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Luis Manrara was a Cuban scholar, political activist, and president of The Truth About Cuba Committee, Inc., a non-profit organization established by Cuban exiles in Miami in 1961 for the purpose of disseminating information about communist Cuba and its role in promoting communism throughout Latin America.

Dr. Lillian Manzor (b.1956) is the founding member, developer, and editor of the Cuban Theater Digital Archive, a bilingual cultural heritage site that provides inter-related information on writers, directors, texts, productions, festivals, venues and theater companies and digitized photographs, theater programs, and other resources, including video excerpts of theater productions. She is also a scholar, writer, and educator, currently an Associate Professor of Modern Languages and Literatures at the University of Miami College of Arts and Sciences, and curator of Cuban Culture on the Edge.

Dr. Manzor earned her Bachelor of Arts in Spanish and French from the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida in 1977. She then earned an M.A. in 1982 and Ph.D. in 1988 in Spanish from the University of Southern California. She worked as a Visiting Instructor of Spanish from 1983 to 1985 at the University of Notre Dame and from 1985 to 1988 at The University of Notre Dame. In 1988, she became an Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature at the University of California, Irvine before coming to the University of Miami in 1995. At the University of Miami in addition to being Professor, she has acted as Director of Graduate Studies, Director of Undergraduate Studies, Department Chair, and Director of Degree Programs in Modern Languages. She has also led numerous study abroad courses to Cuba, Chile, Spain, Panamá, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Guatemala.

She has a manuscript in the works called Marginality Beyond Return: US-Cuban Performances and Politics, which is about Cuban theater in the US. Her published works include: El Ciervo Encantado: An Altar in the Mangroves. With Jaime Gómez Triana. New York: Hemispheric Institute for Performance and Politics Tome Press, 2015; Teatro venezolano del siglo XX. Edited with Alberto Sarraín. La Habana: Editorial Alarcos, Colección Clásicos del Siglo XX, 2008; Teatro cubano actual: Dramaturgia escrita en Estados Unidos. Edited with Alberto Sarraín. La Habana: Ediciones Alarcos, 2005; Latinas on Stage. Edited with Alicia Arrizón, Berkeley: Third Woman Press, 2000, (the first book on Latina performance artists); and finally, Borges/Escher, Cobra/CoBrA: Un encuentro postmoderno. Madrid: Editorial Pliegos, 1996. She has also published dozens of peer-reviewed research articles in journals such as The Drama Review, Gestos, Ollantay Theater Magazine, Tablas, and Conjunto, book chapters, book reviews, and newspaper articles about U.S.-Cuba relations, collaboration, and travel. She has curated the exhibits “A Theatrical Thunderbolt. Cuban Playwright Virgilio Piñera in his Centenary” for the University of Miami Richter Library Cuban Heritage Collection, which ran August – December 2012, and “Protagonistas de los 60 en el teatro cubano” at University of Miami Richter Library Cuban Heritage Collection, which ran from March – August 2010. She published a bilingual online exhibit Cuban Theater in Miami: 1960-1980 (with Beatriz Rizk.) In 2013, this exhibit won an honorable mention in the Katharine Kyes Leab and Daniel J. Leab American Book Prices Current Exhibition Awards in the electronic exhibition category of Rare Books and Manuscripts Section of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL).

Dr. Manzor also works on incorporating GIS in digital humanities projects. She has a research project on performing arts spaces in Spanish in Miami called "Sites that Speak" created using the Scalar platform (http://scalar.usc.edu/hc/sites-that-speak/index) learned during the 2012 NEH Summer Institute for Advanced Topics in Digital Humanities on Digital Cultural Mapping.

Dr. Manzor has directed and edited the filmed documentation of over a hundred theatrical performances in major cities in Cuba as well as New York and Miami. She has worked as a dramatist, literary and cultural advisor on productions such as Cartas de amor a Stalin, Contigo, pan y cebolla, Huevos, Anna in the Tropics, Sonia se fue, and Gentefrikation.

She has acted as organizer and curator for countless symposiums, colloquium, and conferences, and given invited talks about her research and work. She has won grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Cuban Artist Fund, and Puentes Cubanos to support her research and work.

Her current research is in performance studies and digital humanities, which originated from her work on theater and performance from a literary perspective. She works with many theater companies in Miami and in Cuba and is actively involved in developing US-Cuba cultural dialogues through theater and performance. To this end, in 2004, Dr. Manzor launched the Cuban Theater Digital Archive with support of UML and collaboration Cuban National Council for Performing Arts. At this time, the Archive is the only place in the world collecting written texts and live performances by both communities in Cuba and in the U.S. Manzor says that, “Theater offers the chance for experiences that are completely foreign to us to sink in and take root, and with each live performance the audience forms an ephemeral community for a few hours. Theater’s potential to help us understand new perspectives is at the heart of my work on theater and on Cuba. I see theater as a tool for reconciliation.” (2017)

She notes that, “Fractures create unique challenges for scholarship due to separation between the on island and diaspora communities and the politics that get in the way.” Her work is therefore to “study how theater and digital culture and creativity can help in the reconciliation of exile Cuban communities with their counterparts on the island.” An example that Dr. Manzor gives of this kind of connection was the 2001 Miami Monologue Festival. She says that, “Reconciliation happens at the human level, recognizing pain and building trust. To face the past. Theater is a catalyst for reconciliation.” (2017)

Jorge Mañach (1898-1961) was a Cuban lawyer, philosopher and writer. Mañach graduated from Harvard University in 1920 with a degree in philosophy and continued his studies in France and Cuba. While in exile during the 1930s, Mañach taught at Columbia University in New York City, until returning to Cuba in 1939. Upon his return to Cuba, he continued his teaching career at University of Havana, and was also creator and contributor to Universidad del Aire, a radio instruction program.

Mañach participated in revolutionary activities against the Fulgencio Batista government in the 1930s and was exiled at various points of his adult life to Spain and the United States for political reasons. In 1960, he was forced into exile to Puerto Rico because of his dissent of the government of Fidel Castro. He died in Puerto Rico in 1961. He was married to Margot Baños and had one son, Dr. Jorge Mañach-Baños.

Jan Mapou (Jean-Marie Denis) is a Haitian author, playwright, director, and arts advocate. He was one of the founders of the Haitian Creole Movement, which began in Haiti in 1965. That same year he also created Sosyete Koukouy (The Fireflies Society), a multi-disciplinary arts company dedicated to preserving Haitian cultural traditions and rituals. In 1969, Mapou was arrested by the Duvalier government for his activities promoting Haitian Kreyol. He immigrated to New York in 1972, before settling in Miami in 1984. He helped found chapters of Sosyete Koukouy in both New York and Miami, and serves as the Society's artistic director. Mapou's writing legacy includes 2 poetry books,1 short story, and 8 plays. He has also directed more than 15 plays in Haiti, New York,and Miami. He owns Libreri Mapou (Mapou Bookstore) in Little Haiti, which has one of the largest inventories of titles on Haitian culture and history in the nation. He also hosts two radio programs on education and culture on WLRN Public Radio and has served on numerous boards, including the Miami Book Fair International. Finally, he is the co-founder of the Haitian Arts Alliance . In 2007, he was the recipient of the Folk Life Award from he State of Florida.

María Leopoldina (Polita) Grau Alsina was born in Havana, Cuba, on 19 November 1915 to Paulina Alsina Fernández and Francisco Grau San Martín. She was the second of five children: Paulina, Francisco, Ramón, and María Dolores Sánchez, the latter who was taken in by the Grau Alsina family upon her mother’s death. Along with her two sisters, Polita attended the Teresian school in Vedado.

Polita’s father Francisco died on 30 November 1930, and the family was taken in by his brother Ramón Grau San Martín. Grau San Martín was a professor of physiology at the University of Havana, and when students there began organizing and protesting against the administration of General Gerardo Machado, Grau San Martín joined them. He was imprisoned for his activities and released on the condition that he leave the island. In January of 1931, Grau San Martín and the Grau Alsina family went into exile in Miami, where they joined many other Cubans who opposed the Machado government.

In 1933, Machado was ousted from Cuba and the Grau Alsina family returned to the island with their uncle, who became president of Cuba. Teenaged Polita served as his first lady until January 1934 when Fulgencio Batista led a successful coup against Grau San Martín. The family was once again sent into exile, this time to Mexico and later Miami. Polita returned to Cuba in May and in September 1934, she married Roberto Lago, a leader of the student movement. Their continued political activity led to Polita’s third exile, arriving in Miami in 1935. On 21 August of that year, her husband Roberto died of appendicitis at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, and Polita returned to Cuba to bury him. In 1939, Polita married José (Pepe) Agüero, with whom she had two children, Ramón (Monchi) and Hilda.

Along with her uncle, Polita was very active in the Partido Auténtico (Authentic Party). In 1944, Ramón Grau San Martín was elected president of Cuba, serving until 1948. His protégé, Carlos Prío Socarrás, succeeded him. In 1952, Fulgencio Batista led another coup d'etat, and Polita became active in the opposition which was led by Prío Socarrás. She gave shelter to many anti-government activists and helped them gain political asylum at various foreign embassies in Havana. Because of her activities, Polita was once again forced into exile in Miami, where she remained until 1959 when the Castro-led revolution succeeded in ousting Batista.

Once again in Cuba, Polita joined her colleagues from the Partido Auténtico and was soon involved in the anti-Castro movement, becoming part of a group known as Rescate led by Tony Varona, coordinating the women who participated in the resistance. They helped the counterrevolutionary forces that were still fighting throughout the island, aided political prisoners, sheltered counterrevolutionaries, and helped move arms and munitions throughout the island.

After the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, Polita’s brother Ramón (Mongo) was recruited to help Miami-based priest Monsignor Bryan Walsh, who was trying to help Cuban parents get their children out of Cuba. With Mongo and Monsignor Walsh, Polita formed the core of Operation Pedro Pan which succeeded in getting over 14,000 unaccompanied children out of Cuba and to the United States. The siblings were arrested in 1965, accused of plotting to overthrow Fidel Castro, and received 30-year sentences.

Polita was released in 1978 and entered her final exile in Miami. Mongo Grau Alsina was freed in 1986 and joined his family in South Florida. From 1978 until her death, Polita focused her activities on raising awareness and garnering assistance for Cuban political prisoners, especially women, and on working with the Partido Auténtico reorganized in exile. She passed away on 21 March 2000 at the age of 84.