|  Former Benidorm mayor, Pedro Zaragoza Orts (archive photo, January 1970), died yesterday of a heart attack at Benidorm's Levante Hospital aged 85.
Born on May 15th 1922, Zaragoza was the mayor of Benidorm between 1950 and 1967 and is attributed as the main catalyst for transforming the town from a small fishing of some 1,700 inhabitants into the country's leading touristic destination it is today.
He will also go down in history for lifting the bikini ban way back in 1952 in the face of massive opposition from the Catholic Church and hard-liners within the Franco administration.
To defend the policy he scootered all the way to Madrid on a Vespa to plead his case personally to Francisco Franco, a meeting that was the start of a long friendship that lasted until the fascist dictator's death in 1975. |
