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Florencio Villareal was a Mexican soldier born in Havana, Cuba at the end of the 18th century. He was the son of Spanish parents that lived on the island.

When he was young he came to Mexico, where he fought with the royalist forces in the Mexican War of Independence. In 1821 Agustin de Iturbide declared the Plan of Iguala, with which he formed the Army of the Three Guarantees, where Villareal served. After Vicente Guerrero was deposed from the presidency, Nicolas Bravo brought Villareal to the state of Guerrero, created in 1849. On the 1st of March 1854 Villareal announced the Plan of Ayutla with Juan N. Alvarez Hurtado, which began the Revolution of Ayutla. After the debunking of Santa Anna, Villareal served the empire of Maximilian of Habsburgo.

Between 1870 and 1890, many Cubans of Spanish origin established themselves in the western parts of the island to start businesses, establishing themselves principally in the Yucatan peninsula, behind Veracruz and Mexico City. The government of Porfirio Diaz, as part of their foreign policies, wanted to bring white immigrants to Mexican soil with the intention of boosting the economy in exchange for protection and asylum, with the purpose of bringing emigrants towards Mexico.

Rodolfo Menendez de la peña, set sail from Havana, together with his brother Antonio Menendez de la peña and his wife, Angela Gonzalez Benitez- both pedagogies, but had yet to reach a similar renown for their work in Yucatan- after they had sympathized and supported Jose Marti in the Independence movement on the island of Cuba. They disembarked from the port of Sisal on the 12 of May of that year, almost reaching 19 years of age, to immediately move to the city of Merida, Capital of the state of Yucatan.