Matanzas (Cuban Spanish pronunciation:[maˈtansas]; Lucumi: Ayá Áta) is the capital of the Cuban province of Matanzas. Known for its poets, culture, and Afro-Cuban folklore, it is located on the northern shore of the island of Cuba, on the Bay of Matanzas (Spanish Bahia de Matanzas), 90 kilometres (56 mi) east of the capital Havana and 32 kilometres (20 mi) west of the resort town of Varadero.
Matanzas is called the City of Bridges, for the seventeen bridges that cross the three rivers that traverse the city (Rio Yumuri, San Juan, and Canimar). For this reason it was referred to as the "Venice of Cuba." It was also called "La Atenas de Cuba" ("The Athens of Cuba") for its poets. (Full article...)
Image 15A 1736 colonial map by Herman Moll of the West Indies and Mexico, together comprising "New Spain", with Cuba visible in the center. (from History of Cuba)
Image 16Cuban victims of Spanish reconcentration policies (from History of Cuba)
Image 24Rebel leaders engaged in extensive propaganda to get the U.S. to intervene, as shown in this cartoon in an American magazine. Columbia (the American people) reaches out to help oppressed Cuba in 1897 while Uncle Sam (the U.S. government) is blind to the crisis and will not use its powerful guns to help. Judge magazine, 6 February 1897. (from History of Cuba)
... that José Ramón Balaguer fought as a soldier-medic for Fidel Castro's rebel army before becoming Cuba's minister of public health?
... that after his release from a hospital for the criminally insane, Richard Dixon burgled $16 from a credit union and hijacked a jet to Cuba?
... that after his movement's victory in the Cuban Revolution, television broadcasts showed Camilo Cienfuegos freeing parrots from birdcages, declaring that the birds had "a right to liberty"?
... that Brooklyn Nine-Nine actress Melissa Fumero is the daughter of Cubans who fled to the U.S. as teenagers?
The 1910 Cuba hurricane, popularly known as the Cyclone of the Five Days, was an unusual and destructive tropical cyclone that struck Cuba and the United States in October 1910. It formed in the southern Caribbean on October 9 and strengthened as it moved northwestward, becoming a hurricane on October 12. After crossing the western tip of Cuba, it peaked in intensity on October 16, corresponding to Category 4 on the Saffir–Simpson hurricane scale. That same day, the hurricane moved in a counterclockwise loop and hit Cuba again. It then tracked toward Florida, landing near Cape Romano. After moving through the state, it hugged the coast of the Southeastern United States on its way out to sea.
Due to its unusual loop, initial reports suggested it was two separate storms that developed and hit land in rapid succession. Its track was subject to much debate at the time; eventually, it was identified as a single storm. Analysis of the event gave a greater understanding of weather systems that took similar paths. (Full article...)
Federico Arístides Soto Alejo (June 30, 1930 – February 4, 2008), better known as Tata Güines, was a Cuban percussionist, bandleader and arranger. He was widely regarded as a master of the conga drum, and alongside Carlos "Patato" Valdés, influential in the development of contemporary Afro-Cuban music, including Afro-Cuban jazz. He specialized in a form of improvisation known as descarga, a format in which he recorded numerous albums throughout the years with Cachao, Frank Emilio Flynn, Estrellas de Areito, Alfredo Rodríguez and Jane Bunnett, among others. In the 1990s he released two critically acclaimed albums as a leader: Pasaporte and Aniversario. His composition "Pa' gozar" has become a standard of the descarga genre. (Full article...)
...that Carlos Manuel de Céspedes(pictured) is known as Padre de la Patria, (English:Father of the Homeland) in Cuba, having declared the nation's independence from Spain in 1868?
...that La Coubre was a French vessel carrying munitions from the port of Antwerp in 1960, which exploded while it was being unloaded in Havana harbor leaving at least 75 dead?
At dawn on October 9 we were hiding very close to the small schoolhouse at La Higuera. We saw the soldiers, observed the helicopters, but never imagined they were holding Che there. In the morning we heard the first news of his capture but reports were very confused, saying he was wounded, then saying he was not and that it was one of his officers. Finally they began to give details about his clothing and personal effects, and we knew it was true.
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