The Union Farm
by Ernest Jaeger
It is at the end of the 20s that our founder Ernest Jaeger arrived in Mexico, the idea of ​​him and many Germans was to establish plantations to supply a growing European market mainly due to the consumption of Germany and other countries. This would be a second wave of young Germans since there were already several plantations in Mexico created at the end of the 19th century in the Cuilco river basin (Tapachula) .1
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The Atlantic slope would be the entire Sierra Madre de Chiapas that feed on the rivers of the Triunfo reserve, in this document we will describe the descent that it makes through the Cuxtepeques valley with a history of cattle exploitation since 1560 (3) where the plantation The most important in the part with altitude above 900 meters was made by the Pohlenz Family in the Custepec Farm, led for many years by the leadership of Don Martin Pohlenz.
Located about 7 kilometers from this farm, Ernest Jaeger established his plantation in the early 30s. Finca Unión would house several families of workers who began the adventure of bringing Bourbon seeds from other farms and seeds from Marago (Arab coffee plant that has as a peculiarity a large size and intense flavor rate) of the Finca Prusia established in the Jaltenango area (also on the Atlantic slope) founded by Guillermo Kahle (1896).
Finca Unión is established by creating the facilities in the Gadow River ravine, as there is no electrical energy, it is designed so that all the machinery of the Wet Mill (coffee processing facilities), is moved by hydraulic energy generated first by a hydraulic wheel and then a Pelton-type turbine (the engineers will understand what I mean), which through the controlled passage of water manages to move the machinery that will remove the pulp from the coffee, and will make it travel through the fermentation tanks and later be dried in the patios where the grains of Finca Unión are sunned.
The electrical energy for lighting will be obtained with a hydroelectric generator and later with solar energy photocells as it is conserved to date, evoking an era of the first coffee farms in rural America.
Preserving this type of production and the architecture of the facilities of the houses, offices, warehouses and kitchens of Finca Union, made with materials available in nature and designs from the 30s, inherited from rural Europe evokes a trip back in time , obtaining a very pleasant fusion with nature, suggesting that Finca Unión has always been there.
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Currently Finca Unión maintains all that magic, producing high specialty washed coffees of the Arab variety Sarchimor, Costa Rica 95 and Marsellesa. To a lesser extent, it preserves the Marago with which I started. Making quality your cup and nature conservation your reason for existing.
Finca Union Coffee
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The Calderon Jaeger family is inspired by the perseverance and love of our mother Dorita Jaeger, who was born in Finca Unión in 1942 as the eldest daughter of Ernest (Don Ernesto).
Our plantations where Dora had her heart and enjoyed the afternoons that ended in a cup of coffee with two pinches of sugar, great desserts made by an incomparable hand and endless conversations.
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Today we take care of our plants since they are a seed, which is sown in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas, (Atlantic slope) at an altitude between 1100 to 1300 meters above sea level and they are processed at harvest time (December to March) duly ripe under a mechanical free from non-renewable energies of washed and dried coffees in the sun on terraced patios. Proudly giving intense aromas and flavors that Doña Dorita inherited to her family.
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The best coffees from Finca Unión are roasted and packed to be taken to the tables of the whole world obtaining unique qualities for being cultivated in lands of a recommended depth of volcanic origin, at a height above sea level that gives it the qualities that The coffee tree needs to give the best flavor and aroma in its fruits, which will be dried and roasted with the greatest of care.
The family
And as so often happens, behind a cup of coffee there is a story of friendship and love and this family is no exception.
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Jaeger
The Germans came by boat and most disembarked on their adventure in the Port of Veracruz, Mexico. Ernesto landed at the end of the 1920s with more friends, as we can see in photos of the family. Unlike the first generations of Germans, we suppose that due to the conditions of the war (the new German empire) these young people did not come with wives, so later on, most of them would form their families with young ladies from the towns they came to inhabit.
Ernesto Jaeger fixed his eyes on a young lady named Elodia Armendariz, an only daughter originally from San Cristobal de las Casas, with whom he had 7 children but who died at an early age even when Dora, her eldest daughter, was only 13 years old.
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My Tia Herna, Dora's younger sister, says that when she was around 18 years old, several young people wanted her in San Cristobal where they had their house and they all studied, so her father Ernesto spoke to a good German friend, Martin Jacobsen, who had gotten married. with a widow named Carmen Saavedra (Francisco Calderon's widow) and they had their daughter Silvia Jacobsen of the same age to go live with them in Tapachula Chiapas and thus calm all those suitors.
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Until here we leave this part of the story to return later ...
Naumann & Calderón
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We assume in the whole family from the photos that one of the protagonists of this story, Candelaria Escobar, was a very pretty girl from the border between Mexico and Guatemala (although at that time the borders between Mexico-Guatemala were not so clear for families that were left on both sides).
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Cande, as they called her, fell in love with a German immigrant named Irving Naumann and with whom she only had a son named Ricardo Naumann (Monteperla coffee farm, Unión Juarez Chiapas) 4, to whom fate would not live with his father since Irving returned to Germany for work-family issues and the war would have left him trapped there, remaining on the side of the German Democratic Republic (Soviet) and ultimately behind the walls of the Berlin Wall that was built in the 60s to end any chance of going out and being able to see his wife and son again.
As the years passed and the impossibility of her husband returning, Cande continued her life together with her son. Years later Francisco Calderón Martinez eldest son of a Galician immigrant (Don José Calderón Fernandez) owner of the Nueva Galicia Coffee Farm (5) who arrived in Tapachula in the 1920s in Spain, conquered her and made her his second wife, having with her 5 sons, the third of them named Raul Calderón.
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Fate unexpectedly played again and Francisco Calderon (8-year-old Raul's father and Ricardo Naumann's stepfather) died abruptly in a car accident, leaving 5 children with Cande (who was left alone again) and three other children with his wife Carmen. Saavedra, which are in charge of his Galician grandfather Don José Calderon.
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Raúl was undoubtedly the favorite brother of his older half-brother Ricardo, they always had great admiration and affection.
Here everything comes together and gives meaning to the story of love and friendship
They remember Herna Jaeger ..ok, because she came to live then at the house of Mrs. Carmen Saavedra who once a widow had married Martin Jacobsen, while there she meets one of her half brothers Pepon Calderon Saavedra and they have an affair. (Yes, my aunt must have been attractive)
Pepon falls in love and asks his half brother Raul Calderón to accompany him to San Cristóbal to visit the Jaeger sisters and they comment on how beautiful they were to cheer him up.
To her surprise, my Aunt Herna Jaeger tells that Raul and Dora fell in love at first sight, although she did not go with Pepon again later.
Raul Calderon and Dora Jaeger, would fall in love and form a family of 4 children to which I am blessed to belong and who have the privilege of being owners by inheritance of Finca Unión.
And the friendship?
On September 7, 2011 our dear Dorita passed away. Among her personal belongings we find a letter in German, sent to her in 1969 by Erving Naumann from the GDR Germany (Soviet) father of Ricardo Naumann (older half-brother of her husband Raul Calderon).
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The letter begins by saying "I feel in the depths of my soul the death of my best friend ... Ernesto Jaeger (Dora's father)", who had died that year in Chiapas, Mexico.
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This is how the love and friendship of two friends come together in this story around a coffee farm who dreamed of coming to Mexico to plant the best coffee in the world and make their own the best cup of coffee, which at that time described masterfully Helen H. Seargent in her book San Antonio Nexapa (1889) 6
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References
1 http://www.turismochiapas.gob.mx/sectur/ruta-del-caf
2 Waibel, Leo. 1925, The Sierra Madre de Chiapas. Edit Miguel Angel Porrua, Mexico, 1998,305pp and maps
3 Gerhard, P. 1979, The Southeast Frontier of new Spain. Princenton University Press, New Jersey, USA
4 https://www.mexicotravelclub.com/la-historia-en-union-juarez-chiapas
5http: //www.microregiones.gob.mx/catloc/LocdeMun.aspx? Type = password & field = loc & ent = 07 & mun = 089
6 Helen H. Seargent, San Antonio Nexapa, Mexico. Fonapas Chiapas. Directorate of culture and recreation, 1980, (Ceiba collection, 11)
