The Cuban Exile Community in Miami

Miami's Cuban exile community began with the wave of asylum seekers that, according to the National Archives, the Cuban Revolution of July 26, 1953 to January 1, 1959 sparked, a wave that grew as the 1950s came to a close.

The first federal step came in November 1960, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower asked Tracy S. Voorhees to serve as his Personal Representative for Cuban Refugees, which led to the Cuban Refugee Emergency Center in Miami (National Archives). On January 27, 1961 President John F. Kennedy directed Health, Education, and Welfare Secretary Abraham Ribicoff to investigate Cuban refugee activities under the executive branch. The National Archives notes that official state and locally based volunteer welfare agencies struggled to keep up with the needs of asylum seekers, and it describes the Cuban Refugee Program as the result of that effort to streamline refugee aid (National Archives).

The National Archives research guide frames the program itself as running from 1960 to 1970, the years in its title, and it keeps the federal files of the Miami program in a single record group described further down this page (National Archives). The Freedom Tower's role began within that span: a state marker dates its years as El Refugio from 1962 to 1974 (Florida Division of Historical Resources).

Nearly 495,000 people registered with the Cuban Refugee Program between 1961 and 1981, according to a 2025 Florida Historical Marker at the Freedom Tower on Biscayne Boulevard, and many of them remained in Miami.

The marker says many registrants passed through the Freedom Tower, which operated as the Cuban Refugee Center, known as El Refugio, from 1962 to 1974 (Florida Division of Historical Resources). Services there included identification cards, economic and food assistance, medical attention and employment leads, supported by the US Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1962 (Florida Historical Marker).

Resettlement services were part of the program. The same marker records that resettlement services led some Cubans to move to other parts of the United States, while many others remained in Miami and helped shape the city (Florida Division of Historical Resources). The marker gives no split between those who left and those who stayed, and no official source read today supplies one, so any precise share quoted elsewhere should be treated with caution.

The marker also calls the Freedom Tower an emblem of Miami's first economic boom and a national symbol of liberty sought and found by Cuban refugees (Florida Historical Marker). The building's own history is covered in the Digital Towns guides to the Freedom Tower; this page stays with the community that formed around it.

Exiles settled in southwest Miami along the Tamiami Trail and Flagler Street, a neighborhood the City of Miami says became a Cuban enclave after the revolution, known as Little Havana.

The City of Miami's historic preservation program site explains that the southwest area of the city was developed into suburban neighborhoods during the 1920s land boom, followed by construction of the Tamiami Trail, which became a main commercial corridor along with Flagler Street (City of Miami Historic Preservation). In the city's account, the exile enclave formed in that neighborhood, which had been developed decades before the revolution.

The Tower Theater, a designated City of Miami historic site, is the landmark the city ties to that change. It was built in 1926 to a design by architect Robert Law Weed, fully renovated in 1931, and designated a City of Miami historic site on May 7, 2013 (City of Miami Historic Preservation). The city says many Cuban exiles learned English watching movies with Spanish subtitles at the Tower Theater, and that for many it was an introduction to American culture (City of Miami).

A practical note for anyone looking the theater up in city records: the historic site page lists the address as 1508 SW 8 Avenue and sits under a Historic Sites and Districts list (City of Miami Historic Preservation). The current City of Miami Historic Preservation page says the list of historic sites is kept on an archived City of Miami website, and it counts over 100 individual resources and sites and 10 local districts in the Miami Register of Historic Places (City of Miami).

Cuban exiles in Miami could apply for permanent residence under the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, a law USCIS still applies today.

The act is Public Law 89-732, and it covers Cuban natives anywhere in the United States, Miami included (USCIS). USCIS says the act allows Cuban natives or citizens living in the United States who meet its requirements to apply to become lawful permanent residents (U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services). The current requirements include being a native or citizen of Cuba, having been inspected and admitted or paroled after January 1, 1959, and having been physically present in the United States for at least one year when filing Form I-485 (USCIS).

The January 1, 1959 date in the rule is the same date the National Archives uses for the end of the revolution, the revolution whose wave of asylum seekers led to the Cuban Refugee Emergency Center in Miami (National Archives; USCIS). The Mariel boatlift is covered in a separate Digital Towns guide.

The federal record set for the Miami program is the National Archives' Cuban Refugee Program files in Record Group 363, split into named series for public response, genealogy and administration.

The National Archives keeps the federal side of the Miami program's records in Record Group 363, Records of the Social and Rehabilitation Service, which mostly document administration at the agency and regional office level (National Archives). It names the series below for researchers and points genealogists to the A1 27 correspondence and the A1 38 state subject files for aid recipients and relatives trying to arrange an arrival or find a family member (National Archives).

The National Archives says these Record Group 363 files largely focus on the program's administration at the agency level and the administration of its regional offices, so a researcher looking for one Miami family should begin with the correspondence series it flags for genealogy, A1 27 and A1 38 (National Archives).

A family can start with the National Archives Record Group 363 correspondence series and then book the University of Miami Cuban Heritage Collection reading room in Coral Gables, open Monday to Friday, 9am to 4pm, by appointment.

The Cuban Heritage Collection asks for one week's notice to book a reading room appointment and takes research questions at [email protected] or (305) 284-4900 (University of Miami Libraries). The collection is in the Roberto C. Goizueta Pavilion on the second floor of the Otto G. Richter Library on the Coral Gables campus, reachable from University Station on Metrorail and served by Metrobus routes 48 and 56 and the Midnight Owl (500) (UM Libraries directions).

For immigration and naturalization files of exiles who arrived in Miami, the National Archives advises contacting the research facility tied to the person's point of entry and the place where the person was resettled, so a family moved by the program's resettlement services may need to check more than one facility (National Archives). Its Cuban Refugee Program page was last reviewed on February 14, 2025, so the series list above reflects that review (National Archives).

Last verified: October 18, 2026, on the National Archives, USCIS, Florida Division of Historical Resources and City of Miami historic preservation websites, with reading room details from the University of Miami Libraries.