KNOW THE MEMORY OF FRANCISCO ARISTEGUIETA URGOITI
Francisco Aristeguieta Urgoiti, Paco for his family, friends and students; He had the gift of transmitting knowledge while motivating in the search for sustainability between technological advancement, people and the environment.
On February 26, 1922 he was born in San Sebastián / Donostia, into a Basque family.
His life as a child and young man was spent in the streets of the Old Town of San Sebastian, playing football in the Plaza Guipúzcoa, enjoying meals at his grandparents’ house with his sister María del Carmen, accompanying his mother María Pilar to visit the relatives of Orio and Aia, or salsearing in his father Venancio’s shoe store on Elcano Street.
Happy childhood cut short by the Civil War of 1936, which forced his family to leave their txoko and go into exile in Bayonne (France). Exile is always difficult and that stage of her life was especially difficult.
His father had obtained safe passage to reach Marseille and there, father and son, the family separated in two as they had to leave the women behind, were able to embark on January 15, 1941 on an endless and dramatic journey that took them, in 465 days aboard the ship Alsina, to Argentine lands.
He would later write a book “My Notes on the Spanish Civil War”.
Upon arriving in Buenos Aires, Paquito worked in the “Cometa” bicycle factory, in an electrical installation store, in the shoe workshop that his father set up and in the “Companía de Construcciones Civiles” workshop, a maintenance workshop that was dedicated to public works.
In addition, he participated in organizations that were dedicated to holding events to help prisoners in Franco’s prisons and to raising funds and collecting clothing that was sent to the Bordeaux League of the Mutilated. Only in March 1947 did he return to France to take his mother and sister and reunite the family in Buenos Aires.
He studied “Electrical Technician”, created the “TAGA” cooperative, participated in the National Workers University created on August 19, 1948, and then in the formation of the National Technological University (UTN), a public university in Argentina, founded in 1959. He studied at said University and received a degree in “Telecommunications Engineer”.
In 1962, together with Victoriano Larrayoz, he set up the RADCO company, a pioneer in the development of printed circuits by stamping and speakers for radio and TV, in whose manufacture the entire family participated.
He taught at the Luis A. Huergo Institute, where for years he had his professorship in the “Electronics” department that he created, in addition to organizing a television studio.
In 1983 he settled in Madrid with his wife María Victoria Guijarro. He wrote the book “National Technological University (UTN), my participation”, wrote several CCC mail courses and created a course on “Electronics” for sale in installments.
He collaborated with his nephews Bittor and Mª Elena Larraioz in the beginnings of Larraioz Electrónica Industrial, marking the ethical lines of the company.
He got to know the place where FACT would later be built, the building that pays tribute to him. He died on January 24, 2010, leaving those of us who knew him the void of a great person, a role model who gave an example of honesty and righteousness.