Resettlement re-cap: a periodic report from the Cuban Refugee Center, March 1963

              SPONSOR CUBAN REFUGEES
Fulfill Their Faith in Freedom
MARCH   1963
RESETTLEMENT   RE-CAP
A PERIODIC REPORT FROM THE CUBAN REFUGEE CENTER — FREEDOM TOWER, MIAMI 32, FLORIDA
U.   S.   DEPARTMENT  OF  HEALTH,   EDUCATION,   AND WELFARE      —      WELFARE ADMINISTRATION
U. S.  CUBAN  REFUGEE PROGRAM
MARSHALL WISE,  Director,  Refugee Center
JOHN FREDERICK THOMAS, Director, Washington, D. C.
J. ARTHUR LAZELL, Deputy Director For Resettlement HARRY  B.   LYFORD,  Editor
REFUGEE KNIT GOODS WORKER WINS OPERA CONTEST ™E SCORE
Refugees in Miami, over    100,000
REGISTERED
Week ending March 1     288
Since January 1961  160, 944
Weekly average, last 8 weeks   548
f^ W  ■ RESETTLED
Week ending March 1  261
Since January 1961  56,003
Weekly average, last 8 weeks 385
By Agencies since Jan. 1961:
}     ^H ,  Jk                                               Catholic Relief  32,305
v **^:                              \                                        ^k    (JJ                   International Rescue  12,315
k ^ "* ^   "l&f^                                           1 1                     Church World Service  9,493
Kx    ^^•\^W                   1 mL^rZ^A                                United HIAS  1,890
From the Cuban Opera Company in Havana, to a weaving machine in a knit goods plant at Lawrence, Mass., then to victory in a Metropolitan Opera Company regional audition at Boston is
the experience of Carlos Hevia, pictured above with his wife and child.  If he succeeds in
New York City auditions, Mr. Hevia hopes he can abandon his machine to pursue an operatic
career.  Urged by a teacher of voice to enter the contest, the refugee tenor practised diligently for roles he had left more than a year ago.  (Another Cuban opera singer, Sara Hel-
guera, mezzo soprano, was resettled to Lowell, Mass., where she was quite willing to become
a shoe factory trainee.)  Photo Courtesy BOSTON HERALD,
A YOUNG MAN CHALLENGES HIS COMMUNITY --AND ALL COMMUNITIES
nMiamifs charity cannot endure forever...What are WE doing to be Americans?"
This question was forcefully put to readers of the APPLETON (Wis.) POST-CRESENT by a letter to the editor, signed by David Prosser, Jr., an Appleton resident studying at DePauw
University, Greencastle, Ind.  Mr. Prosser writes, in part:
"The Cubans have given up everything to come to this land of freedom.  If freedom is unfriendly, if opportunity is not found, Cuban disappointment will be a catastrophic blow to
the United States. We are visited by the best of the Cuban people.  When Castro is at last
deposed, these refugees will return to their homes and rebuild their island.  If freedom
should fail them, they will return to Cuba with a bitterness that no revolution and no amount
of aid can rectify.
"Then, too, other nations are watching us.  How will Americans react to these foreigners?
Will we be smug and selfish, or will we open our hearts and our homes and lend assistance?
The problem can be boiled down to a few simple questions:  Is there one spare job in Appleton?
Is there one group, one organization, one individual with the humanity and circumstances to
sponsor one refugee family?...What are we doing to be American?
"Let us remember that America is the Mother of Exiles.  On Liberty Island in New York
harbor a giant statue invites every nation to send us its tired, its poor, its huddled masses
yearning to breathe free...Will there ever be an equal opportunity to lift the lamp of liberty? Will there ever be an equal chance to prove ourselves a great people -- without resort
to war?"
WHAT MORE REWARDING PEOPLE-TO-PEOPLE EFFORT THAN TO HELP CUBAN REFUGEES
UNDERSTAND AMERICAN GOVERNMENT IN YOUR OWN HOME TOWN?'