Rivera Biography: Rivera's Houseguest: Leon Trotsky

Leon Trotsky was a Bolshevik revolutionary and Marxist theorist. He was one of the three leaders of the Russian October Revolution, second only to Lenin and above Stalin. When Lenin was assassinated in 1924, his death left Trotsky and Stalin vying for his vacant top power position. Stalin, being the bigger brute between the two, maneuvered himself into running the show and Trotsky ended up running for his life. He ran straight to Mexico into Diego's big welcoming arms. When the dust had settled, the idealist, Rivera, was on the side of the Marxist Trotskyites and stood against Stalin. On January 9, 1937, Leon and his wife, settled into Frida's family home that her father had built in Coyoacan. Diego turned the house into a small fortress with armed guards to assure their safety while in Mexico.

In the beginning the two families spent much time together socializing. Eventually, Diego and Leon's differing opinions on what constituted a good Marxist split them apart. Leon told Diego he was too much of an anarchist to be a true Marxist. Diego should have told Leon he was too much of a traitor to be a true friend. Would seem the ungracious Leon had a torrid love affaire with Frida while he and his wife were the Rivera's houseguests.

On May 24, 1940, Communists fired thousands of rounds into the house but failed to kill Trotsky. On August 21, 1940, a single hard-core Stalinist drove an ice pick into his neck, killing him instantly. After the first attack, Rivera was in fear for his own life so he went to the American Embassy to ask for help. It seems Diego had been an informant to the U.S. State Department, a fact not uncovered until the 1990's. He got an immediate border crossing, and arrived in San Francisco in June 1940, in the company of the famous movie star, Paulette Goddard. For six months, Diego painted a live mural on Treasure Island as a showman in front of an audience. He was visited by Frida in September, on her way to New York with a lover half her age. A short while later, she returned to San Francisco to remarry Diego on December 8, his 54th birthday. When they returned to Mexico, he moved into the Blue House in Coyoacan with Frida.

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