Portal:Mexico/Selected biography/2

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José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori (15 September 1830 – 2 July 1915) was a Mexican-American War volunteer, French Intervention hero, and President. He ruled Mexico from 1876 to 1880 and from 1884 to 1911.Porfirio Díaz was born in 1830 in the city of Oaxaca, Oaxaca. He was a mestizo, of Creole and Mixtec (a Mesoamerican tribe) ancestry. His father, José Faustino (de la Cruz) Díaz Bohorques was a modest innkeeper and died when Porfirio Díaz was three years old. His mother, Petrona Mori Cortés, later tried to keep the inn going but the business failed. She sent young Porfirio to the Seminario Conciliar in 1843, but he was not cut out for the priesthood. He joined the local militiary in 1846, dreaming of defending his country from a threatening United States invasion. In 1850 Porfirio entered the Instituto de Ciencias y Artes to study law.