Editing Galápagos Islands (section)

===20th century===
[[File:Eleanor Roosevelt Visiting Troops in the Galapagos.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Eleanor Roosevelt]] visiting U.S. servicemen at Beta Base ([[Seymour Airport]]) on Baltra during [[World War II]]<ref>{{citation |last=Roosevelt |first=Eleanor |author-link=Eleanor Roosevelt |contribution-url=https://www2.gwu.edu/~erpapers/myday/displaydoc.cfm?_y=1944&_f=md056756 |contribution=28 March 1944 |title=My Day |date=28 March 1944 |publisher=United Feature Syndicate |location=New York }}.</ref>]]
[[File:Admiralty Chart No 1375 Archipelago de Colon (Galapagos), Published 1953.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Admiralty chart]] of the Galápagos <small>(1953)</small>]]
For a long time during the early 1900s and at least through 1929, a cash-strapped Ecuador had reached out for potential buyers of the islands to alleviate financial troubles at home. The US had repeatedly expressed its interest in buying the islands for military use as they were positioned strategically guarding the [[Panama Canal]].<ref>{{cite news |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1144&dat=19290121&id=dksbAAAAIBAJ&pg=6398,2635333 |title=May Sell Galapagos; Ecuador Needs Money, Wants Rid of Key to Canal |date=21 January 1929 |agency=[[United Press International|United Press]] |publisher=[[The Pittsburgh Press]] |access-date=4 September 2012}}</ref> Besides the United States, [[Empire of Japan|Japan]], [[German Empire|Germany]] and Chile also expressed interest in establishing bases in the islands at the turn of the century.<ref>{{cite book |last=Fischer |first=Ferenc |date=1999 |title=El modelo militar prusiano y las fuerzas armadas de Chile 1885–1945 |chapter=¿La guantánamo del océano pacífico? la rivalidad de los EE.UU., Alemania, Japón, y Chile por la adquisición de las islas galápagos antes de la I guerra mundial|location=Pécs, Hungary |publisher=University Press |pages=71–87 |language=es }}</ref><ref>{{cite thesis |last=Tapia |first=Claudio |date=2009 |title=La creación de un área de influencia en América del Sur. Las relaciones políticas, económicas y militares de Chile con Ecuador y Paraguay (1883–1914) |type=Ph.D. |publisher=instituto de estudios avanzados, [[Universidad de Santiago|Universidad de Santiago de Chile]] |language=es}}</ref> Chile had previously acquired the [[Strait of Magellan|Straits of Magellan]]<ref>See Michael Morris, "The Strait of Magellan", Martinus Nijhoff Publisher, 1989, {{ISBN|0-7923-0181-1}}, pages 62 and 63</ref> and [[Easter Island]] for strategic reasons and lieutenant Gregorio Santa Cruz argued in 1903 that possessing an island in equatorial waters, like the Galápagos, would be of great benefit since the [[geopolitics|geopolitical]] situation of Chile was expected to drastically change when the Panama Canal opened. Another benefit would be to widen the security radius of Chile.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Garay Vera |first1=Cristián |title=La imaginación territorial chilena y la apoteosis de la armada de chile 1888–1940. Otra mirada a los límites 'Naturales' |journal=Revista enfoques |date=2011 |volume=9 |issue=15 |pages=75–95 |url=https://biblat.unam.mx/hevila/RevistaenfoquesSantiago/2011/vol9/no15/4.pdf |access-date=23 February 2021 |trans-title=Chilean territorial imagination and the apotheosis of the Chilean Navy between 1888{{ndash}}1940. A different view of "natural" limits |publisher=[[University of Santiago, Chile]] |language=es}}</ref> Chile was alarmed by the United States plans to establish a [[Guantanamo Bay Naval Base|Guantanamo-like]] base in the Galápagos Islands since it would mean that Chile's [[Nitratine|nitrate-rich]] [[Norte Grande|northern provinces]] would be within the range of [[United States Navy]].<ref name="Fischer2008">{{cite journal |last1=Fischer |first1=Ferenc |title=La expansión (1885–1918) del modelo militar alemán y su pervivencia (1919–1933) en América Latina |journal=Revista del CESLA |date=21 April 2008 |volume=11 |pages=135–160 |url=https://www.revistadelcesla.com/index.php/revistadelcesla/article/view/196/193 |access-date=25 February 2021 |trans-title=The expansion (1885–1918) of the German military model and its survival (1919–1933) in Latin America |publisher=[[University of Warsaw]] |language=es}}</ref> Ecuador's staunch resistance to a US purchase or bases in the islands can be credited to Chilean diplomacy, which in turn was informally backed on this issue by [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|Great Britain]] and [[German Empire|Germany]].<ref name=Fischer2008/>

In the 1920s and 1930s, a small wave of European settlers arrived in the islands. There occurred a series of unsolved disappearances on the island of Floreana in the 1930s among the largely European expatriate residents at the time, which prompted the movies ''[[The Empress of Floreana]]'' and [[The Galapagos Affair|''The Galápagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden'']]. Ecuadorian laws provided all colonists with the possibility of receiving twenty hectares each of free land, the right to maintain their citizenship, freedom from taxation for the first ten years in Galápagos, and the right to hunt and fish freely on all uninhabited islands where they might settle.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lundh |first1=Jacob P. |title=Galápagos: A Brief History |url=http://www.galapagos.to/TEXTS/LUNDH1-1.php |access-date=25 February 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110720084818/http://www.galapagos.to/TEXTS/LUNDH-3.HTM |archive-date=20 July 2011 |url-status=live}}</ref> The first European colonists to arrive were Norwegians who settled briefly on Floreana, before moving on to San Cristobal and Santa Cruz. A few years later, other colonists from Europe, America and Ecuador started arriving on the islands, seeking a simpler life.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hoff |first1=Stein |title=Drømmen om Galápagos |trans-title=The Dream of the Galapagos |publisher=[[:no:Grøndahl & Søn Forla|Grøndahl & Sønn]] |url=http://www.galapagos.to/TEXTS/HOFFTofC.php |access-date=25 February 2021 |language=Norwegian |translator-last1=Horneman |translator-first1=Friedel |translator-last2=Bowman |translator-first2=Robert I.}}<!-- best support for this claim appears to be in part IV --></ref> Descendants of the Norwegian Kastdalen family and the German Angermeyer still live on the islands.

During World War II, Ecuador authorized the United States to establish a naval base in Baltra Island, and radar stations in other strategic locations. Baltra was established as a United States Army Air Force base. Baltra was given the name of "Beta Base" along with "Alpha Base" in Nicaragua and "Gamma Base" in Salinas (continental Ecuador). The Crews stationed at Baltra and the aforementioned locations established a geographic triangle of protection in charge of patrolling the Pacific for enemy submarines, and also provided protection for the [[Panama Canal]]. After the war, the facilities were given to the government of Ecuador. Today, the island continues as an official Ecuadorian military base. The foundations and other remains of the US base can still be seen as one crosses the island.
In 1946, a penal colony was established on Isabela Island, but it was suspended in 1959.

[[Galápagos National Park]] was established in 1959,<ref name="Galapagos.com">{{cite web|url=http://www.galapagos.com/conservation.php|title=Galápagos Conservation|work=galapagos.com|access-date=22 September 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110903013655/http://www.galapagos.com/conservation.php|archive-date=3 September 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref> with tourism starting to expand in the 1960s, imposing several restrictions upon the human population already living on the island. However, opportunities in the tourism, fishing, and farming industries attracted a mass of poor fishermen and farmers from mainland Ecuador. In the 1990s and 2000s, violent confrontations between parts of the local population and the Galápagos National Park Service occurred, including capturing and killing giant tortoises and holding staff of the Galápagos National Park Service hostage to obtain higher annual [[sea cucumber]] quotas.<ref>{{cite journal |author-last=Stutz |author-first=Bruce D. |year=1995 |title=The Sea Cucumber War |journal=Audubon |volume=97 |issue=3 |page=16 }}</ref>