Part II: On the Way to Success
Eva arrived in Buenos Aires (it is believed) in 1936. No one knows
for sure how she survived once she first got to B.A. If she did, in
fact, travel with Magaldi (and his wife?), she more than likely stayed
with them. There's some speculation, however, that her brother, Juan,
was living in B.A., and she stayed with him upon her arrival. However,
though what happened immediately after her arrival is unknown, she
made herself very known a short time after she got there.
Eva started out an aspiring actress. Most people who saw her, though,
admitted readily that she couldn't act. This, as much as the chauvinism
of Argentine men at the time, surely contributed to her way of using
the "casting couch." It is widely known that
Eva used her charm (and her body) to sustain herself until she could
live on her own. Unfortunately for her, she began to use men who could
only help her advance herself. In this manner, she landed a starring
role in a once-weekly radio show based on the lives of famous women
around the world. Little did she know, though she did dream, that she
would one day be one of the most influential women of this century.
On January 22, 1944, Eva Duarte met the man who would change her life
forever: Colonel Juan Peron. They met at a charity concert held to aid
the victims of an earthquake in San Juan. The night they met, the rest
of both of their lives began.
As soon as Eva and Peron became involved, Eva situated herself very
securely in Peron's life. She became indespensible to him. And she
had her sights set on one thing: marriage. He was opposed to this,
presumably more than just slightly. One night, at a dinner amongst
friends, casual conversation was floating around the table, and someone
brought up a possible marriage between Eva and Peron. Peron's answer
was non-committal. Eva responded with, "You are going to marry
me, aren't you?" No one knows if she perhaps had something that she
could have used as blackmail if he hadn't married her, or if she had
simply become so much a part of his private and political life that
he couldn't let her go, but whatever the case my be, on October 21, 1945,
they were married...for better or for worse.
From this point on, Eva became as much a driving force for Peron as
his own ambition was. She campaigned for him, gave speeches for him,
and almost single-handedly catapulted him into the hearts of the
descamisados, literally, the shirtless ones. The descamisados
were Eva's people, and by bringing Peron to the hearts of her people,
and her people to the heart of Peron, she was finally coming full circle.
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Her work to get to the top wasn't done yet. There was still much
campaigning to do, more speeches, whistle-stop tours, always, always
working Peron and herself further into the hearts of the poor, poverty-
stricken people, the very people who needed him, and indeed her, most.
Eva was driven by not only her unyielding love for Peron, but also
her own ambition to outrun her past, to make something up to the people
that were so like she used to be, and to finally, finally, make it to the
top.
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And make it to the top, she did, when on February 24, 1946, Colonel
Juan Peron was elected president of Argentina, and Eva stepped into the role
of, as though it had been created for her, first lady of Argentina.
She was Eva Duarte de Peron, and she was where she'd always wanted to be.
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