May 13, 2005 - 5:00 PM
On April 20, 1980, hundreds of Cuban “undesirables” set sail from Havana’s Mariel Harbor for the United States. Over the next five months 125,000 Cubans took to the sea in an often-desperate attempt to reach South Florida. Their chaotic and widely publicized exodus forever changed the Cuban émigré community and today the Mariel Boatlift remains a flashpoint for Cuban-Americans. On the 25th anniversary of this momentous event, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Mirta Ojito (author of the recently released memoir, Finding Mañana) and filmmaker Lisandro Perez (executive producer of “Mas Alla del Mar”) join Prof. Ted Henken of Baruch College and others in assessing the impact of the boatlift on both sides of the Florida Straits. Prof. Mauricio Font, director of the Bildner Center of Western Hemisphere Studies at the City University of New York, will moderate.