Calle Zulueta follows the line of the old defense wall of Havana, its route is affected by several inflections along the way. Running from its northern source at Calle Arsenal, it follows a slight incline to the southwest and heads south at the intersection with Calle Neptuno, then inclining to the south southeast at Calle Dragones.[1] With a slight incline to the southwest, it heads south at the intersection with Calle Neptuno, then inclining to the south southeast at Calle Dragones.[1] It marks one of the limits of the Parque Central|, it extends by the Plaza hotel, and by the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes (Trocadero, between Zulueta y Monserrate), Sloppy Joe's bar.
History
Calle Zulueta drawn on partal 1909 Habana map by Baedeker
Calle Zulueta runs north from its southern intersection with Calle Cárcel north to the Havana Central railway station on Calle Arsenal. Calle Ignacio Agramonteis was its official name given in 1909, the locals to the present call it by the name it received in 1874: Calle Zulueta.[2]
Its name honors of the potentate Don Julián de Zulueta, 1st Marquis of Álava, a colonel of the Volunteer Corps, president of the Spanish Casino, municipal deputy mayor, interim political governor on several occasions in which he rendered notable services to the city of Havana in terms of charity and public works. Julián Zulueta was a staunch defender of slave trafficking.[a][1]
Guillermo Cabrera InfanteLa writes in 'Habana para un Infante Difunto': "Only I want to talk about the microcosm of Zulueta 408, a world in itself, a closed orb (the culture of the present then). I have to mention in passing how we changed the ad hoc furniture of Monte 822 for the room set (unavoidable commercial phrase from Havana that designated a kind of triplet composed of wardrobe —called a showcase in Havana—, coquette —another word habanera to designate a kind of console-dressing table that my mother welcomed delighted, since as a political woman she was very emancipated and that meant in the village the audacity to dye their hair, smear rouge and use crayon lips—and a camera bed).I don't remember if the fourth game was acquired (yes I'm sure it was purchased on installments) immediately after the moved or a few months after returning to what was defined as our goal, end that was an eternal beginning. I do remember that the rough makeshift table by the anonymous black carpenter, made in silence, disappeared in the move like a lost object in the fourth dimension of memory—but I wasn't going to dissipate our poverty, now marked by darkness where before there was always light. As in a prison, the only light bulb in our cell turned off at ten o'clock at night: electricity was free on the site that mendaciously advertised that it was possible to get free rooms there, but the lights they switched on variable at dusk and went off uncontrollably at ten. It took many years before we could enjoy the possession of that magical disseminator of popular culture, called by an announcer "a source of solace and recreation', which was a radio set."[3]
^Julián Zulueta y Amondo, 1st Marquis of Álava and Viscount of Casa Blanca, was part of a group of the most powerful Spanish slave traders, moneylenders, and landowners, managed to contract the agency for the demolition of the walls of the city, which is why one of the streets through which it extended would be known as Zulueta street.[1]
