When my dad fled Cuba for Spain in 1964, he left behind parents whom he never saw again: Agustín Guerra, an orphaned peasant who beat the odds to become a small tobacco farmer, and Aurora Almirall, a graduate of one of Cuba’s rigorous escuelas normalistas and a rural teacher who founded a one-room school in 1926.
Launched for a three-year run in 1962, “Basic Schools of Revolutionary Instruction” were designed to teach the principles of Marxist-Leninism to legions of Cuban workers who were enthusiastic supporters of Fidel Castro’s Revolution but knew next to nothing about Communism—including how or even why the government was supposed to own and plan the national economy. Hoping to boost productivity among all workers, officials relied on the EIBRs to develop cuadros (awkwardly translated from the Soviet word “cadre”).
Stamp collecting reached a zenith of popularity in Cuba and the United States about the same time: 1950s and 1960s. As Cuba’s revolutionary state adopted communism, government organizations charged with ideologically educating citizens heavily promoted the hobby as a methodical, non-lucrative and meditative way to broaden one’s consciousness.
Aprender a comer en cubano was literally the name of a daily, national public radio program sponsored in the 1940s by the first elected government of the Auténtico Party. Its leaders claimed to represent the “authentic” program of Cuba’s 1895 War for Independence. The least fulfilled goal of this war and the Republic it founded was the establishment of a prosperous small farmers’ economy.
On April 9, 1948, the assassination of Liberal Party presidential candidate and congressman Jorge Eliécer Gaitán provoked an incendiary riot in downtown Bogotá. Military and police repression combined with violent protests left over three thousand dead. Working as a photojournalist who had planned to cover an inter-American diplomatic congress, Eduardo “Guayo” Hernández witnessed and fearlessly documented these tragic events.
Unusual for its large size (5”x7”) and the rarity of its subject, this tin type was made in Trinidad de Cuba in the early 1870s. I acquired it from a man I caught selling national antiquities to tourists. When I stopped the sale by explaining to his buyers why such an image should be treasured by Cubans rather than purchased like a tourist trinket for display in France, he quickly demanded that I put my money where my mouth was.
Along with thousands of images of Cuba and Latin America, the Andrew St. George Collection also includes many intimate portraits of the photojournalist’s family from the early years of the Revolution when, together, they witnessed Cuba’s tumultuous transformation. No words can express the gratitude that all of us who study and love Cuba feel toward the donors of the Andrew St. George Collection. His sons and their families have entrusted priceless treasures of knowledge to the University of Florida. Thank you.
Probably written in 1978 when the Carter administration negotiated with the Castro regime to allow visits by Cuban exiles and US citizens for the first time, this fascinating report paints a portrait not unlike that of Cuba today.
Dated 1974, this letter from Cuban sugar baron Alfonso Fanjul to his cousin and fellow magnate George Braga reveals the tight connection between US foreign policy toward Cuba and the power of the United States’ wealthiest elite.
Read more "Sugar magnate (privately) endorses US-Cuba relations"
Throughout 1959, the revolutionary government headed by Fidel Castro and a cabinet of top revolutionaries who had fought the urban war against Batista was enormously popular.
This glass is a product of the massive tide of euphoria that engulfed popular culture and consciousness when Fidel Castro’s caravan triumphantly entered Havana on January 8, 1959, a week after the dictator Batista had fled.
Owner and director of the newspaper Prensa Libre, journalist Sergio Carbó completed this book, the first record of the atrocities perpetrated by President Gerardo Machado’s government against citizens, in late August 1933. It was published only two weeks after the dictator, his family and many military and police officials fled Cuba for sanctuary in Miami.
Read more "Machado: Crímenes y horrores de un regimen by Sergio Carbó (1933):"
In the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse, many of the most far-fetched examples of Fidel Castro’s “policy-making-by-whim” became both the stuff of legend and taboo.
Read more "Medal for building “tunnels of love” or war? Fidel’s autocracy in the 1980s"
Taken by Alberto Díaz, better known as “Korda”, and bearing the stamp of his studio, this photograph shows a 36-year-old Fidel Castro addressing adoring crowds in Moscow on his April 1963 tour of the Soviet Union. Although conspicuously absent from the stage that day,
Although most of us would probably not qualify these objects as “archival”, a historian sees in them the opportunity to document the struggles that Cubans face in an economy defined by austerity, scarcity and intense creativity.
This original copy of the play “Peasant Soul” (Alma Guajira) was published by the Cuban cigar company Gener in 1927.