Lares barrio-pueblo is a

barrio ''Barrio'' () is a Spanish language, Spanish word that means "Quarter (urban subdivision), quarter" or "neighborhood". In the modern Spanish language, it is generally defined as each area of a city delimited by functional (e.g. residential, comm ...

and the administrative center (

seat A seat is a place to sit. The term may encompass additional features, such as back, armrest, head restraint but may also refer to concentrations of power in a wider sense (i.e " seat (legal entity)"). See disambiguation. Types of seat The ...

) of

Lares Lares ( , ; archaic , singular ) were Tutelary deity#Ancient Rome, guardian deities in ancient Roman religion. Their origin is uncertain; they may have been hero-ancestors, guardians of the hearth, fields, boundaries, or fruitfulness, or an ama ...

, a municipality of

Puerto Rico ; abbreviated PR), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, is a Government of Puerto Rico, self-governing Caribbean Geography of Puerto Rico, archipelago and island organized as an Territories of the United States, unincorporated territo ...

. Its population in 2010 was 2,690. As was customary in Spain, in Puerto Rico, the municipality has a barrio called ''

pueblo Pueblo refers to the settlements of the Pueblo peoples, Native American tribes in the Southwestern United States, currently in New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas. The permanent communities, including some of the oldest continually occupied settlement ...

'' which contains a central plaza, the municipal buildings (city hall), and a Catholic church. Fiestas patronales (patron saint festivals) are held in the central plaza every year.

The central plaza and its church

is the name of the central plaza located in Lares Barrio Pueblo. The central plaza, or square, is a place for official and unofficial recreational events and a place where people can gather and socialize from dusk to dawn. The

Laws of the Indies The Laws of the Indies () are the entire body of laws issued by the Spanish Crown in 1573 for the American and the Asian possessions of its empire. They regulated social, political, religious, and economic life in these areas. The laws are com ...

, Spanish law, which regulated life in Puerto Rico in the early 19th century, stated the plaza's purpose was for "the parties" (celebrations, festivities) (), and that the square should be proportionally large enough for the number of neighbors (). These Spanish regulations also stated that the streets nearby should be comfortable portals for passersby, protecting them from the elements: sun and rain. Located across the central plaza in Lares barrio-pueblo is the (English: Church San José of Lares), a Roman Catholic church. Originally made of wood, it was inaugurated in 1838. In 1881, it was remade based on a design by Ramón Soler with stone masonry but with wooden towers and a wooden roof. Then in the 1920s it was remodeled again. The building has changed completely but the original lateral walls and the first level of its front facade also remain from the original.

History

Lares barrio-pueblo was in Spain's

gazetteer A gazetteer is a geographical dictionary or wikt:directory, directory used in conjunction with a map or atlas.Aurousseau, 61. It typically contains information concerning the geographical makeup, social statistics and physical features of a co ...

s until Puerto Rico was ceded by

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

in the aftermath of the

Spanish–American War The Spanish–American War (April 21 – August 13, 1898) was fought between Restoration (Spain), Spain and the United States in 1898. It began with the sinking of the USS Maine (1889), USS ''Maine'' in Havana Harbor in Cuba, and resulted in the ...

under the terms of the

Treaty of Paris of 1898 The Treaty of Peace between the United States of America and the Kingdom of Spain, commonly known as the Treaty of Paris of 1898, was signed by Restoration (Spain), Spain and the United States on December 10, 1898, and marked the end of the ...

and became an

unincorporated territory of the United States Unincorporated may refer to: * Unincorporated area, land not governed by a local municipality * Unincorporated entity, a type of organization * Unincorporated territories of the United States, territories under U.S. jurisdiction, to which Congress ...

. In 1899, the

United States Department of War The United States Department of War, also called the War Department (and occasionally War Office in the early years), was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army, als ...

conducted a

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of Puerto Rico finding that the population of Lares Pueblo was 1,450.

Sectors

Barrios (which are, in contemporary times, roughly comparable to minor civil divisions) and subbarrios, in turn, are further subdivided into smaller local populated place areas/units called sectores (''sectors'' in English). The types of ''sectores'' may vary, from normally ''sector'' to ''urbanización'' to ''reparto'' to ''barriada'' to ''residencial'', among others. The following sectors are in Lares barrio-pueblo: , and .

Gallery

Church and monument, Plaza de la Revolución, Lares, Puerto Rico.jpg, Church and monument, Plaza de la Revolución Fountain, Plaza de la Revolución, Lares, Puerto Rico.jpg, Fountain in Plaza de la Revolución, Lares, Puerto Rico.jpg, Map mosaic at Catholic Church, Lares, Puerto Rico.jpg, Catholic Church in Lares El interior de la Parroquía San José en Lares, Puerto Rico.jpg, The church interior Casa Alcaldia, Lares, Puerto Rico.jpg, City Hall, 2019 Plaza de la revolucion, placa.jpg, Plaque in Lares Ice Cream Parlor.jpg, Ice cream shop owned by Jose Rodríguez Ruiz, mayor of Lares in 2020

References

External links