+Granollers was born and has grown around a crossroads. This location in a “place along the way” has become a feature that defines the character of the city with a market that was documented as early as the 11th century. La Porxada, which was a grain market in the past, built at the end of the 16th century, pays witness to its commercial importance and has, at the same time, become the symbol of this open town.
New forms of communication, such as the new layout of the Barcelona-Vic road in 1848 and the arrival of the 2 railway lines (1854 and 1876) led to the transformation of the economic activity of the city from the last 30 years of the 19th century. Industry, particularly textile and metallurgy, started to take on considerable significance and changed the physiognomy of the city.
The urban, demographic and economic growth which started in the latter years of the 19th century continued during the first 30 years of the 20th century. In 1920, just over nine thousand people lived in Granollers. In 1930, the city had 12,699 inhabitants and in 1936, the population had grown to 14,381 inhabitants, a figure which increased during the war due to the presence of a significant number of refugees and evacuees.
Granollers was a city with a very dynamic social and cultural life. The significant number of people who belonged to associations in Granollers were organised around the Catholic Centre, La Unió Liberal and El Casino. This dynamic was helped by the large number of existing local publications, which came into being at the end of the 19th century.
During the Second Republic, the city underwent the social and political process of change that was produced throughout the country. Changes in the names of the roads and squares and a decided attempt to make collective life secular were the first proposals that required fast, visible changes.
The Events of October 1934 were experienced with particular virulence. In addition to the initial events of the 6th, the resistance in Granollers lasted until two days later. The army occupied the city until the 17th. Some eighty people in the region were arrested, thirty-five of whom were from Granollers. The country was subjected to a state of war until April 1935.
Between the end of 1934 and February 1936, there were times of political and social control. With the triumph of the left-wing parties in the February elections of 1936, a reform process that had been started by the Republican Government was started again, which had a radical response from the right-wing sectors.
Everything went to pieces in July 1936. The military rising against the Republic meant a new change in the life of the city. The spiral of violence stained Granollers with blood and fire and the revolutionary 1936-1939 conflict radically transformed the life of the people of Granollers.
The revolutionary changes, the mobilisations, the collectivisations, the arrival of refugees, the difficulties in finding food supplies, the need for new housing, the damages produced to property by the bombing and, above all, the human cost of the war were the most important features of this period.
