Cumplido, Ignacio (1811–1887)

Ignacio Cumplido (b. 20 May 1811; d. 30 November 1887), Mexican publisher. Born in Guadalajara, Cumplido, the son of a doctor and medical school professor, grew up in Mexico City. While an employee at the National Museum, he began publishing newspapers. In 1829 he became the manager of the shop that printed El Correo de la Federación, soon followed by El Fénix de la Libertad. In 1838 he went to the United States to buy the equipment necessary for a first-class printing establishment, but he lost everything when the French blockaded the port of Veracruz. Nevertheless, he continued to publish the most celebrated authors of the day in El Museo Mexicano, La Ilustración Mexicana, and other periodicals. Although associated with liberal politics, Cumplido was imprisoned in 1840 for printing José María Gutiérrez Estrada's pamphlet advocating monarchy. Soon after he was named superintendent of prisons.

Cumplido is best known for founding El Siglo XIX on 8 October 1841; it became the foremost daily newspaper of nineteenth-century Mexico City and was published almost continuously through 1896. The list of its editors forms a who's who of Mexican intellectual life of the time and includes Guillermo Prieto, Manuel Payno, Ignacio Ramírez, Francisco Zarco, Francisco Sosa, and Francisco Bulnes. In 1842 he was elected to Congress first as deputy and then as senator, always giving his salary to charity. He founded a lithography school for orphans in his home. In 1847, during the war with the United States, Cumplido volunteered as head of a battalion of national guard and was subsequently promoted to captain.

In 1848 Cumplido went to Europe and purchased steam-powered presses. Following the French Intervention, Cumplido became a member of the 1873 Ayuntamiento of Mexico City in charge of boulevards. It was his idea to plant trees on both sides of the Paseo de la Reforma in emulation of the Champs-Élysées.

See alsoJournalism in Mexico .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ramiro Villaseñor y Villaseñor, Ignacio Cumplido: Impresor y editor jalisciense del federalismo en México (1974).

Additional Bibliography

Lombardo García, Irma. El siglo de Cumplido: La emergencia del periodismo mexicano de opinión, 1832–1857. Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 2002.

Villaseñor y Villaseñor, Ramiro. Ignacio Cumplido, impresor tapatío. Guadalajara: Gobierno de Jalisco, Secretaría General, Unidad Editorial, 1987.

                                    Barbara A. Tenenbaum