Time Traveling Table

Before we begin, I have a little assignment for you.

One of the best ways to understand history is to watch it. Thankfully, a few home movies from the late 1940s have survived, giving us a chance to see the people, places, and everyday moments that photographs can’t quite capture, they offer a wonderful glimpse into the Mexico that was emerging during the 1940s.

Choose your own adventure… or watch both if you’re feeling ambitious.

Rural Mexico

This amateur home movie follows American travelers as they journey south from the Texas border toward Mexico City along the Pan American Highway. You’ll pass through villages, markets, and small towns that would have looked very familiar to many Mexicans living in the early 1940s.

One little heads up before you press play. It was filmed by tourists, and you can tell. There are a few moments where the camera lingers on people who look more uncomfortable than excited to be on film. It made me cringe a bit and made me wonder what was going through their heads. Just remember you’re seeing Mexico through the eyes of visitors passing through.

Watch the film here: OLD MEXICO

Mexico City

If you’re more interested in city life, this home movie explores Mexico City during the same era. It includes visits to the home of Diego Rivera, the floating gardens of Xochimilco, bustling city streets, and even a bullfight. It’s a fascinating look at the country’s rapidly growing capital and the more modern side of life in the 1940s.

Watch Mexico City: Exploring Mexico City

As you watch either film, pay attention to the little details. Notice the homes, the clothing, the buses and automobiles, the market stalls, and the way people move through their day. By the time you’ve finished this article, you’ll recognize many of those scenes in a completely new way.

So let’s get into it. Thirty years doesn’t sound like much. Many people who sat down to dinner in 1910 were still alive in 1940. Yet in those three decades Mexico experienced revolution, land reform, growing cities, new technologies, and a reimagining of national identity. So what actually changed in everyday life?”

Home Life: 1910 vs 1940

If you walked into a typical Mexican home in 1910, much of daily life would feel familiar to someone living a century earlier. In rural communities, houses were often built from adobe, stone, wood, or woven materials gathered from the local landscape. Floors might be packed earth. Light came from candles, oil lamps, or the glow of the cooking fire. Water was carried from wells, springs, rivers, or communal fountains. The home was not just a place to sleep. It was a workspace, a kitchen, a gathering place, and often the center of family life.

By 1940, the picture had begun to shift, especially in Mexico’s growing cities. New neighborhoods appeared around factories, rail lines, and commercial districts. More urban households had access to electricity, allowing families to stay awake later, read after sunset, or gather around a radio in the evening. Indoor plumbing remained far from universal, but running water was becoming more common in cities and larger towns. For many families, the simple act of turning a faucet or flipping a light switch represented a remarkable change from the routines their parents had known.

Inside the home, daily tasks were slowly becoming less labor intensive. Many families still cooked on wood or charcoal stoves, washed clothes by hand, and slept in crowded multi generational households. Yet manufactured goods were becoming easier to obtain. Enamel cookware, factory produced textiles, sewing machines, clocks, and radios increasingly found their way into urban homes. The divide between city and countryside remained striking. While some city residents were embracing new technologies, many rural families continued to live in ways that would have felt familiar decades earlier.

For many rural families, life still revolved around the same courtyard, same cooking fire, and same fields. But for urban families, modern conveniences were becoming part of daily life.

Food & Cooking: What Stayed the Same?

Of all the changes that swept across Mexico between 1910 and 1940, food may have been the most stubbornly consistent. A family sitting down to eat in 1940 would have recognized many of the same flavors their grandparents enjoyed before the Revolution. Tortillas remained the heart of the table. Frijoles provided affordable, dependable nourishment. Chile brought heat, depth, and character to nearly every meal. Squash, tomatoes, nopales, herbs, and whatever fruits or vegetables were in season continued to shape everyday cooking.

In rural communities, many families still grew at least part of their own food. The milpa remained a living system where maize, beans, and squash supported one another just as they had for generations. Chickens scratched through courtyards. Fruit trees shaded homes. Markets offered local produce harvested only hours before. Daily meals were deeply tied to the landscape and the agricultural calendar. A family in rural Oaxaca, Yucatán, or Jalisco might prepare food very differently, yet all would recognize the importance of maize as the foundation of life.

What changed was not so much the food itself, but how people obtained it. Growing cities created larger urban markets filled with ingredients arriving by rail and truck from distant regions. Commercial bakeries became increasingly common, making bolillos and sweet breads easier to purchase than to bake at home. Canned goods began appearing on store shelves, particularly in urban areas. Imported products such as condensed milk, canned fish, coffee from abroad, and packaged foods slowly entered the diets of middle class families. These items rarely replaced traditional foods, but they expanded the options available to those with money to spend.

Yet despite new products and modern distribution networks, the core of the Mexican table remained remarkably unchanged. A worker in 1940 might listen to the radio while eating dinner instead of hearing only conversation around the hearth, but there was a good chance that dinner still included tortillas, frijoles, chile, and whatever the season had provided. Some things, pues, are simply too woven into the fabric of daily life to disappear.

That continuity is one of the most remarkable parts of Mexican food history. Revolutions came and went, cities expanded, and technology transformed daily routines. Yet the flavors that nourished families in 1910 still filled kitchens across the country in 1940.

Experience the Day Through Food

Plan 1: A Day on the Table in 1940 Mexico

If you had spent an ordinary day in Mexico around 1940, your meals would have looked something like this. This menu is built from foods that were widely enjoyed during the era, using ingredients and preparations that would have felt familiar to families across much of the country. Pull up a chair and enjoy a taste of everyday life.

Desayuno (Breakfast)

• Huevos Rancheros: Fresh corn tortillas topped with vibrant ranchera salsa, fried eggs, and a side of frijoles for a hearty start to the day.
• Champurrado: A comforting blend of masa, Mexican chocolate, cinnamon, piloncillo, and milk, served warm.

Almuerzo (Midmorning Snack)

• Warm Roasted Peanuts: Freshly roasted peanuts, just as you might have purchased from a street vendor in a paper cone.
• Café de Olla: Coffee gently simmered with piloncillo and cinnamon for a rich, aromatic cup.

Comida (Main Meal)

• Sopa de Fideo: Toasted vermicelli noodles simmered in a savory tomato broth with onion and garlic.
• Chicken Flautas: Crisp fried corn tortillas filled with tender shredded chicken.
• Served with:
  • Frijoles de la Olla: Slow cooked pinto beans in a flavorful broth.
  • Crema: Rich Mexican cream for a cooling contrast.
  • Queso Fresco: Mild, crumbly fresh cheese.
  • Shredded Lettuce: A crisp finishing touch.
  • Pico de Gallo: Fresh tomato, onion, chile, and cilantro.
• Agua de Jamaica: A refreshing hibiscus drink with a delicate balance of tartness and sweetness.

Merienda (Evening Treat)

• Fresh Pan Dulce: A concha or another sweet yeast bread picked up from the neighborhood panadería that same day.
• Warm Milk with Cinnamon: Steamed milk gently infused with cinnamon for a simple, comforting end to the evening.

Plan 2: A Modern Taste of 1940

Love the flavors of 1940 but prefer a menu with a modern twist? This version keeps the same spirit and core ingredients while giving each dish a contemporary restaurant style makeover. Think of it as history with a fresh coat of paint.

Breakfast

• Huevos Rancheros Tostada Stack: Crisp blue corn tostadas layered with smoky black bean purée, fire roasted ranchera salsa, avocado crema, queso fresco, and jammy eggs.
• Smoked Chocolate Champurrado Latte: Mexican chocolate, cinnamon, piloncillo, and espresso folded into a silky champurrado inspired latte.

Snack

• Piloncillo and Ancho Chile Candied Peanuts: Warm roasted peanuts coated in piloncillo, ancho chile, cinnamon, and flaky sea salt.
• Nitro Café de Olla: Cold brewed coffee infused with piloncillo, cinnamon, and a hint of orange peel.

Dinner

• Roasted Tomato Fideo Broth: A refined interpretation of sopa de fideo featuring toasted noodles in an intensely flavored fire roasted tomato consommé.
• Chicken Flautas de la Casa: Hand rolled corn flautas filled with citrus braised chicken and fried until perfectly crisp.
• Served with:
  • Charred Black Bean Purée: Silky beans with deep roasted flavor.
  • Avocado Crema: Smooth, creamy, and lightly tangy.
  • Cotija Cheese: Salty, aged cheese for a savory finish.
  • Pickled Red Onions: Bright acidity to balance the richness.
  • Heirloom Pico de Gallo: Fresh tomatoes, onion, chile, and herbs.
  • Shaved Lettuce: Delicate crunch in every bite.
• Sparkling Jamaica Lime Refresco: Hibiscus, lime, mineral water, and piloncillo syrup served over ice.

Dessert

• Concha Bread Pudding: Buttery concha baked into a vanilla cinnamon custard with toasted pecans and a light caramel glaze.
• Cinnamon Milk Steamer: Warm milk infused with cinnamon, vanilla, and piloncillo.

Travel & Communication

In 1910, news often arrived at the speed of a horse. By 1940, it could arrive through a radio speaker sitting in your living room.

That single change captures just how dramatically Mexico’s sense of distance had transformed in only thirty years. In 1910, many people rarely traveled far from the communities where they were born. Horses, mules, carts, and railways carried people and goods across the country, but travel remained slow and often expensive. A letter could take days or even weeks to reach its destination. For many rural families, the outside world arrived through travelers, merchants, newspapers, or word of mouth.

By 1940, Mexico was becoming far more connected. New roads linked towns that had once been difficult to reach. Buses carried workers, students, and families between communities with increasing regularity. Automobiles remained a luxury for most households, but they were becoming a more familiar sight in cities and along major transportation routes. The railroad was still important, yet it was no longer the only thread binding the country together.

The most revolutionary change may have been the radio. Suddenly, a family in a small town could hear the same music, news, speeches, and advertisements as someone living hundreds of kilometers away in Mexico City. Regional cultures remained strong, but people were also beginning to share a national conversation. Popular songs spread more quickly. News traveled faster. National events felt closer and more immediate than they had a generation earlier.

Of course, these changes did not reach everyone equally. In remote villages, daily life still moved at a slower pace, and some communities remained relatively isolated. Yet even there, the walls of distance were beginning to crack. Mexico was becoming a country connected not only by roads and railways, but by voices carried through the air itself.

That growing connectedness helped reshape how Mexicans understood their place in the nation. A person could still spend their life rooted in a single village, compa, but they were increasingly aware of a much larger world beyond it.

Childhood: Growing Up in a Changing Mexico

A child born in 1910 entered a Mexico very different from the one a child experienced in 1940. In the early twentieth century, many children, especially in rural areas, spent much of their day contributing to the household economy. They carried water, gathered firewood, tended animals, watched younger siblings, worked in fields, or helped with family businesses. Childhood and adulthood were not always separated by the long period of schooling that many people expect today. From an early age, children were expected to become useful members of the household.

Education was one of the areas that changed most dramatically during these thirty years. In 1910, literacy rates were low, particularly in rural communities and among Indigenous populations who had long been neglected by government institutions. After the Revolution, expanding public education became a national priority. New schools appeared in villages and towns across the country. By 1940, more children were attending school than their parents ever had, and reading and writing were becoming increasingly important skills for everyday life.

Even so, school did not replace work. Many children still balanced lessons with chores and agricultural labor. A boy might spend the morning in a classroom and the afternoon helping plant maize. A girl might practice reading before returning home to help prepare food, wash clothing, or care for younger siblings. Expectations remained deeply tied to family responsibility, but education was opening doors that had previously been closed to many ordinary Mexicans.

Not everything changed. Children still found ways to play. They chased one another through plazas and dusty streets, played marbles, flew homemade kites, climbed trees, and invented games with whatever materials they could find. Toys were often handmade, shared among siblings, or passed down through generations. Entertainment came from imagination, neighborhood friendships, and community celebrations rather than purchased products.

Perhaps the biggest difference was what adults hoped a child’s future might hold. In 1910, many children expected to live lives very similar to their parents. By 1940, growing cities, expanding schools, and new economic opportunities meant that more young people could imagine different paths ahead. The future still carried plenty of uncertainty, but it also carried possibilities that had been far less common just one generation earlier.

That shift in expectation may have been one of the Revolution’s most lasting legacies. A child in 1940 still belonged to their family, their village, and their community. But increasingly, they also belonged to a nation that was investing in their future.

Work: From Haciendas to Factories

If there is one area where daily life changed most dramatically between 1910 and 1940, it was work. In 1910, Mexico was still overwhelmingly rural. Millions of people earned their living through agriculture, often on vast haciendas that dominated the countryside. These enormous estates could stretch across thousands of hectares, shaping nearly every aspect of local life. Many laborers spent their entire lives working the same land their parents and grandparents had worked before them. Opportunities for advancement were limited, and economic power was concentrated in the hands of a relatively small elite.

The Revolution challenged that system. One of its most significant outcomes was land reform, which redistributed portions of large estates into ejidos, communal lands that could be worked by local communities. The process was uneven and far from perfect, but it fundamentally altered the relationship many rural families had with the land. Instead of laboring exclusively for a hacendado, some farmers gained access to land that could support their own households and communities.

At the same time, Mexico’s cities were expanding. Factories produced textiles, food products, cement, steel, and manufactured goods for a growing domestic market. Railways, government offices, schools, and public works projects created jobs that scarcely existed for ordinary people a generation earlier. Young men and women increasingly left villages in search of opportunities in urban centers, trading agricultural labor for wages earned in workshops, offices, stores, and factories.

This did not mean the countryside disappeared. In 1940, most Mexicans still lived close to the land, and agriculture remained the backbone of the economy. A farmer rising before dawn to tend maize would have recognized much of the daily rhythm his grandparents knew. Yet more people now had choices. A child growing up in a rural village could imagine becoming a teacher, a clerk, a factory worker, or a government employee in ways that would have been far less common in 1910.

The transformation was not simply economic. It reshaped how people understood their future. For generations, work had often been something inherited. By 1940, for a growing number of Mexicans, it was becoming something they could choose.

That possibility, however limited, marked one of the most profound changes in everyday life between the Revolution and the modern Mexico that was beginning to emerge.

Entertainment: From the Plaza to the Silver Screen

After a long day of work in 1910, entertainment was usually something experienced together. Families gathered in plazas, attended church festivals, listened to local musicians, watched traveling performers, or participated in community celebrations. Music was everywhere, but it was often something you heard live. A guitarist playing in the town square, a village band during a fiesta, or relatives singing at a family gathering provided the soundtrack of daily life. Entertainment was deeply local and rooted in face to face community.

By 1940, those traditions were still alive, but new forms of entertainment were transforming how people spent their free time. Radios brought music, comedy programs, sports, and national news directly into people’s homes. Popular singers could now be heard across the country, allowing a song recorded in one city to become familiar hundreds of kilometers away. For the first time, millions of Mexicans were sharing the same voices, melodies, and cultural moments.

Cinema may have been even more exciting. The 1930s and 1940s marked the beginning of Mexico’s Golden Age of film. Movie theaters became gathering places where audiences could watch rancheras, comedies, dramas, and romantic stories brought to life on the screen. Stars became household names. People copied fashions, songs, and expressions from their favorite actors. For many families, a trip to the cinema felt modern, glamorous, and full of possibility.

Yet the plaza never disappeared. Children still played in public squares. Families still attended fiestas patronales. Musicians still filled streets with song. The difference was that entertainment no longer came only from the people living around you. Increasingly, it arrived through speakers, film projectors, and recordings carried across the country.

In just one generation, Mexico’s entertainment expanded from the reach of a village to the reach of a nation. The local traditions remained strong, but now they shared the stage with a growing national culture that connected people from Sonora to Yucatán through the same songs, stories, and stars.

Identity: Redefining What It Meant to Be Mexican

Some of the most important changes between 1910 and 1940 could not be measured in kilometers of railroad track or the number of radios in a city. They happened in the way Mexicans thought about themselves.

Before the Revolution, wealth, political power, and social prestige were often tied to European fashions and customs. Many Indigenous traditions were dismissed or treated as relics of the past rather than living parts of the nation. After the Revolution, a different vision began to emerge. Artists, teachers, writers, and politicians increasingly argued that Mexico’s strength came from its own history, its own people, and its extraordinary cultural diversity.

This period saw a growing celebration of Indigenous heritage, folk traditions, regional music, local crafts, and traditional foods. Massive murals painted on public buildings told stories of workers, farmers, revolutionaries, and Indigenous communities. Schools taught a shared national history. Musicians popularized songs rooted in regional traditions. Dishes that had long been considered everyday peasant foods became symbols of national pride.

Of course, reality was more complicated than the ideal. Indigenous communities still faced discrimination, poverty, and unequal treatment. Yet there was a noticeable shift in the national conversation. More Mexicans were beginning to see Indigenous and mestizo cultures not as obstacles to progress, but as essential parts of the country’s identity.

A person from 1910 would have recognized the foods, languages, and traditions around them. What might have surprised them was seeing those same traditions increasingly celebrated as symbols of Mexico itself.

That cultural confidence helped shape the modern nation. The Mexico of 1940 was not trying to become another country. It was learning to embrace what made it uniquely Mexican.

A person from 1910 would have recognized the smell of tortillas cooking on a comal, the sound of church bells, and the importance of family. But they would also have encountered radios, growing cities, public schools, and a country that was beginning to see itself differently. Mexico in 1940 was not a new nation. It was an old nation learning how to become modern without forgetting who it was.