Carmen Romano Nölck (1926–2000) was first lady of Mexico being the wife of President José López Portillo, in the period that spanned from 1976 to 1982. She stood out for being a great cultural manager who achieved important advances in terms of the creation of artistic institutions, as well as its diffusion to all corners of the country.
However, in Mexican popular culture she is known for leading a life of luxury and extravagant requirements that always gave people something to talk about. Mainly because of their magnitude and high cost, generating much controversy because they were requested during the presidential tours that she carried out with her husband.
She stood out in her work as first lady with cultural management. Photo: BernaMarCamp
At the same time, she was a woman very concerned about her image, always wearing eye-catching clothes and makeup that made her always be on the lips of public opinion.
Biography
Daughter of Alfonso Romano - a high-ranking businessman from the Ford automobile company - and Margarita Nölck, an opera singer from Caracas, Carmen was born on February 10, 1926 in Mexico City, where her parents had finally settled after have lived in the United States, Guatemala and Germany.
His family cultural mix is highly diverse, as Romano is of French, Venezuelan, German, Italian, and Spanish descent.
As a result of the musical talent inherited from her mother, she trained as a concert player since she was a child, studies that she supplemented with piano master classes that she received from great European interpreters.
After becoming a musician, he traveled to Europe to develop as a soloist, but became seriously ill and could not carry out his promising career.
Back in Mexico, she abandoned her dream of dedicating herself completely to playing the piano - although she kept it as her main recreational activity that she carried out on a daily basis - and found a new professional passion as an architect and infrastructure designer, a task that materialized to the point that he got to build his own home.
At the age of 25 she married José López Portillo, whom she knew from an early age as he was her neighbor. They both settled in Mexico City and had three children: José Ramón, Carmen and Paulina.
Her husband's first political position was Secretary of the Treasury and Public Credit, whom Carmen faithfully accompanied as a volunteer in family development programs, a job that years later she would develop at the official level from the presidential office.
First lady of Mexico
As a PRI candidate, López Portillo won the 1976 elections. Thus, Carmen Romano became the new first lady of Mexico, a position that she would hold throughout the presidential term that ended in 1982.
Already settled in Los Pinos, the Mexican presidential residence, Carmen Romano and López Portillo were sentimentally separated, but legally united in marriage. Work and responsibility that they decided to assume and maintain during the six-year term of the mandate, sleeping in different rooms and each one sharing a wing of the house with their families.
Main contributions
From her office, the first lady established and created important institutions dedicated to social development in Mexico. In 1977 she founded the National System for the Integral Development of the Family (DIF), which was based on promoting the welfare of the people through preventive medicine, nutrition and progress, especially in the most needy areas of the population.
Public social assistance, the dissemination and expansion of cultural programs formed the axis of its work. He managed the creation of the National Fund for Social Activities, destined to finance and organize cultural activities throughout the Mexican region.
Likewise, he promoted the birth of the Mexico City Philharmonic Orchestra and the School of Perfection, Life and Movement, with the aim of training future musicians in the country.
To honor Spanish-speaking writers, starting with Mexicans, he created the Ollin Yoliztli International Literary Award in 1979, which began to become popular years later until it became one of the most important literature awards in Latin America.
He was also in charge of the Technical Committee of the Trust of the Center for Shows, Conventions and Exhibitions of Acapulco, continuing with his tuning in works destined to celebrate, strengthen and promote musical and artistic idiosyncrasies.
Personal life
Beyond her merits in culture, music and social development, Carmen Romano always attracted the attention of the press and public opinion for her evident life of luxury and eccentricities.
Her reputation as a wasteful of money earned her an incessant chain of rumors, gossip and criticism that she could never rid herself of. The reputation was formed mainly by the stories of her presidential trips, in which she always carried her gigantic grand piano that she had installed in the hotels where she spent her stay as first lady.
One of the episodes that generated the most controversy was when allegedly, during an official visit to Paris, his piano did not fit in the suite and he ordered to knock down the wall of the room to enlarge it and thus be able to play his religious daily recital, paying all the expenses of the request.
In terms of image, many remember her as a striking character for her style of dress and an overloaded makeup at all times. During her trips to Europe, where she went quite frequently, she used to take a tour of the most emblematic places in terms of tourism, being also a recognized client of the most exclusive jewelers on the continent.
He was very often seen in the most expensive and prestigious luxury restaurants, where he ordered whatever he wanted, even if it was not on the menu. On the presidential plane, she also traveled loaded with enough desserts to supply the days she would be out of the country, since she would not get them at her destination.
And when they went shopping in stores in the United States and Mexico, Romano had the doors of the stores closed so that he had full freedom to take everything he wanted without limitations or people around.
But transcending the semblance of luxury and monetary waste, his great talent as a pianist and the incessant work for art, culture and music always highlighting the values of Mexico, are facts that will accompany his memory forever.
Carmen Romano died on May 9, 2000 in Mexico City, at the age of 74.
References
- Sefchovich, Sara, “La Suerte de la Consorte”, Mexico City, DF, Editorial Ocean, 1999.
- Muñoz Altea, Fernando and Magdalena Escobosa Hass de Rangel, "History of the Official Residence of Los Pinos", Mexico, Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1988.
- Carrillo, Mario Alejandro, The First Lady: Under the Shadow of Power. Politics and Culture, 1992.
- Dif official website, dif.gob.mx
- Peter H. Smith, Mexico since 1946: Dynamics of an Authoritarian Regime, 1990.