As the patriarch and father of the Mirabal family, Don Enrique Mirabal (Papá) plays a complex role in the novel, shaping the sisters’ feelings about men, masculinity, and patriarchy. His first appearance telling fortunes in Chapter One portrays him as fun and jovial, particularly in comparison to Mamá’s religiosity. He even gladly gives away goods from the store to the campesinos in need, suggesting that he’s charitable and generous. However, even here we see a hint of what is to come. The implications in his fortune for then eight-year-old Mate bely the way he views the role of women in society. He predicts that her future consists of attracting many men. This hint of machismo proves prevalent in his character as the novel progresses. Papá doesn’t want to send his daughters to boarding school and does his best to keep Minerva from going to the university, attempting to control his girls and devaluing their education. Minerva strongly believes that one of the reasons he has an affair is to attempt to father a son who would carry on his name through the patriarchal line. When Minerva follows him to the yellow house, he attacks her, furious at having a daughter challenge his role in the family. Additionally, despite his generosity to the male campesinos, it is Minerva who invests in his illegitimate daughters’ well-being and education.
Papá’s role as patriarch of the house ties into the ways he refuses to challenge the Trujillo regime. Papá does not even put up resistance when Don Manuel, who notoriously procures young women for Trujillo, ushers Minerva up to Trujillo’s table at the Discovery Day dance. Although Dedé will later proclaim that Papá’s jail sentence, which results from the fallout at the dance, makes him a hero, the reality is that Papá is arrested not for his own resistance, but Minerva’s. While it’s possible to read fear and concern for his family in Papá’s lack of rebelliousness, another answer lies in the similarities between Papá and Trujillo. Although Papá does not agree with Trujillo's tactics, Trujillo, too, is a man who likes control of his household, is obsessed with legacy, and has a lecherous streak. These similarities reveal how machismo and patriarchy undergird and perpetuate dictatorship. If the head of the household may enact total control over his children, so may the head of the country.