H2O Diving

A brief history of the Dominican Republic

The earliest known inhabitants of the Dominican Republic reached the island around 2600 BC, using dugout canoes that allowed them to ride the current from South America throughout the Antilles. They were primarily nomadic hunter-gatherers who used stone tools and left little behind. A second group, often referred to as the Salanoids or ancient Arawaks, landed on Hispaniola around 250 BC. The group spread throughout the Caribbean.

A third migration, from Venezuela, swept through the Antilles about 2000 years ago, and by AD 700 occupied the Dominican Republic and most of the surrounding islands. This society's complex hierarchical structure allowed for specialization in fishing, worship, art and farming. They called themselves the Taíno (friendly people), and an estimated 400,000 of them lived on Hispanola when Christopher Columbus got off the ship to greet them. Folks on another island had told Columbus that there was gold to be found there, and the anxious Italian set off in the night to find it, accidentally dashing the Santa María offshore.

Columbus named the island Hispaniola ('Little Spain') and returned with a thousand colonists the following year. Naturally it was the Taíno who were set to work to build this vision, and within six years of Columbus' arrival they had been thoroughly decimated by cruel working conditions and European diseases. Though some independent communities survived in hard-to-reach areas of the island, much of the original culture was lost.

The original Spanish settlement near Isabela was abandoned after just a few years and settlers shifted to the present site of Santo Domingo, where Columbus' son, Diego, tried to flesh out his father's blueprint. Hispaniola, however, ran out of gold rather quickly, and Santo Domingo soon lost prominence when gold and silver were discovered in Mexico and Peru. Pirates ransacked Spanish settlements, particularly in what's now Haiti, and Spain finally gave up on the western third of the island and ceded it to France in 1697 - a decision it no doubt came to rue as the French turned what became known as Haiti into the world's richest sugar cane producer.

The slave rebellion in Haiti was initially supported by the Spaniards, but their politicking backfired when revolutionary leader Toussaint L'Ouverture invaded the eastern part of Hispaniola, took Santo Domingo and freed the island's 40,000 slaves. This prompted much of the Spanish elite to relocate to neighboring islands like Puerto Rico and Cuba.

Toussaint was eventually driven back to the formerly French territories, and Haiti declared independence in 1804. Then, they invaded the eastern half of the island again in 1821. This time they stayed for 23 years, looting the country, freeing the slaves (again) and bringing economic activity to a standstill. A nascent Dominican nationalist movement formed during the occupation and beat the Haitians back to the eastern side of the island in 1844. The leader of this important revolution was Spanish dandy and all-around ass-kicker Juan Pablo Duarte, now hailed as the father of the Dominican Republic.

Various military men and families with money fought for control of the fledgling government, one General Santana actually allowing the republic's annexation by Spain just to stay in power. The poorly armed Dominican population fought Spanish troops so well that on March 3, 1865, the queen of Spain annulled all claims to the island. The DR has been fully independent ever since.

Much damage had been done to urban infrastructure and the agrarian economy in the course of the war, however, and things weren't looking good. More military men and moneyed families crawled out of the woodwork, playing tug-of-war for the next 35 years with what was left. There was some progress, particularly under liberals General Luperón and Father Arturo (1879-1882), and Ramón Cáceres (1905-1911), but overall things were a bit of a mess.

The neighboring United States saw trouble in the Caribbean as opportunity for expansion, and in 1916, US troops moved in. Like the Spanish, who lost interest when the gold ran out, however, the USA became bored with the island when it became clear that the Germans probably weren't going to attack the Panama Canal after all, making the DR a bit less strategically important. In 1924, they stepped back, and President Horacio Vásquez stepped up.

The new president built roads and schools, initiated irrigation programs and got the economy hopping. Just when things were going really well, army chief Rafael Leonidas Trujillo got jealous of all that power he didn't have (he had been siphoning money off the military budget for years, but sometimes wealth just isn't enough) and forced Vásquez to resign. From 1930-1947 (and indirectly until 1961), Trujillo dispensed with the formalities of democracy and got down to business. Repression, murder and torture went side by side with building, land reform and economic success during the Trujillo administration. Authoritarianism is efficient, at least.

The resumption of free elections pitted the usual suspects against one another: Reform-minded liberals, military men and wealthy families all fought for the brass ring. The Dominican Republic continued to diversify its economy, build schools and slowly move forward almost in spite of its leadership (not to mention the increasingly regular rolling blackouts caused by increasing infrastructure and inadequate power plants). Current President Leonel Fernandez Reyna, a lawyer who grew up in New York City, has his work cut out for him. Perhaps he'll rise to the occasion and finally realize the potential of this amazing land.

Environment

Back in the good old days, the Dominican Republic was blanketed with lush rainforests teeming with diverse flora and fauna, including some 1500 species not found anywhere else. Today, many of the swamps have been drained and trees cut down for charcoal, but there are still isolated pockets of untamed nature enough to satisfy the most adamant ecotourist.

The main challenges facing the environment are overpopulation and poverty. It's a familiar cycle: Forests are razed to provide firewood, building materials and farmland; the mountainous countryside and heavy rains conspire to send the fragile topsoil into the ocean; and the earth is rendered all but barren. Various organizations in the DR are working to build a sustainable relationship between the growing population and the increasingly pressured ecosystem, but any such changes are difficult to make.

Despite all this, the Dominican Republic boasts some seriously beautiful countryside, from mangrove swamps to highland cloud forests, dozens of gorgeous blooming trees and more than 218 species of birds. Offshore the wildlife is even more spectacular, particularly the famous gathering of humpback whales in the Bahía de Samaná during the breeding season. Manatees, pilot whales and more than eight species of sea turtle call the waters surrounding Hispaniola home.

(Lonely Planet)

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This page was last updated on 06 June 2008