The role of young people in Franco's heritage management during the civil war and the first post-war period in Catalonia

This article presents a group of young people who intervened during the Civil War and the post-war period in Catalonia as agents of the Levante Zone Police Station of the National Artistic Heritage Defense Service (SDPAN). Through their correspondence, university records and technical reports, the investigation examines how twelve young people between 16 and 27 years old, mostly Catalan and Aragonese, had a personal relationship with the management of the State Technical Board first and with the Ministry of National Education. after. Some of them exiled themselves from the republican zone to join the rebel side. Before the start of the war they had shared studies, cultural interests and links with social Catholicism.

During the Summer Revolution of 1936 churches and cathedrals were burned, the governments of the Republic and the Generalitat did not take long to create organizations made up of volunteers and officials destined to safeguard the heritage. The rebel side wanted to carry out a similar process and finally, homologous to the other Francoist institutions, the SDPAN was created as a militarized organization. At that time youth played an important role. The youngest agents of the Levante Zone Police Station were the ones who, accompanied by people of valued reputation in the field of heritage, toured a good part of Catalonia in military trucks, taxis, buses and trains after the occupation by the rebel side. Among these agents were students linked to the fascist right and right-wing unions in which they advocated for a dominant and “violent” youth, willing to establish a change in the cultural paradigm through “the flags of Faith and Culture.” These young people participated in the transfer of the works of art safeguarded in Lleida to Zaragoza and in the entry of the SDPAN to the provincial capitals and towns of Tarragona, Barcelona and Girona, as well as in the return operations to individuals and institutions.

This article considers youth as a diverse group in which issues of class and political cultures come together, placing these young people as a relevant part of the group of representatives of the Franco regime in the defense of heritage. As a historical category, this article points to youth as a useful social group for the Ministry of National Education of the “New State” in heritage management actions in military vanguard territory during the war and as a point of support in the first postwar period. Likewise, the young people who participated in these actions found in the new regime a boost for their professional careers.

Eduard Caballé i Colom, researcher Institut Català de Recerca en Patrimoni Cultural (ICRPC-CERCA)

For more information: https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/articulo?codigo=9813586

Bibliography: CABALLÉ i COLOM, Eduard. (2024). “El papel de la juventud en la gestión franquista del patrimonio durante la guerra civil y la primera posguerra en Cataluña”. Movellán Haro, Jesús; Irisarri Gutiérrez, Raquel; Fernández Torres, Luis. Miradas al pasado, miradas al presente. Nuevos horizontes de la historiografía contemporánea. Universidad de La Rioja 978-84-09-56520-7, p. 605-614.

Image: cover of the publication.