The Treaty of Petrópolis, signed on November 11, 1903, in the Brazilian city of

Petrópolis Petrópolis (; ), also known as The Imperial City, is a Municipalities of Brazil, municipality in the Southeast Region, Brazil, Southeast Region of Brazil. It is located in the state of Rio de Janeiro (state), Rio de Janeiro, northeast of the ci ...

, ended the

Acre War The Acre War, known in Brazil as Acrean Revolution ( pt, Revolução Acreana) and in Spanish as ("The War of the Acre") was a border conflict between Bolivia and the First Brazilian Republic over the Acre Region, which was rich in rubber and g ...

between

Bolivia , image_flag = Bandera de Bolivia (Estado).svg , flag_alt = Horizontal tricolor (red, yellow, and green from top to bottom) with the coat of arms of Bolivia in the center , flag_alt2 = 7 × 7 square p ...

and

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

over the then-Bolivian territory of Acre (today the

Acre state Acre () is a state located in the west of the North Region of Brazil and the Amazonia Legal. Located in the westernmost part of the country, at a two-hour time difference from Brasília, Acre is bordered clockwise by the Brazilian states of Am ...

), a desirable territory in the Bolivia-Brazil border during the contemporary

rubber boom The Amazon rubber boom ( pt, Ciclo da borracha, ; es, Fiebre del caucho, , 1879 to 1912) was an important part of the economic and social history of Brazil and Amazonian regions of neighboring countries, being related to the extraction and comm ...

. The treaty, drafted by Brazilian foreign affairs minister José Maria da Silva Paranhos, gave Brazil the territory of Acre (191,000 km²), in exchange for over 3,000 km² of Brazilian territory between the Abunâ and

Madeira ) , anthem = ( en, "Anthem of the Autonomous Region of Madeira") , song_type = Regional anthem , image_map=EU-Portugal_with_Madeira_circled.svg , map_alt=Location of Madeira , map_caption=Location of Madeira , subdivision_type=Sovereign st ...

rivers, a monetary payment of two million

British pound Sterling (abbreviation: stg; Other spelling styles, such as STG and Stg, are also seen. ISO code: GBP) is the currency of the United Kingdom and nine of its associated territories. The pound ( sign: £) is the main unit of sterling, and t ...

s, paid in two installments, and a pledge of a rail-link between the Bolivian city of

Riberalta Riberalta is a town in the Beni Department in northern Bolivia, situated where the Madre de Dios River joins the Beni River. Riberalta is on the south (south east) bank of the Beni River. As the capital of the province of Vaca Diez, the city ...

and the Brazilian city of

Porto Velho Porto Velho (, ''Old Port'') is the capital of the Brazilian state of Rondônia, in the upper Amazon River basin, and a Catholic Metropolitan Archbishopric. The population is 548,952 people (as of the IBGE 2021 estimation). Located on the border ...

, which would bypass the

rapids Rapids are sections of a river where the river bed has a relatively steep gradient, causing an increase in water velocity and turbulence. Rapids are hydrological features between a ''run'' (a smoothly flowing part of a stream) and a ''cascade''. ...

on the Madeira. The rail line was called the Madeira-Mamoré Railway. It was supposed to go as far as Riberalta, on the Rio Beni, above that river's rapids, but had to stop short at Guajará-Mirim. This was actually the third such attempt. In the 1870s, during the rubber boom, the American George Church was defeated twice by the heat, the difficulty of the terrain and appalling loss of life from fever. The contract for the Madeira-Mamoré railway required by the treaty was won by another American,

Percival Farquhar Percival Farquhar (1865–1953) was an American investor and financier with extensive interests in Latin America and pre-Soviet Russia, including railways, mines, hotels, and restaurants. Early life Farquhar was born to a wealthy Maryland-Penn ...

. Construction began in August 1907 and was completed on July 15, 1912.Revista História Viva, nº 14, pg 30-41. "Dossiê Madeira-Mamoré". Editora Duetto.

São Paulo São Paulo (, ; Portuguese for 'Saint Paul') is the most populous city in Brazil, and is the capital of the state of São Paulo, the most populous and wealthiest Brazilian state, located in the country's Southeast Region. Listed by the GaWC a ...

. (2004). The project cost US$33 million. At least 3,600 men died building the 367 km of track Guajaramirin-Station (popular estimates say that each one hundred sleepers cost one human life). The Madeira-Mamoré railway had about a year of full operation before the combination of the collapse of rubber prices, the opening of a railway from Bolivia to the Pacific via Chile and of the Panama Canal rendered it uneconomical. It was kept in operation until 1972. The

BR-364 BR-364 is an inter-state highway in Brazil connecting the southeast state of São Paulo to the western state of Acre. The highway was opened in the 1960s and paved in the 1980s. It has brought economic development and population growth in the Amaz ...

road eventually subsumed the route as railway bridges were taken over, leaving what remained of the track to enthusiasts to salvage what they could.

References

Bibliography

* * 1903 in Bolivia 1903 in Brazil Bolivia–Brazil border History of Acre (state) November 1903 events Treaties concluded in 1903 Petropolis Treaties of Bolivia Treaties of the First Brazilian Republic {{Bolivia-hist-stub