Mineros en Puertollano: movimiento obrero y represión franquista (1873-1949)

This article analyses the process that shaped the class consciousness of the miners in Puertollano (Ciudad Real), identified as a vindictive city. Factors such as the harshness of the work, the poor living conditions and the shortage of rolling stock for transporting coal made this town a standard-bearer for the workers' movement in the La Mancha region. At the same time, the decisive role played by the miners in the fact that Franco's dictatorship, determined to achieve a model city, took the post-war repression to an extreme. In short, we analyze the variables that explain the terror unleashed in this mining area against a mass of workers who, with ideas manifestly opposed to the regime, found it very difficult to survive the repressive machinery.