But unlike Burke, who observed the happenings in France from the safety of England, Buckley was a participant in the drama that unfolded in Mexico, where he had moved in 1908.
This is the subject of “William F. Buckley Sr.: Witness to the Mexican Revolution, 1908-1922,” a fascinating if uneven book by the independent historian John A. Adams Jr.
Considering the Buckley family’s indelible association with New York City and its leafy environs, it may come as a surprise that Buckley père was raised in South Texas, where he was born in 1881.
Will and his siblings grew up poor, “blessed with neither electricity, gas, telephone, running water, nor refrigeration,” as one of the children later recalled.
But they were bilingual, perhaps of necessity, given that 90% of the 2,000 residents of San Diego, Texas, their hometown, were of Mexican descent.