A fact from Villar Residence appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 13 June 2013 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:
Did you know... that the Palacio Haedo in Buenos Aires was once occupied by the Banco Popular Argentino?
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As explained in my article on this house (https://pabellonarg.com/2021/10/28/vecinos-interesantes-3/) - in Spanish, but Google Chrome gives a pretty decent translation - this house in its original version that looked like a small, two-towered castle, was built by a wealthy landowner from Entre Ríos province, colonel Reynaldo Villar. He had bought in 1881 the single storey house that occupied this quaint triangular city block from the Haedo family succession. That house had belonged to José Braulio Haedo. Villar commissioned Swiss architect Giuseppe Maraini for the design. Between 1928 and 1930 Villar's daughter Dominga, nicknamed Numa, had the castle transformed into the neogothic French château you can see now, in a sad state of disrepair. Even the current owner, Administración de Parques Nacionales, has the story wrong. Alejandro Milberg (talk) 19:17, 19 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I understand it is hard to believe, but the "official" history you quote is mistaken. I have emailed the librarian at Biblioteca Perito Francisco Moreno, we'll see if she answers.
It is clear that nobody at Parques Nacionales (the current owner) ever looked up the 1881 deed of sale between the inheritors of José Braulio Haedo (his brother Mariano and four nephews) and Reinaldo Villar, which makes it obvious that what was being sold wasn't the small castle but the old, ramshackle single-story house that existed on this quaint triangular city block. This document can be found at the National Archives in Buenos Aires, public notary Manuel Salas, July 18, 1881, page 869. As I explain in my blog https://pabellonarg.com/2021/10/28/vecinos-interesantes-3/, the deed shows that the sellers were Mariano F. Haedo, brother of the deceased José Braulio, and four nephews, sons of another deceased brother, Manuel José Vicente Haedo Alvarado. Don Mariano gave his address at 80 (or 70) San Martín street, and his nephews all lived at 715 Piedad – addresses that have nothing to do with the property for sale, so none of them lived there. Neither did José Braulio, a judge, who had lived outside Buenos Aires. That single-story house was split up in several different homes and rented out to workers, as shown in the 1869 Buenos Aires census. When describing it on page 870, from the number of entrances cited in the deed it is obvious that it refers to the single-story one: "... that they sell to Mr. Villar, a property of common property located in this City, street of Maipú formerly number three hundred fifty-five to three hundred fifty-nine, today five hundred thirty-seven to five hundred forty-one, also facing the streets of Charcas and Santa Fe and the Plaza de Marte or del Retiro, indicated by that of Charcas, previously with numbers sixty-three to sixty-nine, today one hundred nine to one hundred and ten-nine and by that of Santa Fe before numbers two to eight, today fifty and four to fifty-six." As can be seen in photographs of the old single-story house, it had several entrances on Santa Fe street, while the small castle had only one, its main entrance.
If any more evidence is required, Reinaldo Villar's initials "RV" are engraved on the glass of the house's entrance doors - you can see the photograph in the article in the Spanish version of Wikipedia, "Residencia Villar" (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Residencia_Villar). Finally, the National Commission of Historic Monuments and Buildings also call it "Residencia Villar", making it even harder to understand why the current owners, Parques Nacionales, also a government entity, do not correct this mistake. Let's hope you will... Alejandro Milberg (talk) 14:34, 9 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
