Culture and History

Christopher Columbus was the first European explorer to encounter Costa Rica. September 18, 1502, and Columbus was making his fourth and final voyage to the New World. Later, the golden bands that the region's inhabitants wore in their noses and ears would inspire the Spaniard Gil Gonzalez Davila to name the country Costa Rica (Rich Coast)

When Columbus arrived to Costa Rica, there were four major indigenous tribes living in Costa Rica. Caribs were in the east coast, while the Borucas, Diquis and Chibchas were in the southwest. Regrettably, only 1 percent of Costa's Rica's 3 million people are of indigenous heritage. Close 98% of the people in Costa Rica is white, and those of Spanish descent call themselves Ticos.

Military rule has reared its head in Costa Rica from time to time, though it has not been marked by the sort of violent extremism that has occurred elsewhere in Central America. In 1870, when General Tomas Guardia seized control of the government, he made some of the country's most progressive reforms in education, military policy, and tax laws.

Costa Rican civil War erupted in 1948, after incumbent Dr. Rafael Angel Calderon and the United Social Christian Party refused to quit power after losing the presidential election. An exile named Jose Maria Figueres Ferrer defeat Calderon in about a month, and he later became in one of Costa Rica's most influential leaders ever, as leader of the Founding Junta of the Second Republic of Costa Rica.