New Year's Eve on the Islas Marías

In early 1905, Porfirio Díaz purchased the Islas Marías archipelago for $150,000, and in the middle of that same year, he turned the Islas Marías into a penal colony. By 1908, 190 inmates and one teacher were living on Isla María Madre.

Years later, after the armed conflict ended in 1910, President Álvaro Obregón imprisoned common criminals and politicians who opposed his regime, and Plutarco Elías Calles sent many prisoners from the Cristero rebellion to the Islas Marías.

The largest island in the archipelago, María Madre, is the only one of the four that was inhabited from 1905 to 2019, as it was part of the Mexican prison system. The transformation of the Islas Marías Prison Complex into a Center for Environmental Learning and Education requires adherence to rules that will aid in the conservation and protection of ecosystems.