For Cubans there has been a long, historic exile path to the United States. The Spanish historian Justo Zaragoza noted that 100,000 persons fled the island in 1869,2 following the start of the Ten Years\u27 War agitating for independence from Spain. Again in 1895 when the War for Independence broke out, Cuban colonies were founded in Southern Florida, Tampa, and other U.S. cities.
Political activity was very much a part of the exile groups from the time that the great Cuban hero, Jose Marti plotted his revolution in a house in Tampa.3 Revolutionary activity was carried on among exiles in the U.S. during the dictatorships of Gerardo Machado and Fulgencio Batista. Castro himself was among the Miami plotters of the Batista era. He left his Mexican exile in 1956 and spent ten days in Miami conferring with other exile leaders and raising funds.
