A 21-gun salute marked the birth of Spain’s King Alfonso XIII, born with the hopes of dreams of a Spain returned to national importance on his shoulders. Following Spain’s humiliating loss of Cuba and the Philippines to the United States, a period of corruption settled over the country, with military generals essentially running their regions as fiefdoms. The hopes of Alfonso XIII leading the the country back to unison soon proved unfounded also, as he let his Captain General, Miguel Primo de Rivera, take over in coup, so that Alfonso could continue his playboy lifestyle.

On this day, September 14, in 1923, with the full cooperation of Alfonso XIII and the army, Primo took over as the dictator of Spain. His promised 90-day rule unsurprisingly extended into an indefinite one.

Primo clamped down on his detractors and kept in place many of the corrupt business practices of old Spain, but he did earnestly try to solve the problem of the country’s flailing economy. To reduce unemployment, he set up a series of public works projects, financed by the country’s first income tax. When that method of financing failed, he attempted to take out public loans, which led to rapid inflation and threw Primo from power by 1930.