Operation Pedro Pan

Poignant stories from one of

the world's largest political exoduses of children



Praise for the first

edition:



"Compelling

reading."--New Republic



"A collection

of tearful testimonies woven with a tale of the event that unfolded in Cuba and

led desperate parents to make the heart-wrenching decision to send their

children along to a foreign country."--Miami Herald



"[Conde]

does an impressive job of reporting dozens of personal stories and fascinating

vignettes. . . . A compilation of tales, some moving, many astonishing."--Chicago

Tribune



"A

well-researched history of Operation Pedro Pan, a portrait of early

revolutionary Cuba and a compendium of testimony from the now-grown children."--Publishers

Weekly



"The

book's primary value lies in the individual stories, from tearful departure and

arrival in Miami to temporary shelters and placement in homes or, in some

cases, in orphanages; to learning a new language and adjusting and, in many

cases, assimilating; to reunions with parents, adolescence in the '60s and '70s,

and adulthood."--Booklist



"Conde

does an excellent job of narrating the essential outline of the history of

Operation Pedro Pan, and an equally superb job of analyzing the circumstances

that created this exodus, from the viewpoint of those who felt compelled to

create it and keep it going. . . . Operation

Pedro Pan is . . . as much a primary source as it is a work of history, as

much a window onto a mentality as it is a guide to events, names, and

institutions."--Carlos M. N. Eire, Hispanic

American Historical Review



"Fascinating

is the least one can say about this book. It's the story of thousands of Cuban children

who wouldn't grow up under communism and were sent by their parents to the never-never

land of America. Some of them lived happily ever after because this version of

Peter Pan is a tragedy with a happy ending sometimes. Fidel Castro, by the way,

plays a very credible Captain Hook."--Guillermo

Cabrera Infante , Cervantes Prize‒winning

novelist



On

August 11, 1961, at the age of ten, Yvonne Conde left Cuba in one of the world's

largest political exoduses of children in history--Operation Pedro Pan. Between

1960 and 1962 over 14,000 children were sent out of Cuba alone by desperate

parents who feared for their children's future under Castro. Unlike Peter Pan,

however, these children continued to grow up even while separated from their

families.

As the children arrived in temporary camps in Miami,

volunteers such as Father Bryan O. Walsh helped them find new homes across the

country. Conde tracked down hundreds of these children to tell their diverse

stories--their uplifting, poignant, and sometimes tragic experiences in American

foster homes and orphanages. Because Conde herself was a Pedro Pan child,

others have opened up to her like never before to share their feelings about

this painful time in their lives. Today, these children and their families

struggle to heal the emotional scars of their long separation.

In this edition, with a new prologue, Conde looks

back on Operation Pedro Pan from the vantage point of six decades and brings

readers up to date on events and discoveries since the groundbreaking first publication

of this book in 1999. Writing with compassion and rare insight, Conde uncovers

the true tales of a little-known episode of the Cold War.