Robert N. Pierce Collection

Collection

Identifier: MS Group 235

Staff Only

Scope and Content

Photographs, newspaper clippings, a draft of a speech, and a press packet containing a letter, pass, and cloth patch. The collection contains materials from Pierce's January 1959 reporting trip to Cuba, mere weeks after Fidel Castro's overthrow of the Batista regime. Representing the Sarasota News, he participated in a press visit, which the new Cuban government called Operación Verdad (Operation Truth) with the intention to highlight positive views of Cuba and its revolution to the rest of the world. The bulk of the collection consists of photographs that Pierce took in Cuba and the accompanying copies of news articles that ran as a special series in the Sarasota News. Topics include the trial of Sosa Blanco, Castro's January 21 speech and mass rally at the Presidential Palace, and the La Cabana prison. One set of photographs (noted below) was provided to visiting journalists as official government photos. The collection is arranged by subject.

Dates

Creation: 1959

Creator

Pierce, Robert N. (Robert Nash), 1931-2010. (Person)

Access

The collection is open for research.

Biographical/Historical Note

Robert N. Pierce (1931-2010) worked as a reporter, editor, and educator throughout the South. He was employed variously by the Miami Herald, Shreveport Journal, St. Petersburg Evening Independent, San Angelo Standard-Times, and Sarasota News. Following his career as a journalist and editor, he went on to become a professor of journalism at the University of Minnesota and Louisiana State University. In 1970 he became a faculty member of the College of Journalism and Communications at the University of Florida. Pierce was the author or contributor to more than twelve scholarly publications. Pierce resided in Micanopy, Florida, at the time of his death in 2010.

Extent

0.2 Linear feet (1 box)

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

Newspaper clippings, contents of an official press packet, and photographs from reporter Robert N. Pierce's trip to Cuba shortly after Fidel Castro came to power in 1959.