Sup /x/
Ever heard about a place deep in the Catalan pirenees called Tor? It has quite a history.
The tiny village of Tor lays on the Catalan side of the mountains and it is one of the most isolated places in the country, only accessible through a long dirt track from Alins, which in turn is connected to Llavorsí via a narrow one-lane country road through a deep gorge, it is cut off the rest of the world by snow most of the winter.
At the end of the 1800s, thirteen families lived there, and in 1896, they signed a document establishing a community of co-owners of the mountain where the village is located, which extends to the border with Andorra. It was this strategic location that would prove to be a curse to its inhabitants.
During the 40s, the isolated location of the village made it a good place for maquis (spanish republican guerrilla fighters) to hide, and in 1944, a confrontation between some maquis and the Guardia Civil (spanish police) ended up with three houses being burned down. It seems that there were some accusations in the village as to who had tipped the police of the presence of maquis and who was harbouring them, and this was the beginning of a long-standing feud between two families that was fuelled over decades by isolation and ambition.
Cont.
>>17831460
The three families whose houses had been destroyed left the village, and the harsh winter and living conditions (there was no electricity, telephone or running water) led to a small exodus over the decades which meant the by the 70s there were few people who still lived in the town all year round.
The document that established the co-ownership of the mountain stated that the inhabitants of the village were those in whose houses there was a fire in the hearth all year round, which meant that the few people left in the village regarded themselves as the only legitimate owners. By this time, two men – Josep Montané, ‘Sansa’ and Jordi Riba, ‘El Palanca’ – were in bitter confrontation over the use of the mountain. Both of them had build dirt roads up the mountain to connect with Andorra, and they were making a big profit with smuggling. There was (and still is) only one road connecting Andorra to Catalonia which meant smugglers had to resort to walking across the mountains or using mules, so having a dirt road on which 4×4 trucks could drive was of great benefit to them. Sansa and El Palanca blocked and controlled access to their roads and demanded money, goods or vehicles in exchange.
Their feud continued, and the fight over ownership of the mountain and the isolation they lived in made them grow paranoid of each other. Both to ‘protect’ themselves and to make sure that their properties were always occupied (and thus securing ownership under the provisions of the ancient law), they surrounded themselves of shady characters that had found in the village a way to escape their past. Sansa set up a kind of hippie camp on his land, and El Palanca hired two gypsies as bodyguards.
>>17831468
By the end of the decade Sansa, seeing the development of tourism on the other side of the border and having been repeatedly and insistently contacted by several developers, had grown more ambitious and started envisioning building a winter resort in the mountain. Sansa was contacted by an Andorran lawyer and developer with a background in doubtful activities (brothels, strip clubs, smuggling…) who put him in touch with British investors and convinced him and three other of the original owners to sign a 99-year lease on the mountain. The rest of the co-owners, and especially El Palanca, who wanted to protect his interests in the mountain, were fiercely opposed to the project, and the situation degenerated quickly. The project stalled for a while, as the investors were wary of the community of co-owners and wanted to clarify the legal situation of the land, and at some point during this time, the paved road was build from the Andorran side to the border, probably with hopes that the winter resort would be built (and making the smugglers’ life easier).
The situation had grown so tense that when the lawyer visited Tor to arrange paperwork with Sansa, he too was accompanied by bodyguards, a couple of retired policemen. It was during one of those visits when they run into El Palanca and his two gypsies, and a heated argument started. Both parties carried guns, and in the confrontation that ensued, the two ex-policemen shot the two gypsies dead. They were later arrested and sentenced to 8 years in prison.
>>17831470
At the beginning of the 80s, the remaining inhabitants started a legal battle for the ownership of the mountain that dragged on for years, putting off the potential investors and an end to the winter resort project. El Palanca and Sansa continued extorting money from the smugglers until 1995, when the Court made a decision and awarded ownership of the mountain to Sansa, on the basis that he was the only real all-year resident in the village. His victory was short-lived, though. Five months later he was found dead in his house.
At first, fingers pointed to the hippies he put up in his ‘Camp Sansa’, but shortly after an eyewitness, Antonio Gil, accused Josep Mont and Merli Pinto a pair of smugglers to whom Sansa allegedly owed money. They were arrested, but later on the judge dismissed Gil’s account on the basis that he had psychological problems and there were several contradictions on his declaration. Mont and Pinto walked free and the case is still unsolved today.
>>17831460
How quaint
bump
>>17831479
For anyone interested in going near the mountain, you can find signs like these that translates into:
Private property and road. Mountain of Tor. The owners of the mountain of Tor will not be held responsible for any physical or material damage ocurring to those that enter the property or use the road.
Wow, what can be said about this place??
