Olímpia

History

The oldest archaeological evidence in the territory dates back to the centuries 9th or 10th. In the early 1990s, workers of construction found four funerary urns containing bones, bead necklaces, and pots inside, which was later linked to the Tupi, and Macro Je people. Although it is known that Latin America was inhabited by nomadic tribes, this is actually the oldest evidence of human presence in the area prior to European colonization. In the 19th century, the foundation of Olimpia (formerly knows as Fazenda Olhos d'Água, and then, Vila Olímpia) is related to the coffee industry during the Empire of Brazil, when plantation owners meet the demand of labor. With the exhaustion of the gold mines, people abandoned their previous sites in search of a better one. The new settlers focus on the unexplored areas to dedicate themselves to agriculture and cattle raising. The first reports indicate that a farmer named Antônio Joaquim dos Santos was the first settler to establish a farm in the 19th century. He named his property as Fazenda Olhos D'Água (Portuguese for Water holes farm) due to the amount of water springs in the area. The increasing numbers of migrant colonials settling in the area and the need for a collectivized farming led the local community the decision to create the village. In 1903, the landowners invitated the English immigrants Robert John Reid, and William Leatherbarrow, to separate the lands and establish the city. The town was elevated to a district of Barretos on December 18, 1906, and named as "Vila Olímpia" in honor to Maria Olímpia Rodrigues Vieira, who was the daughter of Antônio Olímpio Rodrigues Vieira. Vieira was one of the founders of the city. Nowadays, a range of buildings reveal the timeline of Olimpia's history and were declared…