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I’m concerned about all my guys’ offseason training regimes, Jim. I don’t think they’re listening.

John, it’s always harder with the pro guys. At least you can always have the looming possibility of scholarship loss if your guys don’t follow along the menu of pure grizzly bear blood and raw eggs.

You don’t even know the half of it, Jim. A pastry shop opened up across the street from the practise field. Some of the guys are even stopping on the way home to get eclairs and doughnuts. It’s madness! How are they supposed to be in peak physical conditioning if they won’t even let us microchip them?

Pastry shops have been nothing but trouble, John. But probably none caused as much trouble as this one in mid-nineteenth-century Mexico…

THE PASTRY WAR

Combatant 1: Mexico

Combatant 2: France

Location of Conflict: Mexico City

Reason for Conflict: Somebody destroyed a pastry shop.

What happened? In 1832, a French baker known by the name of Monsieur Remontel complained to the French government that Mexican military officers looted and destroyed his shop on the outskirts of Mexico City, demanding remuneration of 60,000 pesos for its demise, despite the fact it was valued at less than 1000 pesos. By 1838, the French had amassed a large list of complaints against French citizens in Mexico, including the looting of French shops from a decade previous. French Prime Minister Louis-Mathieu Mole demanded 600,000 Mexican pesos as an indemnity from the Mexican government (a ludicrous amount compared to the value of the damage that had taken place), and when Mexican President Anastasio Bustamante refused to pay, the French moved  the gunboats in. The French navy blockaded every port on the Caribbean side of Mexico, from the Rio Grande all the way to the Yucatan, and captured the city of Veracruz, along with almost every ship in the Mexican navy.

The Aftermath: The Pastry War was a relatively minor conflict in the grand scope of Mexican history, but it was another nail in the coffin for the formerly gigantic Mexican Empire, which had begun crumbling since the Texas Revolution of 1835.

With trade cut off along the entire eastern coastline of Mexico, the population was forced to smuggle in goods via Corpus Christi, Texas, which forced independent Texans to patrol their port much more rigorously. The US, eyeing Texas as a future American state, also assisted the French in their blockade of Mexico with some additional warships stationed in the Gulf of Mexico. Despite being disorganized, the Mexicans wouldn’t go quietly; former President and General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, the famous leader who beat the Texans at the Alamo, was in retirement by late 1838, but with the news of the siege of Veracruz, he came back to lead troops – without any requests from the military or government. Unfortunately for him, he had his leg blown off by French grapeshot; it was buried with full military honors, and Santa Anna used the incident to amplify his heroism and leadership, and catapulted back into the political game to become president once again.

In just three months, Mexico capitulated, and signed a peace treaty with France; France got an agreement for payment of their 600,000 peso indemnity, as previously demanded, and the navy pulled out of their blockade. However, this payment never actually took place, and thus by 1861, the French launched a second Mexican campaign to force a regime change in North America. This one went even worse for Mexico – the French installed a puppet Emperor for a number of years, but when they were finally driven out by Mexican forces in 1867, the country was shattered, with political divides between liberal republicans and conservative monarchists causing rifts that lasted for generations. Coupled with the loss of territory in both the secession of Texas, and the defeat of Mexican forces in the Mexican-American War that ceded California and the Southwest to the US, the mid-19th century was not a happy time for Mexico as a nation.

Shouldn’t have wrecked that bakery, I guess. Although, I’ll be goddamned if the power of suggestion doesn’t get me all riled up, you know. Back before the protein and blood diet was mandated here at Ann Arbor, I bet I could eat a few hundred doughnuts in a single sitting, no sweat.

I guarantee you that when it comes to eating things, I could absolutely kick your ass, Jim.

Sounds like a gentlemanly challenge then, brother dear. First man to eat a hundred doughnuts wins? LET’S GO RIGHT NOW.

Jim, it’s 4:30 in the morning. The pastry shop’s not even open yet.

***

Information for this article taken from here, here, here, and here. Banner image by The Maestro.