San Martín National Institute

The San Martín Institute was founded on April 5, 1933 (the 115th anniversary of the Battle of Maipú), by a member of the Military Officers' Association, Dr. José Pacífico Otero.

The project met with official approval, and the mayor of Buenos Aires, Basilio Pertiné, had the city donate a prime, 290 m2 (3,100 ft²) lot in the city's Palermo section for its construction, and in 1944, President Edelmiro Farrell designated it a national institute under the aegis of the Ministry of War; its first proceedings as a national institute were convened on June 27, 1945.

[1] The new headquarters was inaugurated on August 11, 1946, and during the presidency of Juan Perón, the institute earned prominence through his policy of underscoring the historical and cultural importance of San Martín, who had died in exile and dependent on the kindness of a French admirer, in 1850.

Official support helped the institute open its first overseas affiliate, in San Salvador in 1957, and this was followed by ones in Santiago (1960), Montevideo (1962), Cuzco and Madrid (1964), Rome, Brussels and Paris (1969), Los Angeles and New York (1972), as well as numerous others (including one in Boulogne-Sur-Mer, where he died in 1850).

[2] The Ministry of Defense transferred control over the institute to the Secretariat of Culture during Raúl Alfonsín's presidency, and in 1993, the Argentine Commission on Military History was created as its dependency.