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Title: Cuban Freedom Committee records
Date (inclusive): 1947-1993
Collection Number: 97004
Contributing Institution: Hoover Institution Library and Archives
Language of Material: In English and Spanish
Physical Description:
72 manuscript boxes, 1 oversize box
(28.8 Linear Feet)
Abstract: Correspondence, speeches, reports, radio broadcast transcripts, financial records, press releases, sound recordings, clippings,
and other printed matter, relating to communism, political conditions and civil rights in Cuba, Cuban influence elsewhere
in Latin America, and Cubans in exile in the United States, and especially to broadcasting activities of Free Cuba Radio from
the United States to Cuba. Includes a few later papers of Mariada C. Arensberg (later Bourgin), executive secretary of the
Cuban Freedom Committee.
Creator:
Bourgin, Mariada C.
Creator:
Cuban Freedom Committee
Physical Location: Hoover Institution Library & Archives
The collection is open for research; materials must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual
or digital media material in the collection, they must be reformatted before providing access.
For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
Acquired by the Hoover Institution Library & Archives in 1997.
[Identification of item], Cuban Freedom Committee records, [Box no., Folder no. or title], Hoover Institution Library & Archives.
The United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) set up the Cuban Freedom Committee in late 1960 to sponsor anti-Castro
radio broadcasts similar to those of Radio Free Europe. The committee appeared as a private activist group that solicited
donations for the operation, later identified as a funding conduit for CIA domestic operations.
The Cuban Freedom Committee produced Free Radio Cuba, a stridently anti-Castro program that was broadcast before, during,
and after the Bay of Pigs invasion on licensed stations in the United States and overseas including WKWF, Key West; WGBS,
Miami; and Radio Swan from the Swan Islands off the coast of Honduras.
Sources:
Historical Dictionary of American Propaganda, Martin J. Manning and Herbert Romerstein, Greenwood Press, Westport Ct., 2004 "Ex-Pittsburger Heads Cuban Freedom Group:
Mrs. Arensberg Named Executive Secretary; Financing Broadcasts Aim,"
Pittsburg Post-Gazzette, April 4, 1961
Scope and Content of Collection
The collection is comprised of records from Mariada C. Arensberg (later Mariada Bourgin), the executive secretary of the Cuban
Freedom Committee and later the special assistant to the U.S. assistant secretary of state for education and cultural affairs.
Materials include correspondence, speeches, reports, radio broadcast recordings and transcripts from Radio Free Cuba, financial
records, press releases, clippings, notes, and other printed matter.
The records of the Cuban Freedom Committee and Radio Free Cuba document research efforts and the creation of and reaction
to radio broadcasts to Cuba. Material includes research files on topics such as Fidel Castro, political conditions and civil
rights in Cuba, the Cuban economy, Cuban propaganda, Latin American groups, Cuban society after Castro, Cuban exiles, Cuban
inmates, Cuban intellectuals, Cuban schools, Cuban subversive activities in Latin America, and Cuban-Russian relations, as
well as material relating to the CIA's involvement in Radio Free Cuba.
As a special assistant in the Department of State, Arensberg was in charge of its programs for women and minorities. Particularly,
there is information relating to increasing the participation in international cultural exchange programs documented through
correspondence, university publications, and print materials.
English and Spanish names of events and organizations were used interchangeably throughout the Cuban Freedom Committee records.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Civil rights -- Cuba
Cuba -- Politics and government -- 1959-1990
Anti-communist movements
Cubans -- United States
Cuba -- Foreign relations -- United States
United States -- Foreign relations -- Cuba
Radio broadcasting -- Cuba
Cuba -- Foreign relations -- Latin America
Latin America -- Foreign relations -- Cuba
Free Cuba Radio