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Towards the second half of the eighteenth century, Father Gaspar de Soria, a wealthy man and a doctor in Theology, undertook the company of building a chapel house, in a point of the region known until then as the Mesa de Chaparral de los Reyes, because it was a arid zone, of reddish earth in which a bush called Chaparro abounded. It is located in the site called El Triunfo, six kilometers from the current municipal seat and gradually people are building their houses around this site, which determined the foundation of a thriving hamlet. A short time later, this chapel house in Chaparral became Vice Parish of Coyaima, until the year 1767 when it was constituted as a Parish, its first Parish priest being Don Vicente de la Rocha.

On June 3, 1773, the Archbishop of Santafé Fray Agustín Camacho decreed that the Parish of San Juan Bautista de Chaparral be erected under the jurisdiction of the Villa de Purificación and, on July 23 of the same year, Viceroy Don Manuel de Guirior confirmed the disposition of the Archbishop; this last date may be the most appropriate to be accepted as that of the foundation of Chaparral.

On November 16, 1827, Chaparral was destroyed by an earthquake, so Mr. Francisco Javier de Castro, a wealthy man in the region, granted the donation by deed, on November 13, 1828, land to build what today constitutes that population. Within the scriptural clauses it was established that no one could sell the land, only the improvements.

The reconstruction and resurgence of the town destroyed in 1827 was rapid, since in 1837 Chaparral appeared as the head of the Canton of Castrolarma, which together with the cantons of Mariquita, Honda, Ibagué and La Palma made up the province of Mariquita. In 1853 the cantons were abolished and finally on April 12, 1861, Chaparral was elevated to the category of Municipality, segregated from Coyaima.

Among the most outstanding personalities of Chaparral, the following stand out: General José María Melo, president of the Republic in 1854; Manuel Murillo Toro, twice President of the Republic, from 1864 to 1866 and from 1872 to 1874; Eugenio Castilla, attorney president of the State of Tolima and Secretary of the National Treasurer, Antonio Rocha, Governor of Tolima, Minister of Dispatch, Member of the Supreme Court of Justice and very notable lawyer; Darío Echandía, designated and president of Colombia, ambassador to the Holy See, Minister of Education, Government and Governor of Tolima, politician and jurist of prodigious talent, who deserved the title of Teacher; Alfonso Reyes Echandía, university professor, vice minister of Justice, member of the Supreme Court of Justice; Alberto Rocha Alvira, governor of Tolima; Alfonso Gómez Méndez, Attorney General, Attorney General of the Nation and a large number of personalities who have put up the name of the municipality and the country. In the year 1580, the President of the Royal Court of Santa Fe de Bogotá, Don Lope Díez Aux de Armendáriz, granted leave to Captain Don Bartolomé Talaverano, resident of the Fort of San Bonifacio, pawned his own property to go 1581 against the Pijao with sixty soldiers from cavalry and the same from native allies. Meanwhile and due to the instability of the royal audience of Santa Fe de Bogotá, Bartolomé Talaverano is forced to remain in Bogotá, for a period greater than three months, with his men already on the march and stationed in Ibagué, who without a government carry out some excesses within the native populations with ranchers and kidnapping of natives of the territories of Cacata-Ima. Where they fortified a palenque in which for four months he was in charge of Captain Alonso Cobo in the midst of disorder. Upon Captain Talaverano's return from Bogotá, the men wished to enter into actions of war where they were rewarded for looting and enjoyed killing natives and raping their women. Taverano allows one of the most problematic men who had the surname Roa there to organize an attack through the territories of Amo-ya, looking for the house of the principal, Cacique Chequera and promising his men "to come to Fort Buga to eat biscuits" He then marches with thirty soldiers to the vanguard led by him and a rear guard with Captain Talaverano with the rest of the soldiers. Two days' walk from Cacataima and towards Buga, pretending to march at night, he falls into the ambush prepared by the Cacica Chequera in which ten soldiers are killed and they force him to retreat to his Talaverano rearguard post, who retreats descending by what for this time they called the "Sierra Coymas" stopping in lowlands on the banks of the river Amo-and where the Fuerte del Escorial sits near the place that today occupies the municipality of Chaparral in Tolima. It prospered for two years, but due to divisions among the soldiers who mutinied and in groups abandoned it until it was left without much protection and the attacks of Cacique Chequera increased, it was abandoned in 1584. After Captain Bocanegra left the area of ​​Santiago de la Frontera in The facts of Cacique Checker looking for a safer place to the south, where he takes for himself, the Escorial Fort, recently abandoned by Captain Talaverano, calling it: fort ´´Medina de las Torres´´ near the current municipality of Chaparral in the Tolima, on the eve of the epiphany in 1584 with reinforcements sent from Santa Fe de Bogotá by the President of the Royal Audience Doctor Francisco Guillén Chaparro

On June 3, 1773, the Archbishop of Santafé Fray Agustín Camacho decreed that the Parish of San Juan Bautista de Chaparral be erected under the jurisdiction of the Villa de Purificación and, on July 23 of the same year, Viceroy Don Manuel de Guirior confirmed the disposition of the Archbishop; this last date may be the most appropriate to be accepted as that of the foundation of Chaparral.





It is a Colombian municipality located south of the department of Tolima, approximately 163 km from the Tolima capital, Ibagué.



Economy

The main economic activity is agriculture and livestock; coffee is one of the main products.



Transport

Since the beginning of the 20th century, construction began on a highway through the Páramo de las Hermosas to connect the cities of Chaparral and Palmira, which would provide the shortest land route between Bogotá and the city of Cali, also turning Chaparral into a development pole of southern Tolima. However, only some sections of this project have been completed and its completion has been postponed indefinitely.





Places of interest

Tuluni and Copete caves

Las Hermosas National Natural Park

Puddle of APA

Blue puddle

La Tigrera

The drum

San Juan Bautista Church

Club Cointrasur

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