A clandestine cell of Eastern European Jewish immigrants in Key West in the 1890s delivered weapons to the Cuban revolutionary rebels who chased the Spanish Empire out of the Americas. Jews in Key West and Tampa were drawn to the revolutionary movement led by José Martí and paralleled the Zionist cause that led to the creation of Israel. Author Arlo Haskell will discuss this exciting and little-known piece of Florida-Cuban history.

Arlo Haskell is currently executive director of Key West Literary Seminar, the nonprofit organization whose eponymous writers’ conference has been held annually since 1983. His 2017 book, The Jews of Key West: Smugglers, Cigar Makers, and Revolutionaries, won the Phillip and Dana Zimmerman Gold Medal for Florida Nonfiction from the Florida Book Awards and a President’s Medal from the Florida Authors and Publishers Association.

This event is funded by the Florida Humanities Florida Talks: At Home! program.