Editing Eva Perón (section)

==Early life==
[[File:Eva Perón - 1 comunión.jpg|thumb|upright|Eva Duarte at her [[First Holy Communion]], 1926]]

===Early childhood===
Eva Perón's 1951 biography, ''[[La Razón de mi Vida]]'',<ref>Published in Argentina in 1952; subsequently published in English-speaking countries under the titles ''My Mission in Life'' and ''Evita by Evita''</ref> contains no dates or references to childhood occurrences, and does not list the location of her birth or her name at birth.<ref name="Razon">Perón (1952).</ref> According to Junín's civil registry, a [[birth certificate]] shows that one ''María Eva Duarte'' was born on May 7, 1919. Her baptismal certificate lists the date of birth as May 7, 1919 under the name ''Eva María Ibarguren''.<ref name="Fraser 2-3">{{harvp|Fraser|Navarro|1996|pp=2–3}}.</ref><ref>Act 495, from the Church "Capellanía Vicaria de Nuestra Señora del Pilar" registry of Baptisms for the year 1919, baptism took place on 21 November 1919</ref> It is thought that in 1945 the adult Eva Perón created a forgery of her birth certificate for her marriage.<ref name="Borroni, Otelo 1970">{{harvp|Borroni|Vacca|1970}}.</ref>{{page needed|date=October 2015}}

Eva Perón spent her childhood in [[Junín, Buenos Aires|Junín]], [[Buenos Aires province]]. Her father, Juan Duarte Manechena Etchegoyen  (1872—1926),<ref>Prutsch, U.: Eva Perón. Leben und Sterben einer Legende. C.H. Beck, München 2015</ref> was descended from [[French Basque Country|French Basque]] immigrants. Her mother, Juana Ibarguren Nuñez (1894—1971), was descended from [[Basques|Spanish Basque]] immigrants.<ref>{{cite news |last1 = Astorga |first1 = Antonio |title = Evita convenció a Franco para conmutar una pena de muerte |url = http://www.abc.es/20110406/archivo/abci-cloppet-201104060326.html |access-date = 25 May 2016 |newspaper = [[ABC (newspaper)|ABC]] |date = 28 April 2011 |language = es }}</ref> Juan Duarte, a wealthy rancher from nearby [[Chivilcoy]], already had a wife Adela D'Uhart and family there. At that time in rural Argentina, it was not uncommon for a wealthy man to have several families.<ref name="Fraser 3">{{harvp|Fraser|Navarro|1996|p=3}}.</ref>

When Perón was a year old, Duarte returned permanently to his legal family, leaving Juana Ibarguren and her children in abject poverty. They were forced to move to the poorest area of Junín. Los Toldos was a village in the dusty region of Las Pampas, with a reputation as a desolate place of poverty. To support herself and her children, Ibarguren sewed clothes for neighbors. The family was [[social stigma|stigmatized]] by the abandonment of the father and by the [[Legitimacy (family law)|illegitimate]] status of the children under Argentine law, and was consequently somewhat isolated.<ref>{{Cite news |url = https://www.nytimes.com/1996/11/24/books/two-faces-of-evita.html |title = Two Faces of Evita |newspaper=The New York Times |last = Jennings |first = Kate |date = 24 November 1996 |access-date = 16 August 2018}}</ref> A desire to expunge this part of her life might have been a motivation for Perón to arrange the destruction of her original birth certificate in 1945.<ref name="Borroni, Otelo 1970"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}}<ref name="Fraser 4">{{harvp|Fraser|Navarro|1996|p=4}}.</ref>

When Duarte suddenly died, and Ibarguren and their children sought to attend his funeral, there was conflict. Although Ibarguren and the children were permitted to enter and pay their respects, they were promptly directed out of the church. Duarte's widow did not want her late husband's mistress and children at the funeral. As she was the legitimate wife, her orders were respected.<ref>{{cite book |last1 = Barnes |first1 = John |title = Evita, First Lady: A Biography of Evita Peron |publisher = Open Road + Grove/Atlantic, 2007 |isbn = 978-0802196521 |edition = Reprint |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=LTG47AxK8lMC&q=juan+duarte+mistress+not+allowed+in+funeral&pg=PT25 |access-date = 6 October 2018 |date = 1 December 2007 }}</ref>

===Junín===
Before abandoning Juana Ibarguren, Juan Duarte had been her sole means of support. Biographer John Barnes writes that, after this abandonment, all Duarte left to the family was a document declaring that the children were his, thus enabling them to use the Duarte surname.<ref name="Barnes">{{harvp|Barnes|1978}}.</ref>{{page needed|date=October 2015}} Soon after, Juana moved her children to a one-room apartment in Junín. To pay the rent on their single-roomed home, mother and daughters took up jobs as cooks in the houses of the local [[estancia]]s.

Eventually, owing to Eva's older brother's financial help, the family moved into a bigger house, which they later transformed into a boarding house.<ref name="Borroni, Otelo 1970"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}} During this time, young Eva often participated in school plays and concerts. One of her favorite pastimes was the cinema. Though Eva's mother wanted to marry her off to one of the local bachelors, Eva dreamed of becoming a famous actress.<ref name="Barnes"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}} Eva's love for acting was reinforced in October 1933, when she played a small role in a school play called ''Arriba Estudiantes'' (Students Arise), which Barnes describes as "an emotional, patriotic, flag-waving melodrama".<ref name="Barnes"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}} After the play, Eva was determined to become an actress.<ref name="Barnes"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}}

===Move to Buenos Aires===
[[File:Eva Duarte by Annemarie Heinrich, 1944 (later Eva Péron).jpg|thumb|right|upright|Eva Duarte in 1944 at age 25, photographed by [[Annemarie Heinrich]]]]

In her autobiography, Eva explained that all the people from her town who had been to the big cities described them as "marvelous places, where nothing was given but wealth". In 1934, at 15, Eva escaped her poverty-stricken village when she ran off with a young musician to the nation's capital of [[Buenos Aires]]. The young couple's relationship ended quickly, but Eva remained in Buenos Aires. She began to pursue jobs on the stage and the radio, and she eventually became a film actress. She bleached her naturally black hair blonde, a look she maintained for the rest of her life.<ref name="Razon"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}}

It is often reported that Eva traveled to Buenos Aires by train with [[tango singer]] [[Agustín Magaldi]]. However, there is no record of the married Magaldi performing in Junín in 1934 (and, even if he had done so, he usually traveled with his wife)<ref name="Fraser 11">{{harvp|Fraser|Navarro|1996|p= 11}}.</ref><ref name="Barnes"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}}. Eva's sisters maintain that Eva traveled to Buenos Aires with their mother. The sisters also claim that Doña Juana accompanied her daughter to an audition at a radio station and arranged for Eva to live with the Bustamante family, who were friends of the Duarte family.<ref name="Quieroz 14">{{harvp|Quieroz|de Elia|p=14}}.</ref> While the method of Eva's escape from her bleak provincial surroundings is debated, she did begin a new life in Buenos Aires.

{{blockquote|Buenos Aires in the 1930s was known as the "Paris of South America". The center of the city had many cafés, restaurants, theaters, movie houses, shops, and bustling crowds. In direct contrast, the 1930s were also years of great unemployment, poverty, and hunger in the capital, and many new arrivals from the interior were forced to live in tenements, boardinghouses and in outlying shanties that became known as ''[[villas miserias]]''.<ref name="Quieroz 14"/>}}
[[File:Peron-Lamarque.jpg|thumb|right|Eva Duarte and [[Libertad Lamarque]] in ''[[La Cabalgata del Circo]]'', 1945]]

Upon arrival in Buenos Aires, Eva Duarte was faced with the difficulties of surviving without formal education or connections. The city was especially overcrowded during this period because of the migrations caused by the [[Great Depression]]. On 28 March 1935, she made her professional debut in the play ''Mrs. Perez'' (''la Señora de Pérez''), at the Comedias Theater.

In 1936, Eva toured nationally with a theater company, worked as a model, and was cast in a few [[B-Movie|B-grade movie]] melodramas. In 1942, she experienced some economic stability when a company called ''Candilejas'' (sponsored by a soap manufacturer) hired her for a daily role in one of their radio dramas called ''Muy Bien'', which aired on ''Radio El Mundo'' (World Radio), the most important radio station in the country at that time.<ref name="Fraser 26">{{harvp|Fraser|Navarro|1996|p= 26}}.</ref> Later that year, she signed a five-year contract with ''Radio Belgrano'', which assured her a role in a popular historical-drama program called ''Great Women of History'', in which she played [[Elizabeth I of England]], [[Sarah Bernhardt]], and [[Alexandra Feodorovna (Alix of Hesse)|Alexandra Feodorovna]], the last Tsarina of Russia. Eventually, Eva Duarte came to co-own the radio company. By 1943, she was earning five or six thousand [[peso]]s a month, making her one of the highest-paid radio actresses in the nation. Pablo Raccioppi, who jointly ran ''Radio El Mundo'' with Eva Duarte, is said to have not liked her, but to have noted that she was "thoroughly dependable".<ref name="Fraser 27">{{harvp|Fraser|Navarro|1996|p=27}}.</ref> Eva also had a short-lived film career during the [[Golden Age of Argentine cinema]], but none of the films in which she appeared were hugely successful. In one of her last films, ''[[La cabalgata del circo]]'' (''The Circus Cavalcade''), Eva played a young country girl who rivaled an older woman, the movie's star, [[Libertad Lamarque]].

As a result of her success with radio dramas and the films, Eva achieved some financial stability. In 1942, she was able to move into an apartment in the exclusive neighborhood of [[Recoleta, Buenos Aires|Recoleta]], on 1557 Calle Posadas (currently the site of the Hotel Melia Recoleta Plaza). The next year, Eva began her career in politics, as one of the founders of the Argentine Radio Syndicate (ARA).<ref name="Borroni, Otelo 1970"/>{{page needed|date=October 2015}}