Canadian photographer Jackie Hartley and her images of Jocotepec in the 1980s

Canadian teacher, photographer and social activist Jean (‘Jackie’) Hartley lived in Jocotepec for several years at the start of the 1980s. She is still remembered in the Lake Chapala area today because she and a friend, Roma Jones, co-founded the Lakeside School for the Deaf, now the School for Special Children, located in Jocotepec:

In the summer of 1979, Jackie and Roma, then in their late 50s, drove a camper van from Vancouver Island, British Columbia, to Mexico. Arriving in the town of Jocotepec (population 9000), on the shores of beautiful Lake Chapala, they decided to spend their retirement years there, in leisurely pursuit of their artistic interests: painting, photography, crafts and woodworking. These dreams were never realized; instead, their waking hours became entirely focused on meeting the needs of disadvantaged Mexican children.”
– Gwen Chan Burton, New Worlds for the Deaf.

Within a few months of arriving, and despite no experience of deaf education, Jackie, a qualified primary school teacher, and Roma had started to teach two local deaf children. Their success was evident, and the number of deaf children seeking help grew rapidly.

When Jackie and Roma returned to Canada in 1986, the support system they had established, and the teachers they had hired, ensured that the school continued to grow, barely missing a beat. The history of this pioneering and successful project, with its many highs and some lows, is candidly related in New Worlds for the Deaf.

These photographs taken by Jackie, some of them printed as greetings cards, are the only ones known to have survived to today. Signed NEJH, they were presumably taken in Jocotepec between 1979 and 1986.

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph (Child in shop doorway).

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph (Child in doorway).

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph (Young girl).

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph, damaged. (Young girls with bird).

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph (Shoeshine boy).

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph (Burro with load).

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph (Fisherman and boat on shore).

Jackie Hartley. c 1980. Untitled photograph (Elderly woman).

During her life,

Jackie had taught primary school students, including many indigenous children, for several years in British Columbia before bringing up her own four children. After her pharmacist husband died, Jackie had spent six months in Europe studying art before she journeyed to Mexico.” – Guadalajara Reporter

Jackie, born in about 1921, died in Victoria, British Columbia, on 24 January 1999.

Sources

• Donald Grant. 1983. “Retired Canadians open Mexican school for deaf.” Globe and Mail, 25 April 1983.
• Guadalajara Reporter. 1999. “Jackie Hartley.” (obituary). Guadalajara Reporter 6 Feb 1999.
• Gwen Chan Burton. 2019. New Worlds for the Deaf: The story of the pioneering Lakeside School for the Deaf in rural Mexico. Sombrero Books.

Comments, corrections and additional material are welcome, whether via the comments feature or email.

Tony Burton

Tony Burton’s books include “Lake Chapala: A Postcard History” (2022), “Foreign Footprints in Ajijic” (2022), “If Walls Could Talk: Chapala’s historic buildings and their former occupants” (2020), (available in translation as “Si Las Paredes Hablaran”), “Mexican Kaleidoscope” (2016), and “Lake Chapala Through the Ages” (2008).

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