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The Fourth of July and Cuban Women

Sandokan

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Cubans women helped raise funds for the revolutionary army of George Washington. The "Ladies of Havana" raised 1.2 million tournoise livres, equivalent to $3.1 million, an astounding amount for that time. From 181 to 2018, adjusted by an average inflation rate of 1.44% per year, it would be equivalent to $81 million in 2018. Their contribution made possible the financing of the decisive battle of American Independence.
 

Are we now expending ourselves on Moldy Oldy irrelevant to now claims to praise?

We really do have important work needing our attention.

I do like a tear jearker, but there is the work...

U C!

!
 
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The Black Plague ushered in the age of the Renaissance. It created the dawn of industry. It gave simple peasants "purpose" hence starting the "middle class" economy. This made for healthier people, and a more robust population.

Gee...we should bring back the bubonic plague then!
 
Hawkeye10 said:
Are we now expending ourselves on Moldy Oldy irrelevant to now claims to praise?

We really do have important work needing our attention.

I do like a tear jearker, but there is the work...

U C!

!
Click to expand...

It takes nerve for the Ladies in White to celebrate July 4. Here's what awaits them.

 
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Hawkeye10 said:
Are we now expending ourselves on Moldy Oldy irrelevant to now claims to praise?

We really do have important work needing our attention.

I do like a tear jearker, but there is the work...

U C!

!
Click to expand...
Because it happened long ago, it is not irrelevant; on the contrary, it is important due to the fact that their support of the U.S. War of Independence have received little exposure in the U.S., notwithstanding that it is well documented history fact.

What can be more important work that the celebration of Independence Day on July 4th, an event of historical significant for the United States of America, a great experiment in democracy.

By the way, Hawkeye is a moldy oldy, from 1823, but a very relevant one from the historical point of view.
 
Stephen Bonsal, winner of the Pulitzer Price for History in 1945, wrote, “The Contribution of Cuban women by way of their jewelry, could very well be the foundation on which is founded, the freedom of the United States.” The “Ladies of Havana” wrote in their contribution, “So the American mothers’ sons are not born as slaves.”

Bonsal also wrote, "The million that was supplied by the ladies of Havana, may, with truth, be regarded as the 'bottom dollars' upon which the edifice of American independence was erected.''
 
Loreta Velázquez, a Cuban-American borne in Havana in 1842, daughter of a Cuban father and a French-American mother, grew up in New Orleans where she married an American and they had three children, which died very young. Her husband joint the Confederate army and was killed in an accident. Devastated by her family loss, she masqueraded as a male Confederate soldier during the Civil War. She fought in several battles reaching the grade of Lieutenant until her gender was discovered and was discharged. She became a Confederate spy, working in both male and female guises, and later as a double agent. She wrote a book title “The Woman in Battle”, her testimony about the Civil War.

 
Aida de Acosta, a Cuban/Spanish-American borne in New Jersey on July 28, 1884, was the first woman to fly on one of the powered airship of Santos Dumont in Paris on June 27, 1903, during a fly that lasted one and a half hour. Her father, Ricardo de Acosta, a steamship executive, was borne in Cuba, and her mother, Micaela Hernandez de Alba, a descendant of the famous Spanish family Dukes of Alba, was borne in Spain.
 
During the World WAR I, Aida sold $2 million worth of Liberty Bonds. She traveled to Europe after the war and work for the American Committee for Devastated France. In 1922, Aida lost sight in one eye to glaucoma. The famous ophthalmologist William H. Wilmer save her other eye. She organized a fun-raising campaign that funded in 1925 the Wilmer Eye Institute in Johns Hopkins Hospital. She served as Executive Director of the first eye bank in the U.S. from 1945 until 1955 when she retired.

She was also interested in the arts, and in 1935, New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia named her as chairwoman of a newly formed art committee to "stimulate the artistic life and expression of the city." She died in May 26, 1962 in Bedford, New York.


Aida de Acosta
 
Isabel Pérez Farfante, a Cuban-American carcinologist, was the first Cuban woman to receive her Ph.D. from an Ivy League school. She was born July 24, 1916 in Havana, Cuba. Isabel was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1942 for biology and ecology, and received a master's in biology in 1944 from Harvard University, one of the first women to attend this university. In 1948 she obtain her Ph.D. from Radcliffe and returned to Cuba where she was a professor at the University of Havana until 1960. Her family was blacklisted by the Castro regime and have to flee Cuba, leaving behind all their possessions.


Isabel Pérez Farfante
 
ElChupacabra said:
cool stuff!

:thumbs:
Click to expand...
Thanks.

Isabel, with her family, returned to Cambridge and worked at the Museum of Comparative Zoology. In 1966 she started working at the National Marine Fisheries Service lab located at the National Museum of Natural History. In 1986 she became Carcinologist (which study crustaceans), Emeritus at the Fisheries Service and retired in 1997. She co-wrote a seminal carcinology book and over 45 technical papers about the subject.
 
Celia Cruz, a Cuban-American singer, was the most popular Latin artist of the 20th century. Celia during her career recorder 80 albums, of which 23 won gold album certification. She also won 6 Grammy Awards and posthumously in 2016 a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. She was inducted in the Hollywood Walk of Fame in September 1987. Celia appeared in 10 movies between 1950 and 1995. In 1994, President Clinton awarded Celia the Nacional Medal of Arts, and the same year she was inducted into Billboard Latin Music Hall of Fame. A year later, she was inducted into the International Latin Music Hall of Fame. She traveled on tours to Central and South America, Europe, Japan and Africa, and received awards from various countries.


Celia Cruz - Jack Vartoogian/Getty Images
 
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ElChupacabra said:
Azzuuucccarr!!
Click to expand...
Celia passed away July 16, 2003 at her home in New Jersey. Three days after Celia death her body was flown to Miami, Florida, for a special public viewing prior to her burial in New York. The number of people paying their respects was estimated at more than 75,000. On July 22, Celia was mourned by more than 20,000 people who lined Manhattan's Fifth Avenue for a 30 block stretch to her funeral at St. Patrick's Cathedral. Patty LaBelle, a friend of Celia, sank “Ave Maria” in the Cathedral. Celia was buried in the Woodman Cemetery in the Brown. In December 2002 she had surgery to remove a brain tumor. In early 2003, she record her last album, “Regalo del Alma”. Her final performance was in a special tribute in her honor title, ¡Celia Cruz: Azúcar! that was aired by the Spanish-language Telemundo in March 2003.

 
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In May18, 2005, the National Museum of American History launched a retrospective tracing Celia Cruz's life “Azúcar! The Life and Music of Celia Cruz”, spanning the Cuban singer's six-decade career as a great singer. The exhibition traveled all around the country. In September 30, 2007, the off-Broadway musical "Celia: The Life and Music of Celia Cruz," opened at New World Stages to rave reviews. “Celia: The Queen”, is a documentary about the stellar performer’s life and legacy released April 2008. She became known as the voice of Cuba around the world, but her music was banned in Cuba by the Castro regime. When her mother die in 1962, Celia requested permission to go bury her, but the regime denied her the visa to enter Cuba.

Celia Cruz – Quimbara has 63.52 million views. This is a word that imitate the sound of percussion of guaguancó, “quimbara cuma cuma cumba quimbambá”. Guaguancó is a Cuban rumba that combine percussion, voices and dance.

Quimbara Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxRWQHCSmUg
 
Tania León was born in May 14, 1943 in Havana, Cuba to parents of mixed descent, and began studying piano at the age of four. She earned a B.S. degree in piano in 1963 and a M.A. in music education in 1964 from the National Conservatory, and became an accomplished concert pianist. She also obtained a degree in Business Administration in 1965.

León came to the US on a 1967 "Freedom Flight" from Cuba, and settled in New York, where she work in accounting. She received a scholarship at New York University where she earned a B.S. in 1971 and a M.A. in 1973, and continuous to performed as a concert pianist. She held the position of music director at the Dance Theater of Harlem from 1969 to 1980, where she function as pianist, conductor and composer. She continuous to evolved her career as a composer, classic conductor, educator and artistic advisor.

León has conducted some of the world’s greatest orchestras, among them the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, the Beethovenhalle Orchestra, Germany, the Netherlands Wind Ensemble, Holland, the Symphony Orchestra and Chorus of Marseille, France, the Orquesta Sinfonica de Asturias, Spain, and Santa Cecilia Orchestra, Italy, among others.


Tania León
 
On October 5, 2018, Tania León was inducted to the board of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in the Visual Arts and Performing Arts.

American Academy of Arts & Sciences
Published on Nov 7, 2018

Tania León - At Work - Celebration of the Arts & Humanities

Tania León shares a short video, "Thoughts of Fifty Years," before speaking (4:44) about her experience as a composer and conductor.
 
Tania León orchestra work Batá (1985), performed by the Foundation Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Davis Snell. Batá utilizes Afro-Cuban percussion and African rhythms. Batá is a double headed drum shape like an hourglass with one end larger than the other, used in religious festivities.


Batá drums

Batá Video:
 
Dr. Ruth Behar a Cuban-American anthropologist and writer was born in Havana, Cuba in 1956, to a Jewish-Cuban family. After the Castro regime took control of Cuba in 1959, about 90% of the 15,000 Cuban Jews left the country when the regime, in the subsequent years, took away their business and properties. In 1960 her family left the island and settle in New York, U.S.

Behar studied cultural anthropology at Princeton University, earning her doctorate in 1983. She is a professor at the Department of Anthropology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. As an anthropologist, she has traveled frequently to Cuba to study her own culture. She had writing several book about anthropology, and also writes essays, poetry and fiction.


Ruth Behar
 
Behar also wrote, directed, and produced the documentary Adio Kerida (Goodbye Dear Love): A Cuban-American Woman's Search for Sephardic Memories, in 2002. The title is borrowed from a Sephardic love song in order to highlight the themes of expulsion, departure, and exile that are at the crux of the Sephardic legacy. She has received several awards, among them the Fulbright award in 2007. In 2018, her novel for young readers Lucky Broken Girl received the Pura Belpré Author Award. She also gives public speaking in different topics.

This is a 3 minutes trailer of “Adio Kerida”: Watch Adio Kerida (Goodbye Dear Love) Online | Vimeo On Demand on Vimeo
 
Behar has published several books about Cuba, among them “The Portable Island: Cubans at Home in the Worlds”, Palgrave MacMillan, 2008, New York, written in collaboration with Lucia M. Suarez.

In the preface Ruth write “For me, Cuba is the homeland that I have sought to recover through anthropological, literary, filmic, and spiritual journeys, and repeated visits to the island. For Lucía, Cuba is the place she has come to know through intense reading of Cuban and Caribbean literature, limited visits to the island, and journeys to other countries that seem to connect her further to Cuba. Working on this book, we have learned that even though we have different ways of experiencing Cuba and belong to slightly different generations, neither of us can totally let the island go. We have come to accept that while we continue to seek a connection to Cuba, our longing to make it ours is inseparable from our understanding that we won’t ever recover the island of our past…. Whether islanders with feet still firmly planted on island soil, or exiles, immigrants, or perennial wanderers seeking home somewhere else, we are all Cubans and all in this together. One thing we know for sure: nothing is more crucial for Cubans than to avoid the curse of loneliness.
 
In "Introduction in Two Voices", Ruth writes


In the last chapter title "Waiting", Ruth writes
 
Gloria was rank no. 70 among the top 100 best-selling artists of all time. She is one of the most successful Latin artists in the world, with sales of 115 million records worldwide.



These are two of Gloria greatest hits, enjoy them.

Gloria Estefan & Miami Sound Machine – Rhythm is Gonna Get You - 7,360,469 views

Gloria Estefan & Miami Sound Machine – Conga - 6,789,798 views
 
Gloria Estefan - Mi Tierra

The album “Mi Tierra” (My Homeland), was released in 1993, Gloria first album in Spanish. Emilio was the producer, and he did not spare expenses and effort to assemble the best musicians.

Juanito Márquez, one of the great Cuban musicians, composer, arranger, orchestrator, orchestra conductor, and guitar player, contributed to the album as an arranger, composer, player of the Tres and 12 String Guitar and conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra string section. The Colombian composer Estéfano (Fabio A. Salgado), wrote the lyrics for the son “Mi Tierra”, based in inspirations by Gloria, and two other songs.

Beside the regular musicians of Miami Sound Machine, a number of top notch musicians are feature in the album. Piano: Paquito Echevarría; Bass: Israel López (Cachao) & Chamin Correa; Guitar: Juanito Márquez; Tres (Cuban Guitar): Juanito Márquez & Nelson González; Percussion: Luis Enrique, Nelson González; Timbales Tito Puente & Sheila E.; Flute: Nestor Torres; Saxophone: Paquito D’Rivera; Trumpet: Arturo Sandoval.

The album “Mi Tierra”, Gloria first album in Spanish, won her a Grammy for best Album of the Year, and recognized as the best-selling Latin album of the year. It was an international success, having been sold over 8 million copies worldwide by 2006.

On August 312, 2009, the song was played as a wake-up call for NASA astronaut José Hernandez aboard the space shuttle.



Video:
 
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