Victor Andres Triay's Books

Bay of Pigs

An Oral History of Brigade 2506

By: Victor Andres Triay

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Bay of Pigs

An Oral History of Brigade 2506

By: Victor Andres Triay

Florida Historical Society Samuel Proctor Award From the interviews: My [pregnant] wife once asked me, 'How is it possible you are not thinking of your child?' I told her, 'It is precisely because of that child and the two others I have here that I am going. I plan to return to my fatherland, and I don't want a Communist homeland.'-- Jorge Marquet One of the sad things that has happened over this period in the history of Cuba is that historians have not given credit to the idealism of those who turned against the revolution. We were really full of good will and wanted to make Cuba better.--Eduardo Zayas-Bazán [A] feeling of duty to defend our faith was what motivated my husband . . . . What made me give my blessing to his activities were my own feelings of duty.-- Myrna Pardo Millán (widowed by the invasion) This is the story of the Bay of Pigs invasion, told for the first time in the words of the idealistic participants who came together in April 1961 to overthrow Fidel Castro's dictatorship. Most of the approximately 1,500 men of Brigade 2506 were captured by Castro's forces in Cuban swamps and jailed until December 1962. About 114 died. Combining oral history and traditional narrative form, Victor Triay tells us who individual members of the brigade were and what they fought for. As one veteran, only eighteen at the time of the invasion, recalls, "It was my turn to do something for Cuba. Probably the purest thing I have ever done in my life was to make the decision to go." Triay describes the volunteers' recruitment, training, combat experience, and the wretched months of their imprisonment. He also presents the women they left behind, including three who were widowed by the invasion. Among the nearly 2 million people in the U.S. Cuban community today, the freedom fighters who made up Brigade 2506 have always been accorded the highest level of respect. Bay of Pigs tells the personal stories of the invasion in an account that restores the human dimension to a pivotal moment in the history of the Cold War.

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214

Published Date

ISBN 10

081306841X

ISBN 13

9780813068411

The Struggle Begins

By: Victor Andres Triay

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The Struggle Begins

By: Victor Andres Triay

Havana, Cuba, 1960. The euphoria following the nation's successful Revolution the previous year has waned among large sectors of the population. Cuba's new leader, Fidel Castro, after having promised to restore democracy to the troubled island, is forcibly dragging the country down the road to Communist dictatorship. As an ominous, Stalinist cloud begins to envelop the country, democratic forces launch an anti-government insurgency with the hope of saving Cuba from the totalitarian darkness that threatens her. The Unbroken Circle series is the story of the fictional Leon family, whose peaceful, middle class existence is swept suddenly into a tempest of warfare, betrayal, and separation during the early years of the Cuban Revolution. Told with the heart-pounding suspense of a Cold War saga and the poignancy of a family drama, The Struggle Begins sets the stage for The Unbroken Circle series with electrifying power. From Reader Reviews: "The Struggle Begins" is a thrilling historical novel that cannot be put down . . ." "The characters are so real that you can almost touch them." "The Struggle Begins" is presented to the readers in a scenario that combines the reality of Cuba in 1960 with fictional characters to make a fascinating novel." "Caught right away in the drama of a Cuban family in the midst of their struggles with Castro's revolution.

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Page Count

210

Publisher

Createspace Independent Pub

Published Date

ISBN 10

1482013150

ISBN 13

9781482013153

The Mariel Boatlift

A Cuban-American Journey

By: Victor Andres Triay

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The Mariel Boatlift

A Cuban-American Journey

By: Victor Andres Triay

American Association for State and Local History Leadership in History Award in Local History - Honorable Mention Florida Book Awards, Gold Medal for Florida Nonfiction Set against the sweeping backdrop of one of the most dramatic refugee crises of the twentieth century, The Mariel Boatlift presents the stories of Cuban immigrants to the United States who overcame frightening circumstances to build new lives for themselves and flourish in their adopted country. Award-winning historian Victor Triay portrays the repressive climate in Cuba as the democratic promises of Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution gave way to a communist dictatorship under which the people of the island became virtually cut off from the outside world. He illustrates how escalating internal tensions during the regime’s second decade in power culminated in an exodus of over 125,000 Cuban refugees across the Straits of Florida during the spring and summer of 1980. Alongside a fast-paced narrative offering a brief history of the Mariel Boatlift, Triay presents testimonies from former Mariel refugees who recall their lives in Cuba before the boatlift and how they longed to reunite with family members who lived in exile in the United States. Their captivating stories detail the physical and psychological abuse they endured in Cuba at the hands of pro-government mobs and the mistreatment many experienced at processing centers there before reaching the port of Mariel. They recall treacherous journeys to Key West aboard vessels that were deliberately overcrowded to life-threatening levels by Cuban authorities, as well as their experiences settling in Miami and beyond. Called the scum—escoria—of society by the Cuban government, a false portrayal accepted and spread by some in the American media, Mariel refugees faced extraordinary challenges upon entering U.S. society. Yet, despite the obstacles placed before them, the overwhelming majority of these immigrants successfully transitioned to their new lives as Americans and many have emerged as leading professionals, scholars, writers, artists, and businesspeople. This book shares their hardships and successes while profoundly illustrating the human impact of international power struggles.

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Page Count

219

Publisher

University Press of Florida

Published Date

ISBN 10

1683400992

ISBN 13

9781683400998

Fleeing Castro

Operation Pedro Pan and the Cuban Children's Program

By: Victor Andres Triay

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Fleeing Castro

Operation Pedro Pan and the Cuban Children's Program

By: Victor Andres Triay

The first complete and comprehensive work on these important, unique programs. . . . An interesting, humane, yet tragic component of the post-1959 Cuban experience and the Cold War in general."--Antonio Benitez-Rojo, Amherst College "The ordeal began [for the children] when their parents told them they had to travel alone and that they had to keep the upcoming trip a secret. The most powerful parts of the book are their accounts. . . . Through interviews with many of the participants—the children and their parents, the coordinators of the airlift, those in the underground in Cuba and the Catholic sponsors in the United States—Triay attempts to answer many of the questions the exodus raised."--Miami Herald A stirring account of the covert effort to smuggle Cuban children into the United States in the aftermath of Fidel Castro's rise to power, Fleeing Castro brings to light the humanitarian program designed to care for the children once they arrived and the hardship and suffering endured by the families who took part in Operation Pedro Pan. From late 1960 until the October 1962 missile crisis, 14,048 unaccompanied Cuban children left their homeland, the small island suddenly at the center of the Cold War struggle. Their parents, unable to obtain visas to leave Cuba, believed a short separation would be preferable to subjecting their offspring to Castro's totalitarian Marxist state. For the children, the exodus began a prolonged and tragic ordeal--some didn’t see their parents again for years; a few never did. Until now, this chapter of the Cuban Revolution has been relatively obscure. Initially the result of an effort by James Baker, headmaster of an American school in Cuba who worked closely with the anti-Castro underground, Pedro Pan quickly came to involve the Catholic Church in Miami and, in particular, Father Bryan Walsh, who established the Cuban Children's Program, the nationwide organization that cared for those children without relatives or friends in the United States--almost half of them. The latter program, in effect until 1981, was the first to allot federal money to private agencies for child care, an action with far-reaching repercussions for U.S. social policy. Victor Andres Triay traces this story from its political and social origins in Cuba, setting it in the context of the Cold War and describing the roles of the organizations involved in Cuba and in the United States. Making use of extensive interviews with Baker, Walsh, and influential underground figures, as well as personal letters that document the fears and dreams of both the parents and the children, Triay presents this history of Pedro Pan--the largest child refugee movement ever in the Western Hemisphere--with the drama of an international thriller and the pathos of a heartbreaking family drama.

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Page Count

136

Publisher

University Press of Florida

Published Date

ISBN 10

0813063035

ISBN 13

9780813063034

Bay of Pigs

An Oral History of Brigade 2506

By: Victor Andres Triay

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Bay of Pigs

An Oral History of Brigade 2506

By: Victor Andres Triay

Florida Historical Society Samuel Proctor Award From the interviews: "My [pregnant] wife once asked me, ‘How is it possible you are not thinking of your child?’ I told her, ‘It is precisely because of that child and the two others I have here that I am going. I plan to return to my fatherland, and I don’t want a Communist homeland.’"-- Jorge Marquet "One of the sad things that has happened over this period in the history of Cuba is that historians have not given credit to the idealism of those who turned against the revolution. We were really full of good will and wanted to make Cuba better."--Eduardo Zayas-Bazán "[A] feeling of duty to defend our faith was what motivated my husband . . . . What made me give my blessing to his activities were my own feelings of duty."-- Myrna Pardo Millán (widowed by the invasion) This is the story of the Bay of Pigs invasion, told for the first time in the words of the idealistic participants who came together in April 1961 to overthrow Fidel Castro’s dictatorship. Most of the approximately 1,500 men of Brigade 2506 were captured by Castro’s forces in Cuban swamps and jailed until December 1962. About 114 died. Combining oral history and traditional narrative form, Victor Triay tells us who individual members of the brigade were and what they fought for. As one veteran, only eighteen at the time of the invasion, recalls, “It was my turn to do something for Cuba. Probably the purest thing I have ever done in my life was to make the decision to go.” Triay describes the volunteers’ recruitment, training, combat experience, and the wretched months of their imprisonment. He also presents the women they left behind, including three who were widowed by the invasion. Among the nearly 2 million people in the U.S. Cuban community today, the freedom fighters who made up Brigade 2506 have always been accorded the highest level of respect. Bay of Pigs tells the personal stories of the invasion in an account that restores the human dimension to a pivotal moment in the history of the Cold War.

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Page Count

201

Publisher

University Press of Florida

Published Date

ISBN 10

0813065917

ISBN 13

9780813065915

Fleeing Castro

Operation Pedro Pan and the Cuban Children's Program

By: Victor Andres Triay

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Fleeing Castro

Operation Pedro Pan and the Cuban Children's Program

By: Victor Andres Triay

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136

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University Press of Florida

Published Date

ISBN 10

0813063035

ISBN 13

9780813063034

The Cuban Revolution

Years of Promise

By: Teo A. Babun,Victor Andres Triay

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The Cuban Revolution

Years of Promise

By: Teo A. Babun,Victor Andres Triay

Trutie's photographs, most of them never before seen, capture everything - the Revolution's soldiers and firing squads, President John F. Kennedy's 1962 address in Miami to Cuban exiles, and Brigade 2506, the liberation army that sought to overthrow Castro. These images vividly document the inner life of a revolution with candid images of rebels dining together, jeeps moving through rustic, muddy camps, and Fidel Castro and Ernesto "Che" Guevara walking side by side in a reflective moment. Trutie's camera also sees the tragic side of revolutionary activity - burning sugar mills, jungle hospitals, and corpses with pockets turned inside out, lying in open graves. These raw, unfiltered photos, combined with the narrative text of Teo A. Babun and noted Cuban-American historian Victor Triay, offer a one-of-a-kind, intimate eyewitness account of the Cuban Revolution as it unfolded."--BOOK JACKET.

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Page Count

116

Publisher

Babun Group Publishing

Published Date

ISBN 10

0813028604

ISBN 13

9780813028606

Book's by Victor Andres Triay

Bay of Pigs

Bay of Pigs

The Struggle Begins

The Struggle Begins

The Mariel Boatlift

The Mariel Boatlift

Fleeing Castro

Fleeing Castro

Bay of Pigs

Bay of Pigs

Fleeing Castro

Fleeing Castro

The Cuban Revolution

The Cuban Revolution

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