Gazeta de Guatemala

Gazeta de Guatemala, Guatemalan periodical published 1729–1731 and 1797–1816. First published on 1 November 1729, La Gazeta de Guatemala (The Guatemala Gazette) arose from a dispute between civil and religious authorities over the best way to confront piracy. It was the second periodical published in Latin America and the third on the American continent. The first was the Boston News-Letter in 1704 (which followed the 1690 single edition of Publick Occurrences in Boston). The second was La Gazeta de México in 1722. The first edition of La Gazeta de Guatemala consisted of a calendar of religious feasts, notices of arrivals of ships and merchandise, items about tribute-paying Indians who belonged to religious orders, and other news. It continued as a monthly until 1731.

The periodical began its second life on 13 February 1797, when the Spanish Bourbons were attempting to implement reforms in America. This time it published the views of groups advocating the reform of the colonial system, through which it made known the profound problems in the captaincy general of Guatemala. Its writers were prominent members of the Economic Society of Friends of the Country, an organization whose members espoused the reformist ideas of the period. This time La Gazeta de Guatemala was published weekly. It was widely distributed throughout Central America and beyond.

The paper's publication was suspended in 1816. It was followed by Pedro Molina's El Editor Constitucional and José Cecilio del Valle's El Amigo de la Patria, both in 1820. Thereafter a series of official newspapers were published under various titles, including Gaceta del Gobierno, Boletín de Noticias, Boletín Oficial, El Tiempo, La Gaceta, Gaceta de Guatemala, El Guatemalteco, and Diario de Centroamérica.

See alsoGuatemala, Economic Society of; Journalism.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

León De Gandarias, "Jornadas periodísticas," in Etapas notables de la prensa guatemalteca (1959).

Rigoberto Bran Azmitia, Panorama del periodismo guatemalteco y centroamericano (1967).

Carlos C. Haeussler Yela, Diccionario general de Guatemala (1983), vol. 3, pp. 1224-1231.

Additional Bibliography

Catalina Barrios y Barrios, Estudio histórico del periodismo guatemalteco: (Período colonial y siglo XIX) (1997).

                                 Oscar G. PelÁez Almengor