Panamá Vieja Escuela

Reviewed by: Kelly Karst

Review start: March 20, 2024

Site Link: https://www.panamaviejaescuela.com/

Archive Link: https://archive.ph/5tp0A

Data Sources

• Images from archives, personal photo albums, advertising, or mass media
• Articles based on images research and compiled by the site owner
• eBooks from local authors available for purchase

Processes

• Site owner’s curiosity led to creating a social media presence in 2012 sharing images and videos of Panama’s past
• The social media presence became overwhelmingly popular, leading to the creation of this site in 2014
• Researching and writing articles to provide fuller context social media posts
• Creating categories for article types and tagging them with the appropriate categories
• Deciding on themes for collected images, creating a linked index to those themes, and making a gallery of images based on those themes
• Monitoring and responding to comments shared by users on article posts

Presentation

The landing page offers users some context for the site, a way to subscribe to be alerted of future article posts, a gallery of the 6 most recent article posts, and an invitation to browse eBooks for sale. The menu at the top of the page includes Articles, Books, Images, Restoration, Who Are We?, Contact, and a search option. Social media platforms icons are available to their Facebook, Instagram, X, and YouTube sites. The heart of the site are the articles which are in a blog list format and can be filtered by given categories. A page dedicated to images is broken up into a linked index of categories to view related image galleries or can be scrolled through.

Digital Tools Used

• Unknown, however:
• Possibly WordPress for website hosting
• Possibly a scanner for some images

Languages

• Spanish

Review

The Panamá Vieja Escuela website was created in 2014, two years after the successful launch of a social media profile of the same name. Within both, images and videos are shared relating to Panama’s past. Panama has seen significant change within the 21st century, and the project’s social media posts struck a strong chord, both among those that were flooded with nostalgia, and the younger generation getting a glimpse of the details of a Panama that no longer exists. To consolidate these posts, they were put onto this website and indexed with a search engine for discoverability. The site focuses on images, which capture the essence of Panama’s past from sources like newspaper and magazine photographs, various personal photographs, print and video advertising, and more.

The site began as a personal project by Osvaldo Angulo Lezcano to understand Panama’s first 500 years; however, his social media presence became so popular that it is now his full-time occupation. Because of this popularity, he has been able to partner with local mass media outlets and local corporations to mine for and share images, videos, news clippings, and more. Other images seem to come from various archives, users contributing content, or directly from the original commercial source. The curated media shared taps into some of the more ethereal collective memory of Panamanians past to capture that jean ne sais quoi of how life used to be.

Although it is unclear, the site appears to be hosted on WordPress. The heart of the site are image rich articles that go into fuller detail on collective memory events shared on social media and allow for users to post comments, sometimes adding details to the collective memory. They are tagged into categories including decades within the 1900s, earlier centuries, provinces of Panama, indigenous groups of Panama, and a few random categories such as businesses, famous people, or the dictatorship. The last post as of this writing was from October 2023, and previous posts seemed to be scattered several months apart, unlike their social media sites which post on a regular basis. Images on the dedicated images page are broken up into themed groups that one can either choose from an index or scroll through. The images do not come with any context.

The site is simple and easy for users to navigate. It is a nice complement to the social media site, particularly within the articles that provide more context to posts. eBooks by local authors on Panama’s history are also available for a small fee. It succeeds in its goal to share and hopefully educate users on Panama’s more intimate history, however, it is not as rich with content as one would hope, considering the vast posts shared via their social media platform. This is understandable as it seems to be a one-person operation. The site owner features his photo restoration services on this site, which although somewhat related, take away from the cultural project. Due to the “brand’s” popularity, it would be beneficial for Panama’s national government’s Ministry of Culture to provide support and funding for a team to create a more robust cultural memory hub, since there isn’t a current similar alternative.

How does this project address information?
Almost all of the information contained within this project is aggregated from elsewhere, whether that be from libraries, archives, personal photo collections, or sources uploaded around the internet. The aim is to tell the story of Panama as it once was, often through those more day-to-day moments that one doesn’t consider while they are living through it, but leave an imprint when looking back. Although largely a curation project, original essays are created to provide contex to some of the images and videos presented. It is unclear how much copyright is considered for this curation.

How well does this project handle information?.
The presentation of information is somewhat effective, however it seems clear that was a side project to create some sort of permanence to the more active social media presence that preceded this particular project. At times it feels incomplete, particularly in areas where images are provided within a theme, but with little to no further context or information about them. Despite at times providing some of this context through essays, there is a general sense that users already know the main points of whatever it is, and this site fills in some of the details overlooked by time.