Rondon expedition 1906-1930
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The Brazilian officer Candido Mariano da Silva Rondon lead a national expedition to expand Brazilian Telegraph lines to the Amazon. From 1907 until 1915 the expedition covered more than 50.0000km of the national territory. The mission had a very peculiar mix of military-civil professionals: military engineers, scientists, biologists, anthropologists, geographers. The mission executed many tasks such as mapping of borders and mineral resources, cataloging biodiversity and rivers, colonization attempts for new cities, organization of extractive economic activities, creation of roads and military bases for defense, the cataloging of communities and indigenous lands, in addition to the "pacification" of these peoples. The international reputation of the mission made the government use the image of Rondon as a national hero, a tropical Humboldt.