"World Cup" Exhibit

In a little over a month the World Cup will begin.  This year, three nations, Mexico, Canada and the United States will host the games.  The opening match will be played between Mexico and South Africa in Mexico City's Azteca Stadium on June 11th.

In honor of one of the world's biggest sporting events, the Franz Mayer Museum, Mexico City's museum of decorative arts, is holding a special exhibit displaying memorabilia from World Cups in the past.  It focusses on the games that were held in Latin American countries.  I am not really a big soccer fan. (Oops, sorry.  Everyone except people from United States calls the sport "football", not "soccer".)  However, I found the exhibit interesting, and I learned a lot about the event.

The very first World Cup was held in 1930, and the host country was the South American nation of Uruguay.  

The official poster of the 1930 World Cup

Uruguay was eager to get the World Cup because it was the centennial of their independence, and they wanted to present themselves to the world as a modern, progressive nation.

They constructed a new stadium for the event with a capacity for 90,000 spectators.  At that time it was the largest in the world outside of the United Kingdom.

Thirteen countries participated, and Uruguay won the championship.

The next Latin American country to host the Cup was Brazil in 1950

The team jerseys of Brazil were white and blue.

After a humiliating loss to Uruguay, the shirts were considered bad luck, and the colors of the team jerseys were changed to green and yellow.

In 1962 the event was hosted by Chile.

In May of that year, Chile was struck by a catastrophic 9.5 earthquake which claimed 50 thousand lives.  The calendar and schedule of games had to be modified since 4 of the 8 stadiums to be used had been severely damaged.

A poster showing the flags of the 16 nations which participated that year.

In 1970, just two years after Mexico City hosted the Summer Olympics, the World Cup was held in various cities in Mexico.

Tickets for events and games at the 1970 World Cup

The Mexico City games were held at Azteca Stadium, the same stadium where the Mexico City games this summer will be held.

In 1978 the World Cup was held in Argentina.

It was a controversial choice because the country was ruled by a military regime that was murdering thousands of political opponents.  The games were compared to the 1936 Summer Olympics in Hitler's Berlin.

The military government hoped that the event would legitimize their rule.  Instead, it drew international attention to their brutal dictatorship.

In 1986, the World Cup returned to Mexico for the second time.

However, there was doubt whether or not the games would go on as scheduled.  The year before, Mexico City suffered a disastrous earthquake.  But the stadiums in the city had not suffered damage, and the games went on as planned.

The mascot of the games was Pique, a sombrero-wearing jalapeño pepper.

In 2014 the World Cup returned to Brazil, the country that had won five championships, more than any other nation.

For the first time, the selection resulted in widespread protests in the host country, as many people demonstrated against the government expenditures of building new stadiums.

This summer, for the first time in World Cup history, the games will be held in three countries... Canada, the United States and Mexico... and in 16 cities.  Forty eight nations will be participating.  Mexico is the first country to host the games three times.  The games in Mexico will be held in three cities... Mexico City, Guadalajara, and Monterrey.

Mexico City poster

Guadalajara poster

Monterrey poster

Mexico City is expected to draw 5.5 million international visitors during the event.

I am actually glad that I will be in Europe for a portion of that time.