In Cuba, like the Soviet Union, the practice of distributing small lapel pins as tokens of the state’s political appreciation became and remained fundamental. Individuals received such pins for participating in specific government campaigns to teach adult illiterates, plant tens of thousands of coffee bushes, cut sugar cane, mobilize for defense against a possible US invasion and the like. However, as this collection reflects, pins also set certain loyalists apart. Elected to the Communist Youth the year it was founded (1965) and elevated to the Communist Party in his twenties, the owner of this collection of medals discarded them all in a waste bin in 2006 because his sister in the United States had claimed him for “family reunification” and he needed to eliminate the evidence of his lifelong party militancy to qualify. From 1960 through the late 1990s, these medals document the highs and lows of the Cuban Revolution as well as a man’s role in it. The personal bodyguard of one of Fidel Castro’s sons for years, he enjoyed perks such as serving as a judge in a weight-lifting competition at the Pan-American Games (for which he had no qualifications), as well as trips to the Soviet Union. Today, this man lives in Miami and enjoys the benefits of permanent residency. Thanks to his son, the real story of his life as a Communist in Cuba survives in Special Collections at the University of Florida.
