At least two major avenues (23 de Maio and 9 de Julho) mark the footprint of the 1932 Constitutionalist Revolution in the city. Yet, across the capital's landscape, numerous other sites evoke the memory of an armed conflict that became the defining myth of São Paulo's history, commemorated as a state holiday since 1997.
It was on May 23, 1932, that hundreds of people took to the streets to protest against the provisional government of Getúlio Vargas. That same night, the protests intensified. A rally organized by students from the Largo São Francisco Law School attempted to storm the October 3rd Club—made up of tenentes (lieutenants) who supported Vargas's coup—which operated out of the PPP party headquarters (formerly the Revolutionary League) on Barão de Itapetininga Street, at the corner of Praça da República. The group was met with gunfire. Five young men died in the clash: Mário Martins de Almeida, Euclides Bueno Miragaia, Dráusio Marcondes de Sousa, and Antônio Américo Camargo de Andrade. Orlando de Oliveira Alvarenga, who was also wounded, passed away months later. Their bodies, along with those of hundreds of others who died in the Revolution, are buried in the Ibirapuera Obelisk.
