![]() ![]() Despite an honorary doctorate from Yale University, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and a statue in the Hollywood Wax Museum, Celia didn't put on airs. When I interviewed her in 1992 for an article in The Orange County (California) Register, I was struck with just how down to earth she was. Just as she helped me to see that in myself. ![]() From her, they got a glimpse of the joy of being Cuban and the richness of our culture. And by making the world jam, she became our greatest cultural export.Ĭelia brought the irresistible, soulful rhythm of Afro-Cuban music to people who knew nothing else about our island. As famous as Cuban cigars, the warmth of our people and the beauty of our beaches, Celia was the voice of Cuba. ![]() She was a national symbol of pride - of how far we could go when we combined our hard work with a hearty laugh and a good dance. No matter how far away from Havana her career or political differences took her, Celia was still one of us. We blasted the tapes of the singer's pure, pitch-perfect alto voice - smuggled to us by our Miami relatives - at every wedding, birthday party and family reunion. Our neighborhood watch group could lecture us or slap us with fines or maybe even send us to jail. The Salsa Queen's decision to defect to the United States made her an enemy of Cuban leader Fidel Castro and his communist government. "Our pain is immense, but even greater is the task that Celia encourages us all to carry out.(CNN) - During my childhood in Cuba, it was against the law to play Celia Cruz albums. On the sad afternoon of January 11, 1980, at the memorial service to bid farewell to the departed fighter, Armando Hart, one of her closest and dearest comrades, said about her words that today have full validity to remember that slender and brave young woman from Media Luna who is still and forever will be an inspiration to whole generations of revolutionaries: ![]() One of her most relevant works was the organization and development of the Office of Historical Affairs of the Council of State, where she devoted herself to preserving the historical heritage of the Revolution-especially whatever was related to the work of Fidel-hearing and solving ordinary citizens’ problems, and spearheading projects of great social and economic usefulness under the guidance of the leader of the Revolution. She was the first woman to join the ranks of the Rebel Army on April 23, 1957, and since then she became Commander in Chief Fidel Castro’s most faithful aide, staying by his side until her decease while in charge of important responsibilities at the level of the State and the Communist Party of Cuba. His great activism to spread the work of the Apostle earned him the placing of his bust atop the Turquino Peak in the year of his centenary in 1953, so it was not surprising that Celia became an early member of the 26th of July movement, founded by Fidel, after the attacks on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes barracks in the cities of Santiago de Cuba and Bayamo, respectively.Ĭelia's organization of networks of peasant collaborators to support the landing of the yacht Granma was essential for the survival of the expeditionary force led by Fidel, Raul, Almeida and Ernesto Che Guevara, among others, who despite the large-scale persecution of tyrant Batista’s forces would form the nucleus of the Rebel Army that would make possible the Revolutionary triumph of January 1, 1959. Her mother died when Celia was a child, and since then she followed her father, who was an example of the best of the first republican generation of highly patriotic professionals who advocated Marti's roots, which he passed on to his daughter as he devoted himself to rural medicine, without thinking about social climbing by profiting from his profession. January 11 will mark the 42nd anniversary of the death of Celia Sánchez Manduley, known as the Heroine of the Mountains and the Plains, who died of cancer at 59 however, those intense years of life were enough for her to make and indelible impression on Cuban history.Ĭelia Esther de los Desamparados was born on in the town of Media Luna, in what today is the province of Granma, to Acacia Manduley and the rural doctor Manuel Sánchez Silveira, who had 9 children. ![]()
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