Manuel Z. Camacho, an indigenous Aymaran Seventh-day Adventist who pioneered education for indigenous peoples in the Puno, Peru region more than 100 years ago, was honored recently by regional government officials.

The Lake Titicaca Adventist Mission accepted the recognition in memory of Camacho and pioneer Adventist missionaries to Peru, Fernando and Ana Stahl.  Members from local institutions, businesses and government attended the ceremony that recognized outstanding persons.

Camacho revolutionized the culture of residents in the Peruvian mountains by starting schools for the Aymara and Quecha Indians as early as 1898.  A large percentage of this indigenous group was kept illiterate by the elite ruling class, according to a December 1990 issue of Spectrum, an independent Adventist journal. Because Camacho felt that learning to read would give natives more political clout, he secretly taught classes and then openly faced threats, beatings and imprisonment.

He and the Stahls started the first official Adventist school in Peru, in 1913, according to the article which reads, “the Adventist educational system came to entirely encircle Lake Titicaca and include as many as 200 schools. By 1947 nearly 7,000 students were in 109 schools.”