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A Cuban exile is a person who has been exiled from Cuba. Many Cuban exiles have various differing experiences as emigrants depending on when they emigrated from Cuba, and why they emigrated.
The exile of Cubans has been a dominating factor in Cuban history since the early independence struggles, in which various average Cubans and political leaders spent long periods of time in exile. Long since independence struggles, Miami has become a notable center of residence for exilic Cubans, and a cultural hub of Cuban life outside of Cuba. Miami became a center for Cuban emigrants, during the 1960s, because of a growing Cuban-owned business community which was supportive of recently arrived Cubans.Grenier, Guillermo J. Miami Now!: Immigration, Ethnicity, and Social Change. Archived at Google Books. Retrieved March 31, 2011.
The San Carlos Institute was established on November 11, 1871 by members of the Cuban exile community who had taken refuge in Key West during the Ten Years' War (1868-1878). The effort was spearheaded by two prominent leaders of the exile community, Juan María Reyes and José Dolores Poyo, with the goal of creating a Cuban heritage and community center that would serve as host to cultural events, political meetings, and educational endeavors.
Key West's subsequent rise in Cigar manufacturing and relocation of factories from Cuba was largely destroyed in Key West's devastating fire of April 1, 1886,"Key West Bicentennial" (2022), pp 10–12 Hundreds of homes and several cigar factories were destroyed, including cigar mogul Vicente Martinez Ybor's still-operational main location. Needing jobs and not willing to wait for their homes and workplaces to be rebuilt, many Cuban tabaqueros decided to pack up their surviving belongings and board a steamship for Tampa.
Following the Ten Years' War, the Spanish authorities decided to exile pro-independence writer Jose Marti to Spain. Years later, on 26 November 1891, Jose Marti was invited by the Club Ignacio Agramonte, an organization founded by Cuban immigrants in Ybor City, Tampa, Florida, to a celebration to collect funding for the cause of Cuban independence. There he gave a lecture known as "Con Todos, y para el Bien de Todos", which was reprinted in Spanish language newspapers and periodicals across the United States. The following night, another lecture, " Los Pinos Nuevos", was given by Martí in another Tampa gathering in honor of the medical students killed in Cuba in 1871. In November artist Herman Norman painted a portrait of José Martí.
On 5 January 1892, Martí participated in a reunion of the emigration representatives, in Key West (Key West), the Cuban community where the Bases del Partido Revolucionario (Basis of the Cuban Revolutionary Party) was passed. He began the process of organizing the newly formed party. To raise support and collect funding for the independence movement, he visited tobacco factories, where he gave speeches to the workers and united them in the cause. In March 1892 the first edition of the Patria newspaper, related to the Cuban Revolutionary Party, was published, funded and directed by Martí. During Martí's Key West years, his secretary was Dolores Castellanos (1870–1948), a Cuban Americans woman born in Key West, who also served as president of the Protectoras de la Patria: Club Político de Cubanas, a Cuban women's political club in support of Martí's cause, and for whom Martí wrote a poem. josemarti.cu/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/0110_A_DOLORES _CASTELLANOS.pdf A Dolores Castellanos On 8 April 1892, Jose Marti was elected delegate of the Cuban Revolutionary Party by the Cayo Hueso Club in Tampa and New York. From July to September 1892 he traveled through Florida, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Jamaica on an organization mission among the exiled Cubans. On this mission, Martí made numerous speeches and visited various tobacco factories. In 1893, Martí traveled through the United States, Central America and the West Indies, visiting different Cuban clubs. His visits were received with a growing enthusiasm and raised badly needed funds for the revolutionary cause.
The preceding President of Cuba, Mario García Menocal, went into exile in Miami, creating a small anti-Machado group in the city. Student leader and later President of Cuba, Carlos Prío Socarrás, also fled to Miami, and created the anti-Machado student group called "the Miami cell". After Machado was overthrown in 1933, both Menocal and Prío returned to Cuba.
Numerous important revolutionaries, including the Castro brothers, were captured soon afterwards. Fidel was sentenced to 15 years in the prison Presidio Modelo, located on Isla de Pinos, while Raúl was sentenced to 13 years. However, in 1955, yielding to political considerations, and the demand's of Castro's childhood teacher, Batista granted all Cuban political prisoners amnesty, under the condition the Castro brothers are exiled from the island.
After leaving Cuba, Fidel Castro toured Miami, New York, and the Cuban community of Tampa, to raise funds for a new rebel force. After his fundraising tour, Castro left for Mexico, to begin training an army of fellow Cuban exiles to assault Cuba.
During this exodus a secretive program known as the Cuban Children's Program was in operation, and helped unaccompanied children emigrate from Cuba. In February 1962, the newspaper The Plain Dealer detailed to its readers the masses of unaccompanied Cuban minors who made their way across the country for three years unnoticed. On March 9 of the same year, the Miami Herald
The male exiles of the Mariel boatlift were depicted by the Castro administration as effeminate and often pejoratively addressed with homophobia by leaders. Revolutionary masculinity ( machismo) and an association of homosexuality with capitalism had fostered homophobic sentiments in Revolutionary Cuban culture. This atmosphere had driven many LGBTQ Cubans to flee when Castro announced he would allow the exodus. By 1980 homosexuality was no longer criminalized by Cuban law, but queer Cubans still faced systemic discrimination. There was a social phenomenon of straight men pretending to be gay to pass the interviews required of applicants for the exodus, because it was believed that homosexuals were more likely to pass the panel held to determine if a person could exit from Cuba. Communities of gay exiles formed in the processing centers that formed for those applying for entry to the United States. These centers kept their gender populations segregated. As a result, a majority of reports of LGBTQ Cuban Exile communities in these centers were focused on gay male exiles. However, secondhand reports suggested parallel lesbian communities had formed in the women's population. Though United States law technically barred emigration into the country on grounds of homosexuality, exceptions were made for the exiles to support them as anti-communists. Only LGBTQ people who clearly and explicitly told the US immigration panel that they identified as such were denied entry to the United States.
Author Susana Pena has written about LGBTQ people in the Mariel boatlift and has speculated that their resettlement in Miami may have spurred on a revival of LGBT culture in Miami's South Beach.
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