Peter Pan,

Freedom Flights
By: Dacey Presnell
 Summary
● Known in Spanish as “Los
Vuelos De La Libertad”
● Fidel Castro became leader
● Cuba became a communist
country
● Parents sent their kids to The
United States with their visa
● A program that transported
Cubans to Miami was created
● Many parents were not reunited
with their kids
 Fidel Castro
● Lead an overthrow of the military
dictatorship in 1959
● Established the first communist
state in the Western Hemisphere
● Ruled over Cuba for nearly five
decades
● Cuba had an antagonistic
relationship with the United States
● Relationship with the United States
lead to the Bay of Pigs invasion and
the Cuban missile crisis
 Bay of Pigs Cuban Missile
Invasion Crisis
● October 1962
● A political standoff
● April 1961
● The installation of nuclear-armed
● A failed attack Soviet missiles on Cuba
launched by CIA ● 90 miles away from the U.S.
shores
during the Kennedy
● John F. Kennedy made a public
administration announcement bringing Americans’
● Attempt to push Fidel attention to the missiles
Castro from power ● Stated that they would use military
force to neutralize this perceived
threat
 Story of Carlos Eire
● The Cuban missile crisis became a bigger problem
● Close to a nuclear war
● A Cuban boy put on a plane by his mother
● Alone in the United States
● Foster family planned on taking care of him temporarily
● Sent to another foster home
● Populated by unaccompanied Cuban children
● Considered juvenile delinquents
● Bullied by kids who tried to get him to commit crimes when
he refused
● Finally a Cuban uncle claimed Carlos Eire and his brother
 Carlos Eire’s Backstory
● Raised in a wealthy family
● “We were under watch all the
time,” stated Carlos Eire
● Forced to praise Castro’s regime
in school
● Limit his movements
● Adjust his life under surveillance
● Parents were worried their
children might be sent to work
camps
 Operation Peter Pan
● 60% of children became the responsibility of the United
States home (never reunited with their parents)
● Private donations came into finance the program
● Eisenhower administer arranged foster care for refugee
children
● The United States cooperated with keeping the program
out of the news
● Program was kept a secret
● Operation Peter Pan ended after the Cuban missile crisis
 Source
https://www.history.com/news/cold-war-refugee-oper
ation-peter-pan-cuba-eisenhower