Draft:Juan Esquivel y Fuentes

Juan Esquivel y Fuentes (27 December 1869–1955) was a Mexican poet, priest and public speaker from the town of Santa María Tepepan, in what is today the Mexico City's borough of Xochimilco. He was better known for his poetry collection called "Tepepam, Poesías", on which he worked from 1932 until his death in 1955, constantly adding new poems, deleting older ones and frequently changing the structure and contents of the others throughout the eight published editions.

While it seems that, unbeknownst to him, by the end of his life he had gained a bit of notoriety in Mexico City's literary and artistic circle, after his death his work fell back into obscurity, in which it mostly remains to this day.

Early life and education
Juan Esquivel y Fuentes was born in the town of Santa María Tepepan, in a place called Tlacomultenco, on 27 December 1869. He was the youngest son of his mother, Sóstenes Fuentes, but his father died when he was still an infant. During his childhood he grew up in abject poverty, which was commonplace for rural Mexico in the late 19th century. He was taught to read and write at a young age by the local priest's mother; however, he did not receive proper schooling because of the lack of a permanent school in Tepepan, having instead intermittent classes given by a traveling teacher.

Between the ages of ten to fifteen, due to the dire economic situation of his family, he was forced to work in the states and ranches around Tepepan, in the nearby Tlalpan and Xochimilco regions, either as a farmhand, a courier, a gardener or doing any other heavy work that was needed. During this time he continued with his basic education; however, he had to interrupt it sometime before age fifteen.

At the age of sixteen, in 1885, he and his mother had to move out of Tepepan after his older half-brother, Pedro Biscerril, kicked them out of their home. They settled in the center of Mexico City, near what today is the Templo Mayor archeological site. There he worked as the doorman and night guard of a building, getting to live with his mother in the doorman's quarters.

He was admitted to a school close by where he was allowed to study in exchange for menial work. After a year of going to this school, he excelled at the final exams, rising above his classmates and coming to the attention of archbishop Pelagio Antonio de Labastida y Dávalos, who gave Esquivel a place in Mexico City's Conciliar Seminary, where he started his formation as a priest.