The Cerro Largo police boy
The police corner of the Regional Historical Museum of Melo, keeps the story of the minor who inherited his father’s uniform to keep his mother and brothers.
In that careful corner there is a deeply human story: that of a teenager who, after losing his father – campaign political – inherited his uniform and began to pay functions as a janitor in the same police station, even if they were a minor.
The black and white photograph, rescued by the retired Juan Godoy, shows the 16 -year -old posing next to a horse, wearing the police uniform and carrying a saber.
He did not carry firearms, since he had not reached the age of majority. According to the journalist Néstor Araújo the promoters of the museum, it was a boy named Buzó whose father had died in fulfillment of duty.
It was then that the commissioner of the time, surnamed Sasiaín, decided that the eldest son gave collaboration in the police station as a janitor, thus allowing him to contribute to the support of his mother and brothers, who had been helpless.
It was not formally a police officer, but his presence in the police post was a symbol of family commitment and continuity.
This image is part of the collection gathered for the “Muspo” Police Museum, a project gestated between the years 2000 and 2010 by a group of police retreats from Cerro Largo.
For a decade, Juan Godoy, Reneé Diogo, Carlos Alfonso, Ricardo Ferreira and Clodomiro Sosa, with the great collaboration and dedication of the police chief of the time, José Adán Olivera, gathered photographs, documents and objects with the objective of conserving institutional memory.
The work was supported by the Command of the Police Headquarters of the time, the Police Retirers and the Cerro Largo Police Center.
Thanks to that silent and thorough task, about 100 photographs were digitized.
Many of them arrived at the initiative of relatives of police, who, aware of the project, began to share memories saved in personal drawers and albums.
The museum was inaugurated on December 19, 2010, within the framework of the Police Day, with the support of the then Police Chief, José Adán Olivera, who facilitated the concretion of space.
Although the Muspo Museum currently occupies only a small sector within the Melo Regional Historical Museum, its drivers believe that it can grow in the future, since the material continues to appear and the stories expect to be told.
That corner, beyond objects and documents, preserves the symbolic value of many lives dedicated to service, such as that of the young man who inherited his father’s uniform and found in him a way to move forward.
