Anita Arnon

Excellent.

But Creole in the context of this time often means, and this is the argument that is had, and it is contested, as it is with Hamilton.

I know Ron Chernow says it is likely contested.

But the Creoles were people who were pure Spanish, but born in the Americas.

So they often had the label of Creoles because their parents were Spanish, but they were born not in Spain.

And so those people often had that label of Creole attached to them.

Yes.

I mean, you mentioned sort of silver, but it's cacao from what we now know as Venezuela.

Yes.

Yeah, absolutely.

What's also different, you have copper and you have cacao.

The reason that it's important that this place that he was born is a little different from the rest of the Americas at this time that Spain has an interest in is that because of that backbreaking work that's needed to harvest cacao, there are hundreds of enslaved Africans working here.

So there is a much more sort of mixed population here in Venezuela than, let's say, even in Peru, for example.

Yeah, well, so jumping ahead a little bit, because at the moment, we're in his childhood, where he is a brat.

I mean, he's just a rich brat, okay?

So his family's net worth, in this sort of Maria Arana book, which I love so much, she estimates it would be worth about $40 million today.

But, but, but, money can't buy you happiness, William, and it doesn't for him.

His father, Don Juan Vicente, dies, and he's only two and a half years old at the time.

His mother, Donna Maria de la Concepcion, she struggles on, she's raising four children, but she is really struggling because she has TB, which is not uncommon at this time.

And by the time Simone is only nine years old, she dies too.