Cuban Refugee Children
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Submitted into the public record in connection with item PZ.10 on 07/25/13 Todd B. Hannon 379 City Clerk CUBAN REFUGEE CHILDREN MONSIGNOR BRYAN O. WALSH Episcopal Vicar for Spanish-Speaking Peoples see them again; amI they were as aliens into a new adult world where Catholic Archdiocese of Miami almost everything would be strange and new, including the language. Although Sixto and his sister did not know it, they were the first of a long line of youths who would make this same trip during the following twenty- three months. Waiting for them at the desk of U. S. Immigration was a social work er, Mrs. Louise Cooper, from Miami's Catholic Welfare Bureau. The before, in response to a message from Cuba, Mrs. Cooper and I, as Catholic Welfare Bureau Executive Director, had begun what was to become a daily vigil at the immigration desk. Thus it was on Christmas Day 1960 that the program of the Catholic Welfare Bureau for the care and protection of unaccompanied Cuban children in the United States actually got under way. News reporters, sworn to secrecy, would christen it Operation Pedro CUBAN REFUGEE CHILDREN* Pan. Before it ended it would involve thousands of families, Cuban and American, several foreign governments, numerous officials of federal and state government, well over 100 child welfare agencies, and the three major uring the past twelve years almost half a million Cubans have faiths in a unique effort of cooperation to help children, the innocent vic sought refuge in Miami. Among them were over 14,000 unac tims of power politics and clashing ideologies. Even though Operation D companied children between 6 and 18 years of age. This article Pedro Pan itself would only last less than two years, the Cuban Children's tells for the first time the story of how the children's exodus began. Itcovers Program would go on for many years and would have a very real influence the period between the middle of November 1960, when we first became on the development of cooperative programs between government and aware of the need, and 1 February 1961, when I met with the Secretary of voluntary child welfare agencies in the United States. the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare to brief hlm on the Itis important to understand the difference between Operation Pedro of the unaccompanied children among the Two days later, Pan and the Cuban Children's Program. The Cuban Children's Program President announced a government aid program for Cuban refu was inaugurated to provide foster care for Cuban refugee children who gees which included money for the care of unaccompanied children, "the found themselves in the United States without the care and protection of most troubled group among the refugee population." 1 their parents. Operation Pedro Pan was developed to help Cuban parents About 4:30 p.m. on 26 December 1960, Pan American World Air send their children unaccompanied to the United States to avoid Commu ways Flight 422 from Havana touched down at Miami International Air nist indoctrination. Both programs developed at the same time but, while port. There were few passengers, if any, on that flight who did not experi Operation Pedro Pan terminated with the missile crisis, the Cuban Chil ence a real sense of relief as they descended from the airplane. Events in dren's Program is still in operation at the time of writing. Between the 3 Cuba were rapidly moving toward a climax and those who couId were January 1961 break in Cuban-U.S. diplomatic relations and the October joining the increasing exodus to Miami. Two teen-agers, a Cuban brother 1962 missile crisis, 14,048 Cuban students were helped by Operation and sister, were among the passengers. Sixto Aquino and his sister, Vivian, Pedro Pan to enter the United States; 6,486 of them received foster care in must have shared in the general relief, but they still had reason to be appre the Cuban Children's Program either on their arrival or shortly thereafter. hensive. No friends or relatives waited for them outside the doors of U.S. Cuban refugees had begun to arrive in Miami on 1 January 1959, the Customs. They had left their parents behind not knowing when they would morning after the fall of Batista. During the fonowing year some Cubans had taken refuge in Miami. Most of them had either been associ * This article is taken from the introductory portion of the author's comprehen ated with the previous government or were of the upper class who felt sive study of Cuban refugee children in the United States, now in progress. York Times, 4 February 1961. "Cuban Refugees," p. 1. threatened by the new regime. However, the increasing radicalization of 378 12- 005'0.:3_ ~bn'7t'fIa/ ... Cub (1cf~c:e: Ch;(df'cn Rr'fiC/e. Submitted into the public record in connection with item PZ.10 on 07/25/13 CUBAN REFUGEE CHILDREN Todd B. Hannon 380 JOURNAL OF INTER-AMERICAN STUDIES AND WORLD AFFAIRS 381 City Clerk the Cuban situation during the summer and autumn of 1960 caused more who have learned of the program. To this question there are no simple and more Cubans of all classes to look toward Miami. The lines of visa answers and perhaps no one answer which covers all situations and cir applicants outside the U.s. Embassy in Havana lengthened in proportion cumstances. This Cuban phenomenon was not, however, unique or as the crisis grew more serious. By October, Cuban refugees were recog unprecedented. nizable on the streets of Miami. The local community and state and federal In modern times many children have been separated from their par authorities were being alerted to their plight by concerned people such as ents and have found themselves in foreign lands and among strange people Miami's Bishop (now Archbishop) Coleman F. Carroll. who differed from them in culture and often in language. The nineteen It is now calculated that there were 12,000 refugees in Miami in De thirties saw Jewish children smuggled out of Nazi Germany and cared for cember 1961, although estimates at that time placed the figure two to in foster homes in England and other countries. A number were later three times higher. Until the missile crisis forced the end of commercial brought to the United States. The Spanish Civil War caused the evacuation 2 air traffic between Havana and Miami, almost 200 new refugees arrived of thousands of children from Spain. Basque children were taken to Bel each day. gium, France, and England and cared for in special camps and schools. During this same period thousands more arrived by small boat across Children-5,000 it is said-were sent to Russia as the Republican govern the treacherous Straits of Florida and through such third countries as ment went down to defeat. In 1937 a ship sailed from Barcelona to Mexico Spain, Jamaica, and Mexico. After the missile crisis in October 1962, these with some 460 children accompanied by a number of their teachers.!) In were the only routes available for three years until President Johnson in 1940 during the Battle of Britain approximately 1,000 British children augurated the Varadero Freedom Flights in December 1965, The refugee were sent to the United States for safety:4. With the end of World War II, exodus then entered a new phase with the emphasis on the reunification of and in the years following, some 5,000 war orphans were brought from families. During the first months of these flights the majority of children Europe to new homes in the United States. separated from their parents in 1961-1962 were reunited with them in But the Spanish experience was the most important for Cuban par exile. By January 1971, it is estimated that there were 261,000 Cubans ents. Cuba had always been close to Spain. It was the last of the Spanish living in Miami and almost as many throughout the country. American colonies to gain independence. The large Spanish migration to This paper is concerned with how it all began and the first five weeks the island since independence had kept its ties to the motherland close and of our two programs. By the end of this time the Catholic Welfare Bureau strong. As Castro and his leading followers made statement after state had built up the basic organization that was necessary to administer both ment, each more radical than the one before, concerning the education of programs and, with this, came much more adequate record-keeping. The the young generation, the fear of the parents mounted. It is my conviction story of the following years is well documented in Catholic Welfare Bureau that, as the threat of communism grew, Cuban parents were greatly in s files and its extraction presents a very different type of challenge. In the fluenced by the memory of the Spanish Civil War. They recalled the beginning, however, as in every new operation, there was little tjme or op 2 "The first refugees (from Bilbao) to be evacuated were children, to be par portunity for record-keeping in the formal sense. This paper, therefore, is celled out among those who agreed to look after them. The CGT in France agreed to take 2.300 and the Soviet Government undertook the care of Communist children. the result of careful gathering of data from correspondence, minutes of A Ba.~qu'e children's relief committee in England, Sllpported by the British branch meetings, and appointment books.