SPORT IN ILHÉUS AND THE CONSOLIDATION OF THE GEOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL INSTITUTE OF BAHIA (1921)

Abstract

This paper discusses the relationship between the first intercity soccer tournament of the state of Bahia held in 1921, and the campaign for the construction of the Geographical and Historical Institute of Bahia (IGHB). The research is based on an analysis of periodicals of that time and on the literature related to that topic. The narrative shows how the participation of the municipality of Ilhéus in the event offered an opportunity to assert its commitment to the ideals of modernization and civilization, which were valued by Bahia’s society at that time. It was also investigated how this participation contributed to the consolidation process of the sport in Ilhéus and its approximation to the sports scenario of the state capital.

Keywords
Sports; Soccer; IGHB; Ilhéus; Civility.

Resumo

Este estudo explora a ocorrência do primeiro torneio intermunicipal baiano de futebol de 1921 e sua relação com a campanha para a construção do Instituto Geográfico e Histórico da Bahia (IGHB). A investigação tem por base a análise de periódicos da época e o diálogo com a bibliografia sobre o tema. A narrativa evidencia como a participação do município de Ilhéus no evento representou uma oportunidade para afirmar seu compromisso com os ideais de modernização e civilização, valorizados pela sociedade baiana da época. Também averioguou-se como essa participação contribuiu para o processo de consolidação do esporte em Ilhéus e sua aproximação com o cenário esportivo da capital do estado.

Palavras-chave
Esporte; Futebol; IGHB; Ilhéus; Civilidade.

Resumen

Este estudio analiza el primer torneo intermunicipal de fútbol del estado de Bahia, realizado en 1921, y su relación con la campaña para la construcción del Instituto Geográfico e Histórico de Bahia (IGHB). La investigación se basa en el análisis de publicaciones periódicas de la época y en el diálogo con la bibliografía sobre ese tema. La narrativa muestra cómo la participación del municipio de Ilhéus en el evento representó una oportunidad para reafirmar su compromiso con los ideales de modernización y civilización, valorados por la sociedad de Bahia en ese momento histórico. Se trata de conocer cómo esta participación contribuyó con el proceso de consolidación del deporte en Ilhéus y con su acercamiento al escenario deportivo de la capital del estado.

Palabras clave
Deporte; Fútbol; IGHB; Ilhéus; Civilidad.

The centrality of the nucleus is responsible for the “coordination and direction of the different activities of the space organized around it” (Milton Santos, 1959, p. 12).

1 INTRODUCTION

On Monday, December 12, 1921, citizens of Ilhéus woke up with a hangover of strong “[…] emotions of lively joy, amidst the vibrant enthusiasm with which the city trembled the day before, after receiving such excellent news […]” coming from the Bahian capital. The Correio de Ilhéus newspaper announced: “Aleguá! Aleguá!¹ Ilhéus is the Intermunicipal Soccer Champion” (ALEGUÁ…, 1921, p. 1). It was the result of the tournament held in Salvador and won by the municipality, according to the newspaper (Figure 1). However, this story began years before with the idea of building the new headquarters of the Instituto Geográfico e Histórico da Bahia (Geographical and Historical Institute of Bahia)², mobilizing the Bahian society and promoting the holding of sporting events, which were unusual until then.

The historical development of sports in Brazil began in large urban centers, and for some time, the phenomenon in such regions has been subject of studies (DIAS; MELO, 2009; LUCENA, 2001; MELO, 2001). But the sports have spread to inland regions, imposing the need for research on such development in places “little or not at all urbanized” (DIAS, 2013, p. 35). However, few investigations deal with sport in the country's backlands, so-called peripheral regions, or even hinterlands, far from centers of political, economic, and cultural decisions (RUSSEL-WOOD, 1998).

Research on the history of culture, leisure, or sport has focused on economically developed regions with higher demographic levels. Despite some recent developments, resulting from investigations conducted in the North, Northeast, or Midwest of the country, “[…] as a general rule, the Brazilian bibliography in this regard is still quite confined to the narrow geographic limits of the South and Southeast regions - especially in the Southeast” (DIAS, 2020, p.11).

Figure 1
Cover of the Correio de Ilhéus

In general, Bahian historiography on various topics was limited to Salvador for years (FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001). However, new investigations have been dedicated to understanding the history of sport in Bahia from a countryside viewpoint³ (SANTOS, 2020; NUNES; RIBEIRO, 2020). Such studies reveal that, in the first quartile of the 20th century, the country experienced efforts related to social improvement, guided by ideas of modernization and civilization of the population in different dimensions of daily life which included the consolidation of leisure practices considered more consistent with those ideals (AMARAL; DIAS, 2017; MELO, 2010).

This study responds to the academic provocation of the researcher Henrique Sena dos Santos “kick-off”, calling the others to “continue the game” (2020, p. 192) of such investigations in the upcountry of Bahia. Therefore, it is intended to analyze what happened in the city of Ilhéus, before, during, and after the "Intermunicipal Soccer Tournament", held to raise funds for the Instituto Geográfico e Histórico da Bahia (IGHB).

2 METHODOLOGY

The research is based on primary sources, because "[…] the historian should always pay attention to the presentation of the historical content he intends to examine, whether it is simple information or ideas" (CARDOSO; VAINFAS, 1997, p. 539). This research model leans on the narratives of historical sources, here constituted by the local newspaper Correio de Ilhéus (BIRREL, 2011; PHILLIPS, 2001). For its analysis, the following recommendations from Luca (2008) were considered: the observance of the materiality of the forms in the physical and visual aspects; its serial character (1921 to 1930)⁴; the perception of the social intentions that this means of communication intended to achieve; the identity of its target audience; the characterization of the group responsible for the publication and its main collaborators, among other aspects.

Thus, as pointed out by Darnton (1996, p. 15), the newspaper is recognized as an “ingredient of the event”, that is, not as a mere record of everyday events but as an instrument that seeks to shape the perception and to condition the actions and decisions of its readers, thereby interfering in the construction of this everyday life, which it claims only to record in a supposedly impartial way. It is important to recognize that Correio de Ilhéus was founded on September 24, 1921, by the representative of the local Republican Democratic Party, Colonel Antônio Pessoa da Costa e Silva. The periodical had the Colonel himself as director and two of his sons as editors (RIBEIRO, 2008; 2017; RIBEIRO, 2015). Thus, Correio de Ilhéus echoed the interests of the city's ruling classes, personified by politicians linked to Coronel Pessoa and the local Republican-Democratic Party.

The guidelines and postures adopted by the journal have always been aligned with the interests of these people and their projects. Perhaps for this very reason, it is observed that, initially, there was no structuring of news related to the sports sector in the newspaper, just loose notes, without regularity defined by the theme itself, but only according to the owners’ expectations. It was only in the late 1920s that the newspaper gained its column organized for this purpose, entitled “Correio Esportivo”, which was certainly motivated by the increase of public interest in the topic, stimulated by the newspaper, for its character of improving social habits, as it will be seen later.

The temporary framework of this research is year 1921, when the first intercity soccer tournament takes place, but it evaluates and points out the unfolding of this event in subsequent years, always based on the aforementioned Correio de Ilhéus, whose collection dates back to 1930, and is the city’s only newspaper published during the period under study, being available as a series for consultation at the Centro de Documentação e Memória Regional da Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz - CEDOC/UESC.

Once the articles of interest were identified, the keywords “tournament”, “soccer”, “sport”, “IGHB”, “leisure” and “sociability” were considered in the journal, within the time frame of the research. Aside from the occurrence of words, the topics that were related to the research were photographed and registered to elaborate syntheses of the information in a database, containing the edition number, date, year, and day of publication.

3 ILHÉUS AND CIVILIZATION EXPECTATION

In research produced in the cocoa region which was romanticized by Adonias Filho (1976), as “Civilização do Cacau” (Cocoa Civilization); Freitas and Paraíso (2001) and Garcez and Freitas (1975) presented the city’s reality, between 1890 and 1920, when it exhibited a scenario of “[...] all kinds of phenomena ‒ demographic, social, political and cultural ‒ that made the regional space be recognized and be the object of all kinds of curiosity and questioning” (FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001, p. 99). This statement accompanies Adonias Filho (1976, p. 93) as he sustains that Ilhéus “[...]is so different, as a result of the sociocultural process of changes, that a regional civilization itself is entirely portrayed”. Garcez and Freitas (1975, p. 18) highlight economic growth, based on the expansion of cocoa farming, stressing that: “State collections, which in the last decade of the century had reached a total of 88.973:629$588, from 1900 to 1909, rose to 103.376:384$979 and in the following decade reached a total of 209.093:206$812” (read as contos de réis⁵).

This growth reaches 1.51% in the first decade of the 20th century and expands to 7.2% in the following decade (GARCEZ; FREITAS, 1975). In the 1920s, the settlement was endowed with a telegraph (1876); kerosene public lighting (1889); a printing press (1901); piped water supply (1911); a sewage system (1912); a port in operation that, in 1910, had a 150-meters-dock and, in 1914, it made the first shipment of cocoa to Salvador (previously, the sacks were transported in boats from Baía do Pontal to ships anchored in the city shore; railroad with provisional traffic beginning in 1910 and inaugurated in 1913; a contract signed for the supply of electricity (1911); telephone service (1915); electric street lighting (1916); Banco do Brasil (1917)⁶ ; and the Post Office (1917) (CAMPOS, 2006; RIBEIRO, 2008; 2017; SANTOS, 2016).

In the case of the railroad, even though it did not connect the region to any place - it connected Ilhéus to its surroundings to help the flow of cocoa production to the port -, in the social scenario it had some importance as the employees and engineers were English, allowing the Ilheense society to be in contact with the habits of another country (CAMPOS, 2006) and consequent local expansion. Thus, as shown by research carried out in other cities in Brazil (DIAS, 2013; LEITE; ROCHA JUNIOR; SANTOS, 2010; ROCHA JUNIOR, 2013), interest in sports and leisure activities had spread.

But it was through the port of Baía do Pontal that Ilhéus connected to the so-called modernity: “Concretely, it opened Ilhéus to the world, thus becoming more cosmopolitan and integrated to the great flows of world capitalism” (SANTOS, 2016, p. 13); allowing part of society, at least, to experience “[...] adventure, power, joy, growth, self-transformation, and transformation of what existed around” (BERMAN, 1986, p. 15). The port provided the possibility of assimilating cultural activities linked to the events happening in Europe, that was the model of civilization at that time, and the acceleration and exploration of the senses.

Those who know Ilhéus and the region of the “Cacau Civilization” in contemporary times will find it difficult to understand the haughtiness that granted “[...] to Ilhéus a cosmopolitan air [...]” (SANTOS, 2016, p. 13), at the time the intermunicipal soccer tournament took place. In that period, the proclaimed intended modernity was based on the growing production and valorization of cacao in the international market, and from the second half of the 19th century, this became Bahia's way to overcome the economic crisis of the state⁷, consolidating Ilhéus as an outlet for the conservation of the export model of extensive primary production that capitalized on surplus labor from northern Bahia and Sergipe (CAMPOS, 2006; FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001; GARCEZ; FREITAS, 1975; MAHONY, 2007; RIBEIRO, 2008, 2017).

Ilhéus quickly became the economic and political center of the “Cocoa Civilization” (RIBEIRO, 2008, 2017), where, everything arrived and left, including the export of cocoa and goods that would feed and scale the so-called civilization and its culture, strengthening the cocoa bourgeoisie. Therefore, the region, originally without expression in the state economic scenario, came to have cocoa “prominence and leadership”; once, from 1904 onwards, “[...] it surpassed the value of tobacco exports, and assumed the condition of Bahia’s main export product, a position it maintained until the 1970s” (FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001, p. 100).

In this scenario, Ilhéus was lift by a wave that led the city to the status of the largest source of taxable resources in the state since the first decade of the 20th century. This reality brought visible benefits to the city; but, at the same time, it demanded leisure and education services, even though these expectations had economic ups and downs, as a result of the two great world wars (1914 to 1918 and 1939 to 1945) and the depression of 1929 (FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001). Moreover, it is pertinent to point out that the largest amount “[...] of the surplus capital was reinvested in other cities, mainly Rio de Janeiro” (RIBEIRO, 2017, p. 64). Amid these changes, social activities and sports began gain presence, such as billiards (1898), soccer 1910), cinema (1910)⁸, theater (plays were staged in cinemas), leisure trips to sailing (1921), bowling (1923), rowing⁹ and swimming (1922) (A FUNDAÇÃO..., 1925, p. 2; ADONIAS FILHO, 1976; CAMPOS, 2006; CLUBE ..., 1922, p. 2; ILHÉOS..., 1923, p. 2; NO PONTAL..., 1921, p. 1).

Therefore, it is not surprising, , that during the 1920s, in addition to the urban transformations inspired by the reforms that took place in Salvador and Rio de Janeiro, (FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001; GARCEZ; FREITAS, 1975; LEITE; ROCHA JUNIOR; SANTOS, 2010; MAHONY, 2007; RIBEIRO, 2008, 2017), the new leisure practices had given rise to spaces destined to them and to the creation of recent entities, such as soccer teams and their stadiums, positioning Ilhéus in the dignified and select group (Ilhéus, Jequié, Nazaré, Juazeiro, Feira de Santana and Itabuna) of the upcountry Bahian cities with completed sports plazas or under construction (AS NOVAS..., 1926; FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001; OLIVEIRA, 2016; SANTOS, 2020). Hence, the Correio de Ilhéus praised the construction of the local stadium, noting that it represented and contributed to “[…] the greatness of Ilhéus […] as an immediate complement to moral progress, […] as the realization of the great work of private initiative […] for soccer games” (O ESTÁDIO…, 1926, p. 2).

Nevertheless, like any observer of history, a contextual analysis of the scenario in that period must be carried out. There was a dispute for the political command in Ilhéus, between the already established aristocrats cocoa colonels, and a recent group named Novos-ricos (Nouveaux riches), from 1894 onwards. The Novos-ricos contested and won the mayorship for the period from 1894 to 1912, as Colonel Antônio Pessoa da Costa e Silva was systematically elected along with several municipal councilors. Nevertheless, the state senate had the benefit of certifying those who were preferred in state and municipal executive and legislative offices. Thus, despite the dispute between the aristocrat cocoa colonels and the Novos-ricos continually electing Colonel Pessoa's circle, the pessoists were discarded (RIBEIRO, 2008; 2017). This last political group, upon assuming the intendancy (1912/1915) with Coronel Pessoa, sought to imprint a process of urban modernization following the events in the capital, with the support of its co-religionist J. J. Seabra, who governed the state for three terms, between 1912 and 1924 (CAMPOS, 2006; MAHONY, 2007).

To demarcate space for his political group, Colonel Pessoa commissioned the writer Francisco Borges de Barros to write a book portraying the city in the eyes of the Novos-ricos with “[...] the history of the struggles of the Portuguese colonizers against the Indians in Ilhéus and the difficulties in establishing a large economy in the region in the colonial period” (MAHONY, 2007, p. 756). With a focus on this recent group, the book should emphasize that they were the ones who paved the way for cacao farming in the region that until then was dominated by the natives. Barros highlighted in the book, almost exclusively, the glorious achievements of the pioneer farmers - the so-called Novos-ricos - who allowed the outbreak of growth and modernity of Ilhéus from the cacao plantations (CAMPOS, 2006; MAHONY, 2007).

Its worth noting that the editors of the newspaper Correio de Ilhéus, which was the official organ of the pessoists and owned by Colonel Pessoa of the Republican Democrat Party, were his sons Astor Pessoa and Mário Pessoa - who was intendant in Ilhéus from 1924 to 1928. This group remained in political command in the city from 1924 to 1930, when engineer Durval Olivieri, Coronel Pessoa's son-in-law, took over the mayorship and, from 1930 to 1937, another associate, Eusínio Gaston Lavigne; subsequently, Mário Pessoa da Costa e Silva assumed his second term (CAMPOS, 2006; RIBEIRO, 2015; RIBEIRO, 2008; 2017; SOUB, 2013).

The stadium opened in 1928 and was named after the club to which it belonged: Stadium do Satellite. Subsequently, it was acquired by the municipality, in the second term of Mário Pessoa (1938/1943), already under the Estado Novo (New Estate) regime, when it received a more modern stage with the name of this mayor, and which, until today, serves the games of the Bahia championship. At its inauguration in 1940, the Estádio Mário Pessoa was considered the largest in the north and northeast axis, in addition to being the second-largest in the country, losing to Pacaembu in São Paulo (SANTOS, 2020; SOUB, 2013).

It is in this context of the history of Ilhéus that the events of the Intermunicipal Tournament will be analyzed along with its relationship with the construction of the IGHB below.

4 THE INTERMUNICIPAL SOCCER SPORTS TOURNAMENT

At the beginning of the 20th century, the peak of journalistic articles in the capital about sporting events in upcountry cities occurred in 1921, with the Intermunicipal Soccer Tournament, which was probably the first event of its kind held in Bahia. Organized by the sportsman identified as Bernardino de Souza, the objective was to promote the participation of the interior cities in the consolidation process of the state of Bahia (SANTOS, 2020). In addition to being a sportsman, lawyer, and geographer, Bernardino de Souza, who was resident in Salvador, served as a state deputy, and was the first perpetual secretary of the IGHB. He also was an influential thinker of Bahian geography in the first quartile of the 20th decade (LEITE, 2011; PEREIRA; SOUSA, 2017; SOUSA, 2015; 2017a, 2017b).

Shortly before, in 1920, the state government decided to participate in the celebrations for the Centenary of Independence, in 1922, delegated to the IGHB, which, in turn, proposed to postpone most of the commemorative activities until 1923, so as they coincide with the Independence of Bahia. Immediately afterward, the IGHB, through Bernardino de Souza, started a campaign for the construction of its new headquarters (SILVA, 2012). This construction, which was inaugurated on July 2, 1923, was budgeted at almost 600:000$000 (six hundred contos de réis) and had 232:000$000 contributions from state and federal governments. The remainder of the donations came from the most diverse social groups in Bahia (SILVA, 2012, p. 179), including the population of Ilhéus.

The first mention of the tournament in Correio de Ilhéus took place in October 1921, with the invitation of IGHB and the “Associação Desportiva Paraguassu” to all prosperous cities in the state to promote events aimed at raising funds for the new headquarters (CONVITE..., 1921, p. 2). The request was promptly answered “[…] in favor of a raised idea of a civic and patriotic end” (ALEGUÁ!..., 1921, p. 1).

It was the sportsman Valeriano Mello who summoned the society of Ilhéus to discuss the necessary measures to fulfill the invitation (TORNEIO..., 1921, p.1). Mello, was an accountant at a local branch of Banco do Brasil, and a titular athlete and captain of the embassy, participated in the commission that chose the soccer players who played in the tournament (INTERMUNICIPAL, 1921, p. 2; MACÊDO; FREITAS, 2001).

The group formation process involved the selection of players, because, in that decade, the city had approximately more than 36 sports clubs, most of them for soccer, even though, in 1921, there were around six active clubs. This suggests the importance of the Intermunicipal tournament to trigger the creation of new sports associations, including soccer, revitalizing the sport in the city (BARROSO ..., 1921; CLUB ..., 1921; CLUBE ..., 1922; DESPORTOS ..., 1922; ILHÉOS ..., 1922a; LIGA ..., 1921; NO CAMPO ..., 1922; O PASSEIO ..., 1922; REPÚBLICA ..., 1921; RIO ..., 1922; SUL ..., 1921).

The administrators of Correio de Ilhéus contributed to the consolidation of the team. During the selection of the players, the editors promoted a contest (CONCURSO ..., 1921, p. 2) in the newspaper (Figure 2), through a coupon used for the election of the players (O NOSSO..., 1921, p. 2). This was a resource used in other regions of the country (MOREL; COTES, 2009) as a strategy to mobilize the city's legal residents. These were articulated actions that, as Silva (2012, p. 249) points out, evidence the role of the press, with the "[…] relative constancy of the dissemination of activities […]" that enabled "[…] broad support from society for the proposed construction of the new headquarters".

Figure 2
Coupon to elect players.

In the effort to take their team to Bahia¹⁰, it was not possible to know whether there was a direct collaboration from the Intendency or the Municipal Council, but this attempt was successful. The embassy, already in Salvador, was received by capitalists from the “colony of Ilhéus in Bahia” and participated in festivities held by Soteropolitan¹¹ (A EMBAIXADA..., 1921, p. 1).

The tournament was organized by Associação Desportiva Paraguassu, from the city of Cachoeira, and took place at Stadium da Graça, on December 11, 1921. It was initially planned¹² to receive representations from twelve cities: Bonfim, Cachoeira, Castro Alves, Feira de Santana, Ilhéus, Itabuna, Itaparica, Juazeiro, Muritiba, Santo Amaro, São Felix, and São Gonçalo dos Campos (SANTOS, 2020). According to the author, the Stadium in question was the "[...] main sports plaza in Bahia [...]" (SANTOS, 2012, p. 2), which provided an environment for social and sporting events, festivals, school Olympics, and soccer championships until 1951, a place of symbolism for events which, also, contributed to placing the Bahian society in tune with social practices, including sports, seen as beneficial to civilizational improvement.

In their first game, the Ilheenses beat the municipality of Santo Amaro by 2 x 0. Then, they overcame Cachoeira by a goal and afterwards defeated Itabuna by 3 x 0. The newspaper pointed out that: “From victory to victory, our glorious countrymen conquer the admiration and applause of Bahian society [...]” (ALEGUÁ!..., 1921, p. 1). These results qualified Ilhéus for the final game with Feira de Santana, and this match was reported on the front page of Correio de Ilhéus with the enthusiastic announcement of the victory of the Ilheenses.

The editors of the newspaper, Astor and Mário Pessoa, published the alleged victory without taking into account the rules of the tournament. According to these rules, the winning team would have been Feira de Santana (A VITÓRIA, 1921, p. 3). The final match, with the presence of “[...] a huge, select, and polite audience [...]", ended in a tie because of the annulment of a goal by Ilhéus, due to an offside (ALEGUÁ!..., 1921, p. 1). The entire tournament took place in one day and, according to the rules, one of the tie-breaking criteria was the balance of corners for the opposing team (only decades later was the sequence of penalties adopted at the end of the tied games). Thus, despite the flashy headline in the Correio de Ilhéus announcing the victory, “[...] CORNER is in favor of Feira de Santana [...]” and the Ilheense team lost the match.

Worn out by the matches of the previous day (ATHLETICA..., 1921, p. 2), the embassy of Ilhéus, before their return back home did not hesitate to accept the invitation to participate in a friendly match with the vice-champion of Salvador that year, the Associação Atlética, to be held the day after the tournament. That last contest was won by the team from the capital, by 3 x 1, but it was marked by “[…] violence used in the game from the Soteropolitan team. Those players were supposed to be condescending to the intermunicipal ones because they were superior as a team, and not equivalent"¹³.

The Correio de Ilhéus transcribed notes from the capital’s newspapers as to provide information about the dispute. The Diário da Bahia stated that a defender from Ilheus “[…] intentionally touched the ball with his hand in the dangerous area […]”, converted by Todd, but in the sequence, João Pinto draws the game (ILHÉOS ..., 1921, p. 2). Atlética scores the second goal with Scott, and after that, the players start a violent game: “Santinho commits a foul against an opposing player violently and the referee gives him a caution”. Subsequently, Scott scores on Geninho's goal. In a new attack by the Ilheenses: “Santinho, to prevent João Pinto from scoring another goal, commits a violent foul against him”. The Ilheense player is removed from the four lines “[…] followed by the entire team, and fans protest when Todd, the captain of the local team, orders Santinho to leave the field” (ILHÉOS ..., 1921, p. 2).

The Diário de Notícias da Bahia collaborating with the above report, exposes the game as disastrous for the well famous Atlética, and states that "[…] after an open score by a penalty in those conditions and two goals achieved by a player who seems to be no longer with the club, this left a bad impression on the Associação Atlética […]” (ILHÉOS ..., 1921, p. 2). The newspaper criticized how the penalty was scored, as well as the performance of a player who no longer belonged to the club, but still both actions were decisive for the victory. Criticism had not ceased, as the League's request for stricter punishment for Santinho for his violent attitude was noteworthy. The article was ended by praising Todd's attitude in removing Santinho from the game.

The unsportsmanlike attitude of the team from the capital was not an exceptional situation, partly due to the incipiency of interregional competitions, which gave the few events of this type a character of the clash between communities, in which the pride of representing the homeland, not infrequently, overlapped with the sportsmanship. Leite, Rocha Junior, and Santos (2010) believe that the most significant transformations in Soteropolitan sport, in the sense of a more standardized practice and, therefore, more focused on the values of the competition itself, were only noticed from the decade 1920.

In any case, this episode is noteworthy as the Soteropolitan newspaper Semana Esportiva frequently proclaimed in its columns the supposed civilizational and sporting superiority of the players and teams in the capital, concerning the "jecas”¹⁴ of the upcountry (SANTOS, 2020). Atlética's lack of fair play, however, shows that the greater “civility” of Soteropolitan did not go beyond the limit of simple speech. On the other hand, the mere existence of this claim shows how much this idea echoed in society at the time (ELIAS; DUNNING, 1992). Civilizing and modernizing became a requirement to be in tune with those times, and was, therefore, a claimed attribute.

Although the formal and initial purpose of that type of event was to raise funds for other institutions (in this case the IGHB), these tournaments provided visibility to athletes, allowing for new hiring, and later contributing, in some way, to the professionalization of the activity. Two years after the competition portrayed, for example, there was a match in Salvador that was marked by the performance of two former athletes from Ilhéus, Mila and Diocléciano, who were transferred to the Soteropolitan club Ypiranga (O FOOT-BALL..., 1923, p. 2). This dynamic, by the way, was not limited to soccer, as there are records of rowers who went to work for clubs in the Bahian capital, such as Arnaldo Freitas, who returned to compete in Ilhéus as a veterans (CORREIO..., 1930, p. 3).

The participation in the tournament was neither the only nor the last Ilhéus contribution to the construction of the IGHB (Figure 3). The Correio de Ilhéus reports on donations from the districts of Ilhéus (CASA..., 1923), when Dr. Bernardino, to raise funds for the conclusion of the project that would show "[…] to the entire Nation that in Bahia, Bahians cultivate love for the things from the past [...]”. On that occasion a musical event was organized in the hall of Cinema Central, with the presence of the Intendant, Colonel Eustáquio de Souza Bastos, to raise funds that totaled more than ten contos de réis (CASA..., 1923, p. 1).

In fact, the community was euphoric with the news that their (supposedly victorious) squad was returning to the capital and started organizing the reception for the players. Correio de Ilhéus summoned the players' families, along with the groups that promoted the team’s participation in the event, and soccer enthusiasts, describing the activities that would be carried out when the athletes arrived at the port (ILHÉOS..., 1921, p. 2), such as the delivery of medals to the players who played both in the tournament and in the friendly match (OFERECIMENTO..., 1921, p. 1).

Figure 3
The contribution of Ilhéus to the construction of the IGHB.

5 CONCLUSIONS

Considering the above, and in response to the objectives of this research regarding the preparation and participation of the Ilheense team in the 1921 tournament, and its consequences, it was perceived that the purpose of the trip to Salvador from the society under study, as well as the other municipalities that participated in the event, were different. The first and most formal was to collaborate in raising funds for the construction of the IGHB, which showed that Ilhéus was committed to that project considered vital to the state of Bahia, as it was an icon of civility, placing the city in line with the other communities that stood out in this attempt. Wherefore, the interests of the public administration, the great traders, and the richest cocoa producers in the city in demonstrating political power are highlighted, both for Salvador and for the dominant social fabric of the country's economy in the period, considering the urban reforms made possible by cocoa farming enabled the cocoa bourgeoisie to flaunt the attributes of urbanity and modernity, attracting both a regional and national look to Ilhéus and its political representatives.

In addition, by engaging in an organized championship, a sport that was still in expansion and imported from the Old World, a region then seen as a civilizational model to be followed, Ilheense society sought to experience and demonstrate, through soccer, that it was itself an expression of the successful assimilation of those civilizing practices. In other words, not only was it helping to give concreteness to a general symbol of civilization of the state (the IGHB), but it was also trying to demonstrate that the “civilization of cocoa” was not an empty epithet. The title represented (so it was intended) the very ethos of that community and, from the tournament, the revitalization of the sport in the city was noticed with the creation of clubs and the restructuring of those that were effectively inactive. Likewise, the sport articulated with diverse cultural activities is perceptible, such as dancing teas, cinema sessions, parties in the colonels' residences, and fairs, among others.

It is not surprising, therefore, that during the 1920s, Ilhéus saw the emergence of approximately 36 sports institutions based in the city or its districts, which engaged in constant sports exchanges. Among them, still active, is the Satellite Sport Club, founded in 1925, creator and builder of the first stadium in the city. Later, already belonging to the municipality, in the 1940s, it was modernized and renamed Estádio Mario Pessoa, where soccer games are held today.

The analysis of the narrative of the journalistic material also showed that episodes such as the intermunicipal tournament served to strengthen the interactions among athletes from the Bahia’s capital and interior cities, creating opportunities for athletes to be seen by other teams and, perhaps, hired, at a time when there was not yet a formal and structured dynamic of exchange and acquisition of interclub players because of the amateur character of most clubs. Therefore, the analyzed records show how these practices originated and how they began to be shaped historically.

Additionally, although it is not the focus of this study, when scrutinizing the figures involved in events of this type, it was possible to identify people who, despite not having been raised in any pantheon of sport, made significant contributions to sports practice, either by their daily actions in the organization/administration of the related activities or by their athletic performance itself. As an example, the sportsman Valeriano Mello, who was a simple accountant at the Banco do Brasil branch in Ilhéus, but who played a leading role in the trip of the city delegation to Salvador, acting both in the technical commission and in the field, where he was head and captain of the embassy. Also, Valeriano Melo was one of the founders of the first swimming association in Ilhéus, Club Natação e Regatas São Jorge, in May 1922, and of the club Ilheopolis de Natação e Regatas (1925). Another name that emerges in this scenario is Bernardino José de Souza, whose notoriety was assured as perpetual secretary of the IGHB, however, in this case, is recognized for his interest and encouragement to practice sports, especially soccer.

The disclosure of these names, more than mere curiosity or beyond even doing justice to the memory of these pioneers, allows to (re)compose personal and inter-institutional relationships network that, shaped from the sum of people and actions identified in other studies related to that period and theme, will allow the gradual reconstitution processes of sport development in Bahia, and its agents. This exercise shows, in fact, the importance of new and future investigations on the subject, especially concerning the state upcountry.

In the scope of the present investigation, however, it is evident that the practice of sport in the city of Ilhéus during the research period is deeply articulated with much broader themes and processes that are relevant to the local community, permeating the ideals and beliefs in the value of adopting modern and civilized habits, which helps to understand the prominent place and social support received by sports clubs and associations, and highlights the importance of continuing the work of identifying these entities, their athletes and their performance as a start in the process of social transformation that was intended to be undertaken.

• 1
  Allez, go, ack (Aleguá) was the yell of Brazilian elites on soccer fields in the early 20th century.
• 2
  The Instituto Geográfico e Histórico da Bahia (IGHB) was founded on May 13, 1894, as an expression of the efforts of the Bahian society to be in tune with the national dynamics in the context of the establishment of the Republic. The IGHB was born with the double condition of both personification and as modernizing instrument of Bahian society, according to the criteria of the then newly established republican mentality, by assuming the role of entity-symbol of Bahia, while contributing to support state policies, through studies and research by its members.
• 3
  Regarding other Bahian research dealing with the theme in Nunes and Ribeiro (2020, p. 3).
• 4
  In the collection, there is no record of other years.
• 5
  Brazilian monetary unit. Real (plural réis) was the name of the currency unit used in Brazil from its colonization until October 5, 1942.
• 6
  The Ilhéus branch of this Bank was the nineteenth in Brazil, even before opening in some capitals (MACÊDO; FREITAS, 2001).
• 7
  Due to not having modernized its productive, commercial, and road system, in addition to the prolonged drought, the international market contraction, and soil erosion in the sugarcane and cotton production sites in the Recôncavo and North of Bahia, there was a decapitalization of these zones and the stagnation of the market for financial support (FREITAS; PARAÍSO, 2001).
• 8
  Inaugurated Cinema Palace. Between 1921 and 1930, the headquarters had six rooms: Vesúvio, Central, Pery, São João, Ideal, and Elite.
• 9
  In 1930, there were already four rowing clubs: Satellite, States Sport Club, Associação Athlectica de Ilhéos and Associação Náutica do Pontal, in addition to the column "De Remo" in the newspaper Correio de Ilhéus.
• 10
  Residents and press of the interior of Bahia, in that period (and the oldest until the present time), referred to the city of Salvador as “Bahia”.
• 11
  Relating to Salvador - BA
• 12
  The newspapers Correio de Ilhéus and A Flor report that “three cities were missing from the event” (O TORNEIO..., 1921, p. 2), the Itaparica team is identified as arriving late, but managing to participate and the absences of the teams from Juazeiro and Senhor do Bonfim.
• 13
  SEMANA..., 1921, apudSANTOS, 2020.
• 14
  Person of rural origin.
• FUNDING
  This research received financial support from four Scientific Initiation (SI) grants, namely: from the Scientific and Technological Development Council (CNPq), the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado da Bahia (FAPESB), and two from SI from UESC (ICB/UESC).

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

We are grateful to undergraduates Emanuel Ramiro Silva Soares, Thiago Santos de Santana, and Ramom de Souza Norte for their research in the collection of the Center for Documentation and Regional Memory (Cedoc), of the State University of Santa Cruz (Uesc). We are also grateful to Dr. Marcelo Henrique Dias for the suggestions of bibliographic references and to Dr. Cleber Dias for reading and criticizing an early version of this article.

EDITORIAL RESPONSIBILITY

Alex Branco Fraga *, Elisandro Schultz Wittizorecki *, Mauro Myskiw *, Raquel da Silveira *

* Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Escola de Educação Física, Fisioterapia e Dança, Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil.

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Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  11 Nov 2022
• Date of issue
  2022

History

• Received
  06 May 2021
• Accepted
  25 May 2022