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Internationally, though, the plaza gained fame for some of its smallest gatherings ever. From the late 1970s, the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo marched silently around the Pirámide de Mayo, the plaza’s small central obelisk, every Thursday afternoon to demand the return of their adult children kidnapped by the armed forces and paramilitary gangs. Most of the disappeared died at their captors’ hands, but the mothers brought Argentina’s shame to world attention.

Ironically enough, emotional throngs cheered the dictatorship here following the April 1982 occupation of the British-ruled Falkland Islands. As the war went badly, though, crowds turned on the de facto regime, whose collapse brought a return to constitutional government.

Most recently, following the December 2001 economic meltdown, the Plaza de Mayo witnessed major protests and a police riot that killed several demonstrators and forced President Fernando de la Rúa’s resignation. Other demonstrators included leftist groups who deplored the “model” ostensibly imposed by international lending agencies, and bank depositors outraged at banking restrictions that effectively confiscated their savings.

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