THE FLIGHT OF THE PINOCHO

A true story
Project for a movie by Juan José Díaz Infante and Fernando de Garay
June 1997



Historical context of Mexico in 1930

Mexico had just finished his revoution in 1921, Zapata and Villa being the main engines of the "movimiento popular". (1921-1924) Senator Field Jurado is murdered for opposing the Bucareli treaties. Vasconcelos, education secretary resigns as a response to the murder. From 1927 to 1929 there was a persecution of the catholic church called "the Guerra Cristera". In 1929 Obregon is murdered after his reelection; the PRI is born under the name of Partido Nacional Revolucionario and in the same year Mexico got his first electoral fraud of the party against Vasconcelos by Ortiz Rubio (which quits in 1932 ) and Abelardo Rodríguez is named to finished the term to 1934. The PNR launches Lazaro Cardenas (our first socialist president) and he wins the elections. In 1939 the opposition party PAN is born.

Treaties of Bucareli
Treaties signed between Mexico and The United States by Alvaro Obregon. Considered by most experts as an act of traition. They are the documents signed by Mexico in order to repair the damages the revolution caused to the United States. One of the clauses states taht Mexico can not invent, set factories or produce anything for 20 years

In the 30´s there was a great influx of foreigners into Mexico. The situation in Europe was politically tense: Hitler, the Nazism, the Spanish Revolution, the beggining of Second World War made a lot of europeans to search refuge in Mexico. The government of Mexico would issue special visas, you could enter any part of the country but Mexico City, meaning to say, foreigners refugees could only live outside of Mexico City.

Zitacuaro is a small town in the state of Michoacán, México. Some of the most important documents of the movement of independance were drawn there.


THE STORY

Miguel was 11 when he was playing "canicas" with the "pelos" and the "tuercas", his closest friends, the first time he saw an airplane fly by. It was then when he decided that one day he was going to be an inventor. Flying machines, cars, motorcycles, anything that moved, flew or else.

Soon their talks was all about planes: "¿Ya supiste que Lindbergh tratará de cruzar el océano?" decía Don Walter , "¿Todo el mar? ¿sin parar?" was the typical conversation between the old man, "el Pelos", el "Tuercas" and "Pinocho".

Pinocho got his nickname after the classic tale. His continuous search to construct things and to bring them to life. Friends decided that he was one too. Even though Miguel never finished high school and of course he did not kearn ever to speak English. He was an avid thinker and a sponge for learning.

He was able to keep a couple Julio Verne´s books that were on top of the shelf. His dog and continuous companion was named Leonardo, of course named after the famous Leonardo Da Vinci.


He would get his livelihood from diving a truck up and down three towns surrounding Zitacuaro. Delivering milk, bread, frijoles, naranjas, etc. In his free time he was building a motorcycle out of spare parts. He rode it at full speed through Zitacuaro.


It was a cold morning, most mornings are...It was the 4th of November of 1934. Historic times for Mexico and the world. Miguel, only 23 at that time, remembered when he was a child two honeysuckers that used to live near his window Roberto Y Fernando. Flash back of his two little flying friends framed by his old window they used to be a living art painting as they danced through the clear space of the crystals.

"Life passes by too fast" was his thought as he walked behind the box that carried the dead body of his father, Don Manuel, the photographer of Zitacuaro and business partner of Don Walter.

At the present body mass "Don Walter" lent his two shoulders for consolation, one to Doña Sara an the other to Doña Cuca. Both of them crying no end, devastated by the unexpected event. Miguel was full of sadness and regret, he was trying to grasp the concept of death;

"He just died, ¡pacatleas!, no warning no nothing" some childre were talking in the back of the church

"63 years of life and nothing to show, death will not get me the same way". Miguel was crying, afraid and picturing his own death.




The whole town was present to show their respects. Don Chucho better known as the "Sacerdito" (The porkypriest), cruel joke, but very accurate about his measurments. Don Chucho was trying to pick the right words. "Don Manuel is already in God´s presence..."

"No, no, no!" echoed through the church as some of the people fainted and the others fell on their knees. They prayed vigorously. The expression on their faces was blank, as if they had seen a ghost.

Indeed they had, Don Manuel had stood up from the box ¡It was a miracle! Totally surprised trying to make sense of his own eulogy.

Half of the congregation lied in the floor, the rest shaken started to pray a rosary as Doña Rosa stood in front to recite the Ave María.

Don Manuel died definitely two weeks later run over by a bus

Miguel had to live again the death of his father, and that was what changed the way he lived from then on. Miguel quit being a simple truck driver to become an inventor. His inheritance was a very modest house in Zitacuaro totally furnished. Miguel immediately put it for sale. El Conde (the count), a good friend of the family bought the property. He knew of the new plans of Miguel and he wanted to help him.



Miguel had decided to take two years off to build an airplane. El Conde also was the one who lent Miguel an abandoned movie theater to make it his workshop. It took over 4 weeks to remodel the place. It was quite an hallucinating sight all those stalls, the stage, the projector, the cabin. It was a very common sight after that the fact that they used to play movies after work to discuss their future strategies.

Pinocho, el Pelos y el Tuercas chose one day that it had to be an Oyamel tree, the perfect wood for the fuselage. And so they went. The forest was full of Monarch butterflies, it was the season where suddenly the forests around Zitacuaro turned orange.

"Fucking Pinocho, I hope you are right about this plane" said Pelos as they carried the trunk back to the truck of Mr. Zepeda.

The blueprints to build the plane came from an issue of Popular Mechanics that belonged to Don Walter, a photographer and German Émigré. It is obvious that if Miguel did not finish elementary school and did not know any English that he needed someone to translate the instructions. Salma, the English teacher of the town was the elected one.

"Güera, I need your help" said Pincoho after church one Sunday
"Is this a pick up line?" replied Salma
"¿May invite a cup of cofee or a meal?"

It took very little effort to convince la Güera, she liked Pinocho and she liked his dreams of flying. She liked the romanticism of the idea. Little by little they fell in love.
Many nights together studying the blueprints made the perfect scenario for a candent relationship.

Salma was called "la güera" as a nickname, because she spoke English. Actually she was a brunette typical of Michoacán.

"Pinocho, tell me again, how, how is it going to fly?
I might remind you that you did not finish elementary school, I do not think this magazine is of such detail that this thing really fly. and you are spending all your money, your time, my youth..." la güera, always a woman, kept annoying the hell out of Miguel, as he was trying to understand a diagram of a valve in bed.

"And if it flies, so what! Why does Zitacuaro need a plane?" la güera insisted as Miguel nodded his head and answered in automatic pilot, "Si amor"

"Pinocho you have everyone busy building this plane, may I know what are you going to give all these people in return, are you going to love them all? " at this time la Güera had a pillow on her hand trying to catch his attention. "Not a bad idea güerita"
"¿Qué significa suscr-ption avai-lable? güera"

"Que te suscribas a la revista imbécil" replied la güera

"¿Nada que ver con el control de vuelo?" asked Miguel

"nada" said la Güera

"Y eso que me estas agarrando?" started to smile Pinocho

"Eso sí es el control de vuelo" replied la Güera as she attacked the lips, and the body of Miguel



It was incredible how Miguel convinced the whole town to cheap in to build the first plane made in Zitacuaro. The enthusiasm grew more and more, first between friends and then between the friends of the friends.



The fuselage by el pelos y el tuercas; the blueprints by Don Walter; translation by la Güera; the main workshop by El Conde; Mr Zepeda cooperated with the mechanical workshop and the Ford Engine of an old truck; Don Guido did the painting; and so on. Each person on the town had a different task to accomplish.

Even the Sacerdito had to bless the plane one day.

Photo with all the participants in the building of the Pinocho

One fine day Pinocho the first was ready to fly, but no one in town knew how to fly a plane. Miguel decided to do some self training. He used to "drive" his plane through the streets of Zitácuaro without wings the flaps, etc. It was quite an illusion when you could see a wingless plane always in the streets of the town.

All the kids would run and shout "Ponte a persinao"!

In 1936 General Cardenas visited the town. The first story he heard was the need of the taking of the plane to Morelia to be flown by a professional pilot. Cardenas granted an sponsored trip for Miguel and his plane by train to the army base in Morelia. Once there el Gato, a friend of Miguel, also a coronel of the Mexican Air Force took the plane up to 100 meters. Landed it and reported El Pinocho to be a mortal trap. El Gato declared that the PINCOHO SHOULD NOT FLY AGAIN.

Miguel did not have any money to get back to Zitacuaro, neither himself or the plane. He actually had to steal some of the special gas for planes from the army depot in order to refuel the Pinocho. And right there took off, persecuted by several soldiers and his friend el Gato that ran behind him shouting and yelling "stop that man he is going to kill himself!"

Zitacuaro was at peace with the world, it was march, and suddenly the town heard a familiar sound, but this time was not from the ground, from the streets. It was from the sky!
Nobody could believe it, the first flight of the Pinocho. Everyone was out, running towards the landing and training site

"Pinocho Pinocho!" , everyone was shouting, everyone was running to greet the Pinocho in his maiden flight. Other children would yell: "hide hide! he is deffinetely going to crash!".

"Stupid idiots", grumbled Don Walter, he was trying to keep the pace with his stick. "Güera, your boyfriend is flying!" said Don Chucho as he was blessing the air and running with everyone. '¡Pinocho, Pinocho!' everyone claimed. More than 400 people met outside the town, they ran from their homes to greet Pinocho. Nobody wanted that vision to end. "¡Quítense que ya no traigo gasolina!" , Miguel in return waved his pagnolet back, the only problem, he was trying to tell them to clear the field so he could land. Nobody understood such delicacy in the message. "¡Qué putazo!" the children exclaimed, Miguel was forced to land away from the people with the unavoidable crash into a "magueyera".

¡Ouch! Miguel was facing the floor as la güera tried to pull all the thorns stuck in the most intimate parts of his being.

"Tomorrow at 9 o'clock sharp, captain Miguel Carrillo will take off from Zitacuaro to México City... flying a plane of his own invention, that will land in the army base in Balbuena" read the telegram that the Excelsior newspaper received the 10th of may of 1936. Raul Ramírez was dispatched immediately to Zitacuaro to investigate this very strange and unnexpected announcement.

The whole town was present, this time outside of the field to see the historical take off of the Pinocho.And in this morning after the very typical snapshots, good luck kisses and propper blessings it took off into the horizon.

Since they did not have a proper flight plan, Miguel followed the train tracks all the way to Mexico City.

"What do you think, Don Walter?"
"Do you think he will make it?"

El Conde was trying to make small talk as both old men zipped through a beer outside the mail office. Most of the women of the town were praying in the church, first the salve and then a rosary for the well being of Miguel.

"How? Why? How did I let him do this?"
continued la Güera...

The typical noise of the telegram started to knock in the mail office. Miguel had landed in Mexico City succesfully.

The town woke up into a great celebration, special barrels of Tequila were open. They cried, they hugged, they celebrated, all day, all night and all day again.

Epilogue

That was the last flight of the Pinocho, Manuel was arrested since no one had any idea who he was, or if he was a german spy. A few hours later he was released after the confirmation of the story by Excelsior. He was admitted as a pilot into the army and he was sent to Baja California to defend our mexican waters against pirate ships of Japan fishing illegally for shrimp.

Miguel Carrillo invented six different instruments used today in modern flight which he holds the patents.