Chubut province

CHUBUT

Beyond the whales

Web of the capital city of the Province	Geography	Interesting dates	Interesting places
The guide of Madryn.com	Geography
	Provincia, southern Argentina, part of the region known as Patagonia, bounded by the Atlantic Ocean (east) and Chile (west) and having an area of 86,751 square miles (224,686 square km). To the west, the forested, fertile Andean foothills are interspersed with lakes. The Los Alerces National Park (463,400 acres [187,500 hectares]) includes glaciated mountains, alpine lakes, rivers, and forests. To the east are isolated mountain ranges, salt flats, and salt lakes. Chubut River crosses the province west to east. The Valdés Peninsula juts into the Atlantic in northeast Chubut province, separating the San José (north) and Nuevo (south) gulfs. San José Gulf was officially decreed a wildlife sanctuary in 1974 in an attempt to protect the breeding, calving, and mating areas of the right whales, orcas, and elephant seals. The area, largely colonized by Welsh immigrants, was organized in 1884 as the Chubut National Territory. It was accorded the rank of province in 1955. Puerto Madryn, Trelew, and Rawson, the provincial capital, were early Welsh settlements. Sheep raising and wool production, the predominant activities, originated with the Welsh colonizers. Oil has become an important source of income, with one of the nation's largest oil fields situated in the south of the province, near Comodoro Rivadavia. It produces about one-fifth of Argentina's petroleum. Pop. (1991 prelim.) 356,445. Rawson: Town, capital of Chubut province, southern Argentina. It lies along the Chubut River near the latter's mouth, about 5 miles (8 km) upriver from the Atlantic coast. It was founded in 1865 by Welsh settlers and named after Guillermo Rawson (1821-90), then Argentine minister of the interior. Although the port has declined in importance, there are small installations for fisheries. A beachis located nearby (Playa Union). Pop. (1980) 12,981.
	Sundance Kid and Butch Kassidy
	Sundance Kid b. 1870, Phoenixville, Pa., U.S. d. 1909?, Concordia Tin Mines, near San Vicente, Bolivia? byname of HARRY LONGABAUGH, OR LONGBAUGH, American outlaw, reputed to be the best shot and fastest gunslinger of the Wild Bunch, a group of robbers and rustlers who ranged through the Rocky Mountains and plateau desert regions of the West in the 1880s and '90s. Harry Longabaugh left home when he was 15 and took his nickname from the town of Sundance, where he was imprisoned (for his first and only time) from August 1887 to February 1889 for stealing a horse. After release he headed for the hideout of Hole in the Wall in central Wyoming and began his outlaw career. At the turn of the century, the Sundance Kid joined with Butch Cassidy and a girlfriend, Etta Place, and in 1901 drifted to New York City and then South America, where they set up ranching in Chubut province, Argentina. In 1906 he and Cassidy returned to outlawry, robbing banks, trains, and mining interests in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, and Peru. (Sundance escorted the ailing Etta Place back to the United States in 1907 but then returned to South America.) In 1909, according to Pinkerton accounts, the two outlaws were cornered by a Bolivian cavalry unit; Sundance was mortally wounded, and Cassidy took his own life. Another story puts their death at a bank robbery in Mercedes, Uruguay, in 1911; still other stories have Sundance surviving and returning to the United States and dying in obscurity under a new name (Harry Long) somewhere in the West (perhaps Casper, Wyo.) in the 1930s or as late as 1957. Cassidy, Butch b. April 13, 1866, Beaver, Utah, U.S. d. 1909?, Concordia Tin Mines, near San Vicente, Bolivia? byname of ROBERT LEROY PARKER, American outlaw and foremost member of the Wild Bunch, a collection of bank and train robbers who ranged through the western United States in the 1880s and '90s. Robert Parker took his alias from Mike Cassidy, an older outlaw from whom he learned cattle rustling and gunslinging (1884-87). Thereafter--except for two years of chiefly cowboying (1891-92) and two years (1894-96) in Wyoming State Prison--he was teamed up with a succession of outlaws. His favourite friend and confederate was Elzy Lay, with whom, alone or in a gang, he helped rob a number of trains, banks, and paymasters and rustled horses and, less often, cattle. The year after Elzy was arrested and imprisoned (1899), Cassidy teamed up with Harry Longabaugh, the Sundance Kid. By then, sheriff posses and Pinkerton detectives were capturing or closing in on members of the Wild Bunch, and Cassidy and Sundance (with Sundance's girlfriend, Etta Place) escaped first to New York City and then to South America (1901). (Etta Place returned home in 1907.) From 1902 to 1906 they owned and ran a ranch in Chubut province, Argentina, but thereafter they returned to outlawry. Drifting from country to country, they robbed banks, trains, and mine stations until 1909, when, according to Pinkerton agents, they were trapped by a group of mounted soldiers near San Vicente, Bolivia, where Sundance was mortally shot and Cassidy shot himself. Another story puts their death in Mercedes, Uruguay, in December 1911, cut down by soldiers during a bank robbery. Still other stories have Cassidy (either alone or with Sundance) returning to the United States, drifting about from Mexico to Alaska, and dying in obscurity in 1937 in the Northwest or in Nevada (possibly Spokane, Wash., or Johnny, Nev.).
	Interesting places
	Puerto Madryn \| Trelew \| Gaiman \| Península Valdés Links externos a: Comarca andina del paralelo 42 \| Rawson

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