Buildings, Boundaries, and Blood: Medicalization and Nation-Building on the U.S.-Mexico Border, 1910-1930
Let's start with a building. The foundations of this two-story red-brick structure were laid in I910 alongside and partially underneath the Santa Fe Street Bridge, which spans the Rio Grande between Ciudad Juirez and El Paso (see fig. i). Initially designed as a site where "every arrival from Mexico" was to be "bathed with soft soap and warm water," this disinfection plant and the bridge leadiiig to it became the stage of violent confrontation seven years later.1 During I9I6, reports of epidemics ravaging Mexico, ongoing military showdowns between Mexican revolutionaries and United States troops, and a heightened concern with disease and contamination prompted the United States Public Health Service (USPHS) and Bureau of Immigration to enlarge the building. Over the course of I9I6 approximately $6,ooo was spent remodeling the plant, including the installation of boilers and streamlined disinfection equipment.2