When you ask AI to create a drawing about Mallorca 50 years from now, the result is a polluted island full of buildings, much like Hong Kong. In 1978, when only natural intelligence existed, this same scenario was already described by the Palma-based cartoonist Pere Joan Riera, better known as Pere Joan. “I–he recalls today in his seventies–was 22 years old and still studying in Barcelona. One day Basilio Baltasar came to see me. He was one of the leaders of the anarcho-ecological formation Terra i Llibertat, which the previous summer, in July 1977, had occupied the small island of Dragonera near Andratx to prevent its development. He asked me for a poster that would reflect the direction Mallorca would take if the construction fever, initiated with the boom of tourism, was not stopped”.

Two members of the family of the princes of Monaco were allies of James III in his frustrated attempt to recover lost Mallorca. And another became lord of Carlat, an enclave that had been part of the ‘kingdom in the middle of the sea’. A few Grimaldis, for that is their lineage, have visited the island until recent times. Let's review the links between these two corners of the Mediterranean; Monaco and Mallorca, taking as a motif that the Club de Mar in Palma hosts, until August 6, an exhibition on the connections between that territory and the Spanish monarchy.

Born in Montuïri in 1944, Antònia Verger Jaume Sopeta is one of those anonymous but key figures in the local history of Pla de Mallorca and, in this case, Montuïri. Antònia Verger was for many years the lady of the Puig or of Cas Carboner, later. Without realizing it, she was a leader, a reference for other women who in the last quarter of the last century too often did not escape household chores. Verger began like this, not in vain when she is asked about her studies, she explains that she managed to take exams at the Institute of Felanitx, but, "the boys continued their studies and the girls, as was usual at that time, ended up doing household chores or as seamstresses". It was at the beginning of the seventies – and not without difficulties, as you will see in the interview – that she embarked, together with her husband, Biel Bennàssar Mayol Carboner, on the adventure of managing the bar and restaurant of Puig de Sant Miquel. In this conversation, Verger reviews from the beginning the success of her cuisine to the tensions and the social transformation that, without knowing it, it represented for the women of the town.

Tomeu Penya, 77, speaks candidly to ARA Balears: “I want my current state of mind to be very clear. I am very sad. As a young man, I would never have imagined that Mallorca's future would be like it is now, an island full of cement and tourists, with saturated roads and residents who cannot afford housing. For this summer's concerts, I'm considering singing ‘Trenc’ again, which I dedicated four decades ago to the emblematic beach of Campos that now, unfortunately, is once again under threat”. ‘Trenc’ was the debut of the country singer from Vilafranca as an environmental activist at 35 years old. It is one of the most outstanding songs from his third album Coverbos (1984).

No other monarch has been so mythologized, idealized, and glorified as James I the Conqueror –well, perhaps the emeritus king, in his good times–: knight king, warrior, valiant, sensible, wise, generous, good Christian... Of course, of all this, half of half, and more in reference to women, whom he used and abandoned when they no longer served his interests. We recall the private life of James I as the 750th anniversary of his death, in 1276, is being commemorated – on July 27th.

He was Aragonese, from inland, but a long sea voyage, including a visit to the Islands, revealed his vocation: the study of the sea, oceanography, of which he was a pioneer in Spain by creating and directing the Oceanographic Laboratory of the Balearic Islands, the second in the State and an international reference. It was the final stages of his career when in July 1936, 90 years ago, he was arrested in Mallorca and imprisoned until August of the following year.

They didn't know it would be the beginning of a war that would last three years. It was supposed to be a coup d'état, supposedly to save Spain from a supposed communist revolution. Not everyone was fascist either, even though they were generally called that. The fact is that elements of the army, of a very minority Falange and of the right, also the Carlists, prepared in Mallorca – not very discreetly – that revolt against the legitimate authority of the II Republic, which broke out in July 1936, 90 years ago.

A few kilometers from the beaches and while we see planes passing every minute overhead, there exists a Mallorca that works in another dimension. It is the Pla. We don't want to say it or shout it from the rooftops either, but we do collect it for you, the people from here, from the land, who live with this same heartbeat. Thus, in the very heart of the Pla, at any point on the road from the field of Pina to Lloret de Vistalegre, there are those who carry the chimera of the old and giant race that Pere Capellà wrote and that Biel Majoral sings.

They were venues of intense cultural activity and are currently closed, unused. While grandiose projects are announced, such as the transformation of the Gesa building into a major cultural infrastructure, spaces like the Assistència Palmesana, La Protectora, the Catalina Valls theater, the Balear theater, or the old Centre de Sa Nostra, all of them in Palma; the Sala Augusta in Maó; and the Dalt Vila Archaeological Museum, among others, are sleeping the sleep of the just, awaiting recovery.

Almost a hundred Menorcan privateering ships hindered Spain and France from helping the American colonists in the revolt against the British, led by George Washington, who would be the first president of the United States and would give his name to the capital. The islanders, and specifically the Menorcans, played a prominent and perhaps not very well-known role in the early days of the USA, which celebrates on Saturday, July 4, 250 years of its declaration of independence, in 1776.The revolt of the inhabitants of the 13 colonies was not an isolated event. On the one hand, it stemmed from the certainly groundbreaking ideas of the Enlightenment philosophers, such as Voltaire and his peers. On the other hand, from a previous conflict, the Seven Years' War, between France and Spain on one side and Great Britain on the other, in which the colonists had supported the metropolis, but for the expenses of which – wars are always expensive – it wanted them to pay the bill. This led to the rupture of hostilities in 1775 and the unilateral declaration of independence the following year.

In the Mallorca of late Francoism, the revolution began in La Calatrava, a small neighborhood of Palma located between the cathedral and the Baluard del Príncep. Antoni Rotger Martínez was its alma mater. “I no longer recognize – he laments at 80 years old – the streets where I grew up and played with other children. There are tourists everywhere and, because of gentrification, many of my former comrades in struggle have had to leave. This was a rundown, working-class neighborhood, and now it is prey to the real estate speculation that the entire island suffers from”. In 1975, this man from Calatrava, of the 'pedra picada' style, was 32 years old and, with Franco agonizing, he already led the neighborhood mobilization against the construction of a large parking lot for tourist coaches in front of the Cathedral. The cry of protest was ‘Park YES, parking NO’. Due to that pressure, in May 1976 the City Council rectified and gave way to a competition of ideas for the design of the current Parc de la Mar, which was inaugurated in 1984.

It was December 1970 when a postal envelope sent from Manacor arrived by motorcycle at the Palacio del Pardo in Madrid. After the mandatory security checks, the envelope, the size of a sheet of paper, ended up on the table of the dictator Francisco Franco. Upon opening it, he discovered what they had already warned him about from Mallorca: inside was a subversive magazine, with articles in Catalan called Es Forat. Founded by Pep Lluís Fuster and Toni Riera, the publication aimed to offer a multidisciplinary view with articles on literature, cinema, and current affairs.

He declared himself excited to visit the land of Juníper Serra and satisfied to combat, in good camaraderie, with the Franco dictatorship, against international communism. 70 years ago, at the beginning of the summer of 1956, who was then Vice President of the United States, Richard Nixon, made a lightning visit to Mallorca to meet with the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs and, as a good tourist, to swim for a while on the beach.

Those of us who grew up with Indiana Jones films often fantasized as youngsters about treasure chambers, golden idol heads, and endless questions that were never answered. How did he know so many languages? How did he get into that chamber? In which other film was his research on that shown? Indiana Jones was always surrounded by ancient papyri, medieval books, stone inscriptions, which made young people's imaginations soar.

Josep Picó Matos was born on Carrer d'en Bosch on June 23, 1874, at a time when growing up in Manacor meant suffering economically and socially. From a Xueta family, he was the grandson of the also Manacorí Josep Picó Pomar Pabordo and Escolàstica Pomar, a native of Santa Maria. Baptized in the old church of dels Dolors, his name is not found in the civil registry.

In March 2022, the Servera family, linked to the Drac de Portocristo caves, put the S'Hort des Correu estate, on the outskirts of Manacor, up for sale. This definitively ended a century-old relationship between the space and the town, and with one of the most curious myths of Sant Joan's night. Around those dates, more than four years ago, the Llull family, the last caretakers of the house, had already left El Correu three years prior, shortly before the pandemic. And with them, the tradition of the magic vimer, the tree capable of curing hernias, had disappeared, once a year, for children who passed naked through its branches at sunrise on the shortest night, always at 6:20 AM.

He was short, but energetic. And, above all, he was loyal to the constitutional legality. The Majorcan military man Valerià Weyler did not like it at all that his colleague Miguel Primo de Rivera staged a coup d'état and became a dictator, with the approval of the monarch of the time, Alfonso XIII. He disliked it so much that, a century ago, in June 1926, at the age of 87, he led an attempt to overthrow Primo de Rivera and return to normality: the 'Santjoanada', so named because it was to take place on the 24th, Saint John's Day.

A ntoni Gaudí Cornet, born in Reus in 1852, found in nature his main source of inspiration. “Originality consists in returning to the origin,” he used to say. At the end of the 19th century, the muses led him to Mallorca. He did so as a member of the Catalan Association of Scientific Excursions, founded in 1876. The entity used to organize trips to the island, then famous for its unspoiled landscapes. The man from Reus was particularly struck by the Caves of Artà and the Caves of Drach (Manacor). This is assured by the Japanese researcher Tokutoshi Torii in a work titled Mallorca in Gaudí's works – it was published in 2002 within the framework of international conferences on Gaudí studies.

The professor of Geography at the University of the Balearic Islands, Nofre Rullan, turned the opening speech of the Sant Pere festivities into a journey through the recent history of the municipality, from its industrial past to its current globalized reality. With the title "Esporles: close to Palma and between Mallorca and the world", the geographer analyzes how the town has gone from textile factories to the model of a commuter town, then to a metropolitan municipality and, finally, to an Esporles marked by mobility, residential tourism, and real estate pressure.

During the boom of tourism, there were Swedes who did not get discouraged. Some tried to dissuade their compatriots from going on vacation to a country that was a dictatorship and that, with the economic support of the USA, had made tourism its salvation. The most activist ones demonstrated with slogans such as 'Boycott trips to Spain!' and 'Trips to Mallorca are a disgrace'. From other countries, these protests would also be supported by Spanish anarchists in exile organized around Defensa Interior (DI). Coordinating the entity was the native of Menorca Octavi Alberola Surinach (1928-2025).