Isabel Vila, the irreverent unionist who is going to change the school

Cal go back to the 1857quan només 14 years, Isabel Vila He is going to sit and work while he is occupying the sunny weather, attentive to the malalts of the mutual aid of Llagostera. In this municipality of Girona, the center of the southern-tapera industry of Catalonia, the family had been transferred from the economic crisis that hit the region. Així is going to be like that noia that came from Calongein the Vila they have taken a path outside the alzinars that populate the Gavarres, they will be imbued with the ambient workerswhich to make up for the lack of social security, have created mutual aid and other similar organizations.

“I had very clear ideas, I was rebellious and willing to go against the current to become a teacher one day”

Submerged in this environment, Isabel Vila spends three hours learning to arrive and write. “I had very clear ideas, I was rebellious and willing to go against the current to become a teacher one day.” Aixi narran Núria Bassa Yo Toni Strubell the first steps of this activist, whose biography has been condensed into Isabel Vila, the first Catalan trade unionist. An illustrated work by the reconeguda dibuixant Pilarín Bayés which reviews the journey of who, over the course of those decades, will become a reference among the social and worker movements of the country.

‘Isabel Cinc Hores’

During the 19th century and the first third of the 20th centurythey will be diverse gifts that will lead the workers’ lluites to Catalonia. Thanks to them, they are going to conquer rights that will allow a greater recognition of gifts in the different sectors of production and other areas of public life. Among the most familiar, mentioning the secretary of the Spanish Federation of Workers, Teresa Claramunt (1862-1931); the internationalist Francesca Saperas (1851-1933); the cenetista Llibertat Ródenas (1892-1970), joined the anarcho-syndicalist and minister of the Second Spanish Republic, Federica Montseny (1905-1994).

Isabel Vila will be key in defending the interests of workers and republican values

In this generation we also found Isabel Vila, who although she has not transcended in official historiography, will be key in the defense of workers’ interests and republican values. Indeed, among the first six actions, it supersedes the impulses of a manifested against the Quintesthe system of military recruitment of young people with the new government of the Sexenni republicà (1868-1874) He intended to recruit the militias that fought the wars waged against Morocco, the Philippines and other overseas territories.

Vila’s ascendancy among the popular capes is going to be clear because 800 gifts from Llagostera subscribe without that document. “On this paper we can intuit fully,” explain Núria Bassa and Toni Strubell, who describe as exceptional the support that the initiative will provoke, especially since the population both of them exceeds only 3,000 inhabitants.

Furthermore, the book is available in the campaigns that Vila will encapsulate for demand the dret dels infants – sobretot de les nenes – a rebre educacióand the one who proposed reduce the working day to five hours for children under 13 years of age that they work at the factories of the region. A fruitful demand of which will become coneguant with Isabel Cinc Hores.

Also in these anys he will star The republican aixecament of the Foc de la Bisbal. Together with three nurses and a group of 3,000 men led by the deputy Pere CaimóIn 1869 he embarked on a march from Llagostera to Cassà de la Selva to defend the Federal Democratic Republic.

From the International to the classrooms

She is considered the first Catalan trade unionist because she became secretary of the AIT of Llagostera in 1871.

If the Bisbal insurgency is going to fail, it will not prevent Isabel Vila from continuing her commitment to the popular sectors. In 1871 he joined the southern union that had formed a Sant Feliu de Guíxolsso continue to enter the core of Llagostera and drive l’Associació Internacional de Treballadors (AIT)of which she will be secretary. “It was precisely this level of responsibility that made her considered the first Catalan trade unionist,” Bassa and Strubell point out.

Malauradament, the cop d’estat of general Pavia in 1874they are going to truncate the militant activity, since in the end the arrest warrant that was weighing on it, He goes into exile to the Occitan city of CarcassonneWith Muntada, some friends of the family, they are going to donate their money and money to the suro factory they run. In total, your stay in Llenguadoc will last forever, during which Vila is going to pursue master’s studies With the objective of recovering the old idea of ​​being a teacher, the situation in the Spanish State allows us, a fet that was not going to occur until the end of 1880.

The contribution in the pedagogical field will mark an entire era, since, “in addition to strengthening the maxim that Cap Dona could run a school, it will contribute to the students taking subjects that are only reserved for the nois”

Aprofitant that the repression of the dissidence had been softened, Isabel Vila is going to cross the border to settle in Barcelona, ​​on He is going to found a school located on Consell de Cent streetto the cap of any, and fruit of the prestige that had acquired, accept the offer of fer-se càrrec of the school of the Center Republicà de Sabadella group of cooperative regimes founded by people of republican ideology, masons, union members and working families. As Bassa i Strubell stated, his contribution in the pedagogical sphere will mark an entire era, since, “in addition to strengthening the maxim that Cap Dona could run a school, it will contribute to students taking subjects that they only need. “they are reserved for the nights.”

As director of the college will endure the attacks of the Church and the municipal authoritiesaixí with the resignation of three teachers who practice spirituality. But neither these obstacles, nor the economic crisis that devastated the city of Vallesana in 1883, will deter it from the “holy cause”, as defined by the teaching tasca. Names The death occurred due to a vascular accident on December 23, 1896.interrupts a trajectory that historiography with prou feines will dignify during the 20th century.

Només l’any 1990, the sociolinguist and former senator of the ERC Francesc Ferrer i Gironès in writing two books that gloss Isabel Vila, which later became the musical Isavel (2013), d’Antoni Mas Yo Enric Planellaand the monoleg Isabel Cinc Hores (2019), which Toni Strubell recites alongside the actress Carmen Sansa.

To these contributions have been added the inauguration of careers and places that have the name i, enguany, the 25th edition of the Isabel Vila Memorial Walkin record of the Marxa of Foc de la Bisbal, the free The Federalby Sebastià Alzamora, i Isabel Vila, the first Catalan trade unionistWith only the drawings of Pilarín Bayés, Núria Bassa and Toni Strubell outline the profile of a restless woman, committed and clau in the lull for the civil and social rights of Catalonia.