Meet Elizabeth Acle
Latino staffers at NPR share their family stories of perseverance, sacrifice, and hard work to achieve the American Dream. These stories are defined by universal values of pride, hope, and an endless determination to help shape the new American landscape.
There are many chapters that can be told when talking about my family’s experience leaving Cuba to come to the United States, and their experiences as Latinos in this country. For the sake of time (and space), however, I will keep this story succinct and tell a small part of my family’s tale.
My Cuban parents came to the United States as children just after the revolution. Fearing that the government would indoctrinate the children in the schools to communism and terminate parental rights, Cuban parents were hurrying to send their children to the U.S. My mother, just ten years old, came to the US alone and lived with relatives for half a year. My aunt (the youngest) was about to be handed over to the church in “operation Peter Pan” (a program set up to relocate Cuban children coming to the U.S. without their parents into foster homes). She spent one night in a camp in Florida City before a relative, who had already taken in my uncle and their cousins, said she and her husband could house all the children if my grandmother moved to the U.S. to help. My grandfather, a lawyer who held hope that the new government could not hold onto power, remained in Cuba until the defeat at the Bay of Pigs. It was then that he decided to give up all the family belongings and reunite with his family in the U.S. The Cuban government seized their home. Shortly after, free travel to and from Cuba was halted.
Once living in the U.S., my grandfather and grandmother received job offers in California to teach Spanish. However, not wanting to separate the family after losing so much, his brother suggested that the two families live together. Both families lived under one roof in a three-bedroom house for five years until my great-uncle’s family moved into a house of their own. My grandfather, the Cuban lawyer, started out as a pharmacy delivery man and eventually opened a pharmacy with his brother while my grandmother, who held a doctorate in philosophy, worked as an independent seamstress making dresses from pictures women cut out of magazines.
After Batista fled the country in December of 1958, my paternal grandmother’s husband — who had been a career military man in Batista’s army until 1958 and was living in the U.S — was incarcerated during a visit to Cuba for having served in Batista’s army. When he was released, he returned to the U.S. with my grandmother and never returned to Cuba, since the government was sending many people to be executed by the firing squads. My father traveled between Cuba (where his father was) and the U.S. for a short time before moving to the U.S. permanently. Once here, my father, who was only a boy, filled out the papers needed to obtain a visa for my grandfather to come to the U.S. with his family.
“…anything you learn is useful. Abuela had a degree, but it was her sewing that helped us.”
It is no surprise that faith, family, and education are among the highest values in our family. It was faith that helped the adults endure the difficulty of fleeing their homes, and separating from each other and their children without any guarantee that they would be reunited. It was the support of relatives that allowed the family to stay together when so many others were torn apart. Regarding education and knowledge, I believe something my mother recently said to me sums it up best, “Anything you learn is useful. Abuela had a degree, but it was her sewing that helped us.” My family had to rebuild their lives with nothing but each other, their faith, a strong work ethic, and the knowledge they possessed. I am thankful for these values my family instilled in me and hope to pass them on to the future generations of my family.
