"Dile a Fidel que yo complire con mi deber"
Latin American Leftism
This Cuban poster features Argentinian President Salvador Allende holding a gun and stating, "Tell Fidel I understand my duty."
unknown
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
1973
1959-1969 Tenth Anniversary of the Triumph of the Cuban rebellion
Cuban Revolution
This poster was created by self-taught Cuban artist, Rene Mederos, in honor of the tenth anniversary of the Cuban Revolution. The image heroicizes Fidel Castro as a leader of people’s liberation struggles.
Rene Mederos
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
1969
poster
Che Guevara's Farewell Letter to Fidel Castro
Cuban Revolution
After playing a pivotal role in the Cuban revolution and early Castro regime, Che Guevara left the island nation in 1965 to help foment revolution in other Third World nations.
In April of 1965, Guevara wrote this farewell letter to Fidel Castro, which was read publicly in Cuba by Castro in the presence of Guevara's wife and. children in October of that year.
unknown
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. late-1960s
poster
Jornada de la Marcha Combatiente Hacia el Moncada
Cuban Revolution
On July 26, 1953, Fidel Castro led a small group of revolutionaries in an attack on the Moncada military barracks in Santiago de Cuba. The barracks was the second largest in Cuba and had been named for General Guillermon Moncada, a heroic figure from Cuba’s War for Independence in the 1890s. The attempted coup failed, with eight killed, several more wounded and more than seventy captured and tortured by the Batista regime, including Fidel Castro’s brother, Raul. Fidel Castro initially escaped into the countryside, but was later captured and placed on trial. During the theatrical trial, Castro famously said, "You may condemn me. History will absolve me." Following the 1959 revolution, Castro would mark the storming of Moncada as the start of the struggle against the Batista regime. This poster commemorates that event.
unknown
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
1980
poster
Stop Racist Frame-Up Free Billy Smith
Anti-War Movement
On March 15, 1971, a fragmentation grenade killed two white officers and injured another on the U.S. Army base near Bien Hoa, Vietnam. Private Billy Dean Smith, who was stationed at the base, was charged with the crime. Smith was an African American draftee born in Bakersfield, California, in 1948, the tenth of twelve children in his family. They lived in Texas for several years before moving to the Watts section of Los Angeles in 1957. Smith was staunchly critical of the War in Vietnam, citing the racialization of the draft and the “imperialist” motivations for the war. His case received considerable media attention in the U.S. and raised awareness of the racial injustice within the military legal system, bringing greater attention to what became known as “fragging.” According to Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield, “fragging” was the result of “an atmosphere that drives an American G.I. to kill his fellow G.I. or superior.. Fragging, I fear, is just an outgrowth of this mistaken, this tragic conflict.” Smith’s case also attracted the attention and support of a wide range of activists across the New Left, including Angela Davis and Fidel Castro. Castro called it “a new cause for the progressive movement and a new cause for international solidarity” and said, “A man became a criminal. A man who refused to destroy schools and hospitals and dikes, who devoted himself to refusing to kill Vietnamese people, who refused to kill women and children, to burn homes, to torture and commit all acts of this type. They are demanding his head and therefore there is now a new symbol: Billy Dean Smith.” In 1971, the Billy Dean Smith Defense Committee wrote, "This is an important case because of the wide array of issues it must, of its very nature, raise. For the first time in a long while, the case of Billy Dean Smith will put the built-in biases in the system of military justice -- and the Indochina war -- on trial. " In a letter published in Seize the Time, a newsletter by the Black Disciple Party, Smith wrote, "The Army is playing a very heavy game on me, and on all of the people at the same time. They are doing everything they can to keep my lawyers in place -- trying to keep information and evidence from them and to keep them from saying what has to be said. It is very clear that they will keep on trying to stop us from getting what we need for my defense." Ultimately, Smith was found not guilty of murder and attempted murder charges, though convicted of lesser charges stemming from the incident and given a bad conduct discharge.
Billy Dean Smith Defense Committee
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
1971
Button
Physical Object
Venceremos Brigade
(6 images)
Cuban Revolution
Roz Payne took these photographs during a trip to Cuba as a part of the Venceremos Brigade. According to the Venceremos Brigade website, “In 1969, a coalition of young people formed the Venceremos ("We Shall Overcome") Brigade, as a means of showing solidarity with the Cuban Revolution by working side by side with Cuban workers and challenging U.S. policies towards Cuba, including the economic blockade and our government’s ban on travel to the island. The first Brigades participated in sugar harvests and subsequent Brigades have done agricultural and construction work in many parts of the island.”
Roz Payne
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. 1969 or early-1970s
Venceremos Brigade: Cuba, 1969-1970
Cuban Revolution
This pamphlet briefly chronicles the history of the Cuban Revolution and diplomatic relations with the United States during the 1960s. Specifically, this pamphlet details the 10 Million Ton sugar harvest in Cuba with approximately six hundred Americans joining Cubans in an attempt to resist American imperialism in the nation and abroad and Cold War policies of the 1960s and 1970s. Creating a bond based on collective work, the Venceremos Bridge, comprised of U.S. revolutionaries and students, functioned as a way to combat U.S. economic constraints in Cuba.
The Venceremos Brigade
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. 1971
pamphlet
Y Salvador Allende Cumplio Su Palabra en Forma Dramatica e Impresionante
Latin American Leftism
This Cuban poster quotes a speech by Fidel Castro given on September 28, 1973 at the Plaza de la Revolucion, shortly after the CIA-backed coup in Argentina on September 11 that overthrew the Democratic-Socialist Salvador Allende and installed military dictator, Augusto Pinochet. During the coup, Allende took his own life.
unknown
Roz Payne
Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
ca. 1973
poster