Cura
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
or CIUDAD DE CURA, a city of Venezuela, formerly capital of the miles W. of Caracas. The site is 1,600 feet state of Miranda, near Lake Valereia, 56 above sea-level, with a steep hill behind it and a wide valley before it. Situated near the llanos of the Guarico, it has a considerable commerce in cotton, sugar cane, coffee, cocoa, indigo, general agricultural products, and cattle. It was founded in 1730 and was the scene of several battles in the War of Independence. In 1900 an earthquake did considerable damage. Pop. about 13,000. CURAÇAO (kö-ra-sa'ō), an island of the Dutch West Indies in the Caribbean Sea; 46 miles N. of the coast of Venezuela; area, 210 square miles; capital, Willemstad; principal harbor, Santa Anna. It is hilly, wild, and barren, with a hot, dry climate. Yellow fever visits it every sixth or seventh year. Fresh water is scarce, and serious droughts occur. The tamarind, cocoa-palm, banana, and other useful trees are reared; among them three varieties of orange, from one of which the Curaçao liqueur is made. Sugar, tobacco, cochineal, and maize are also pr produced, but the staple exports are salt, and a valuable phosphate of lime used as a manure in its natural state, or made to yield valuable superphosphates. The islands of Curaçao, Bonaire, Oruba (or Aruba), St. Martin, St. Eustache, and Saba form a Dutch government, the residence of the governor being at Willemstad. From the 16th century Curaçao was held in succession by the Spaniards, Dutch, and British, and finally ceded to Holland in 1814. Pop. (1918) 34,639, of the colony, 57,195. CURAÇAO, or CURACOA, a liqueur or cordial prepared from a peculiar kind of bitter oranges growing in Curaçao, which have a persistent aromatic odor and taste. It is prepared from the yellow part of the rind.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
When Collier's wrote this in 1921 it treated Cura as a Venezuelan town of some 13,000 people; the place is now generally called Villa de Cura, sits in the state of Aragua rather than Miranda, and has grown many times over into a city of well over 100,000. The greater change is on the second half of the page. Curaçao in 1921 was a barren, drought-stricken salt and phosphate island visited by yellow fever every sixth or seventh year; the Shell refinery opened there in 1918 to process Venezuelan crude turned it into one of the Caribbean's busiest industrial ports, and yellow fever is long gone. The Dutch group Collier's lists has since broken up: Aruba split off in 1986, the Netherlands Antilles was dissolved in 2010, and Curaçao is now a self-governing country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, living on refining, tourism and offshore finance. The orange-peel liqueur is still made and still bears the island's name.
Written for this edition, 2026.