A unique virtual tour with Cuban scholar Lisandro Pérez through Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery, highlighting the lives of the many notable 19th century Cubans buried there. These prominent personalities belong to the migration wave that arrived in New York in the aftermath of the outbreak, in 1868, of the first Cuban war of independence from Spain.
As Pérez duly has duly noted: “That wave made Cuban New York the largest community of Latin American immigrants east of the Mississippi and remained so until Ybor City (another Cuban community, in Tampa) surpassed it in 1886. It was a migration spearheaded by the Havana elite, as well as lawyers and intellectuals… Here they joined forces with longtime Cuban residents of the city to support, with widely ranging degrees of enthusiasm, the cause of the rebels fighting the Spanish in Cuba.”
Miguel Aldama (pictured above on the first page of the December 4, 1869 edition of Harper’s Weekly), the most prominent leader of the criollo aristocracy, and perhaps once the richest man in Cuba, is buried at Green-Wood.
Pérez will be interviewed by Green-Wood Historian Jeff Richman. The conversation will be followed by a Q&A open to the public.
We sponsor this history event as part of our CreateNYC Language Access Cuban History and Literature Series.
DUE TO TH COVID PANDEMIC, THIS EVENT WILL BE STREAMED LIVE.
CCCNY MEMBERS can register FREE with this promotion code: MEMBER2020
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Lisandro Pérez is Professor of Latin American
and Latino Studies at John Jay College,City University of New York. Founder of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University, which he directed for twelve years, he has devoted his academic career to the study of Cuba, especially the Cuban presence in the United States. Pérez worked on Sugar, Cigars & Revolution during his Cullman Center Fellowship in 2004-2005.
For those who wish to learn more about some of the 19th century New York Cubans buried in Green-Wood, you can purchase Lisandro Pérez’s book on the subject at: https://amzn.to/3mrjmxy
This conversation is hosted by The Green-Wood Historic Fund as part of its series of virtual programs about the history of Green-Wood and its permanent residents, Zooming in on History.
This presentation is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
With the promotional collaboration of
