During his many years at the command of Cuba’s government (1934-1944, 1952-1958), General Fulgencio Batista regularly expressed that his greatest admiration for the United States was embodied in its paramount liberator, President Abraham Lincoln. Obviously, for anyone familiar with Lincoln’s life, legacies or even the simple fact of his commitment to constitutionalism and elections, the ironies of Batista’s claim abound. Yet Batista was said to have kept multiple busts of Lincoln on display at Kuquine, his vast personal estate on the outskirts of Havana. He also might have kept this marble bust of Lincoln in his presidential office or, where it now resides, just outside in the hallway. The curators of today’s Museum of the Revolution do not say. One reason may have to do with the fact that, like Batista, Fidel Castro also made similar declarations, often citing Lincoln during his struggle against Batista in the 1950s or as a Communist ruler a decade later when he still credited Lincoln with inspiring his own efforts to “unify” and “liberate” Cuba. Museum of the Revolution (former Presidential Palace), Havana, 2016.
