the Virgin, like Juan Diego of Guadalupe? With time on my hands because of quarantine, I did some research.

I discovered monuments to Jesus Garcia in Mexico City and Zacatecas, in Veracruz and Aguascalientes. In Hermosillo, a stadium is named in his honor, and several schools. There are statues of him in Cuba and Guatemala, as well as in Germany and the U.K. Jesus Garcia, far from being an unsung hero, has had at least two corridos composed in his honor.

It all began in the early 20th century, when copper was suddenly in demand for telephone wires, motors and pipes for plumbing. Phelps Dodge, a U.S. mining company, opened a subsidiary called Moctezuma Copper Corporation in Sonora. 

In the past, all mining transport, including the delivery of mining equipment to the mine and the movement of ore from the mine, was done by mules. It was labor-intensive, costly and inefficient. So, the mining company built a railroad. One of their most dependable engineers was Jesus Garcia, a 23-year-old from Hermosillo. His main route was from the copper mine to the lively town of Nacozari, Sonora, home to miners and their families, as well as shopkeepers and engineers. It was also a storage facility containing gas tanks and dynamite.

Despite his youth, Garcia was well respected for his work ethic and maturity. He had worked his way up, starting as a waterboy at age 17, then to switchman, fireman, brakeman and engineer at 20. 

On Nov. 7, 1907, he said goodbye to his fiancee and went to work on Engine No. 2, transporting ore from the mine to the town, then picking up supplies. He had already made two trips when he stopped for lunch with his future mother-in-law in Nacozari while the cars were being loaded. When he headed out of town to the mine, the cars had been loaded with 70 crates of dynamite, caps and fuses, as well as several wagon loads of hay. A defective firebox for the steam engine threw sparks, and he soon observed one of the dynamite boxes smoking. Efforts by the brakeman to douse the flames were unsuccessful and soon another crate caught fire.

Quickly realizing that his cargo would result in an explosion sufficient to destroy the town and its 5,000 residents, Garcia ordered all the workers off the train and opened the throttle to put as much distance between the train and the town as possible. Unwilling to jump from the train himself lest the steam engine fail and coast backward, he got the train safely away before the 70 crates of dynamite blew up. He was killed instantly by the massive detonation, which was heard 10 miles away and shattered windows throughout the town. But the population of Nacozari was spared.

Garcia was hailed as a hero throughout Mexico. The town was renamed Nacozari de Garcia, and a monument raised in his honor. The American Red Cross posthumously awarded him their highest award for valor, and the federal government declared Nov. 7 National Railroad Month to commemorate his sacrifice. His courageous life ended a week before his 24th birthday. Tragically, his novia died a year later from a broken heart.