In 1962, newspaper headlines screamed alarming news about the Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy and the United States were locked in a tense political game of chess with the Soviet Union. For 13 days, American citizens - and people all over the world - waited with unease for the confrontation to come to a head. Ultimately, President Kennedy and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev agreed to a compromise that ended the standoff and the Soviet Union removed the nuclear missiles they'd placed in Cuba, just 90 miles from the coast of Florida.
Just five years previously, Cuban President Fulgencio Batista was still in power. Amid rumblings and early signs of a coming Revolution against the oppressive Cuban leader, an Airstream Wally Byam Caravan arrived to tour the country. It's amazing looking back, 58 years later, that we were able to meet the Cuban people and learn about their culture as we enjoyed unique foods and visited sugarcane plantations, nightclubs, rum distilleries, Spanish colonial buildings, cigar factories, and tropical forests.
One moment trapped in time for the Caravan was meeting with President Batista, pictured here speaking to Louise Hawks and Wally Byam. Wally had tremendous pride in being American. His Caravans not only made other nations and places available to Airstreamers, but also shared with those other nations a better understanding of the United States - and represented our ideals of freedom, even in foreign lands whose rulers did not share those ideals.
What was truly impactful about the Caravan was a relationship formed that stand the test of time. In Cuba, Helen Byam Schwamborn met a man named Roberto, whose last name is lost in time. Due to the Revolution, Roberto was forced to flee his homeland, where he went to México to continue teaching. Helen and Roberto corresponded for decades.
The Airstream Caravan wasn't about politics. It was about people. Wally believed that's what brought nations together with the understanding that we are all the same, even with diversity in geo-politics, language, customs, and religion. Even during periods of oppression and unease, the strength of people was evident, on every Airstream Caravan, whether we toured Africa or México, Central America or Europe, or yes, even Cuba.
