1 Born in a peasant family in rural Galicia, Ángel Castro was a first-generation landowner determined to ensure that his children never had to suffer the hardship he endured.
1 Born in a peasant family in rural Galicia, Ángel Castro was a first-generation landowner determined to ensure that his children never had to suffer the hardship he endured.
3 In 1920, Ángel (45) met Lina Ruz González (17, seen here on horseback), who entered his household as a servant but quickly became his soul mate. Despite their age difference, the couple forged an effective partnership, with Ángel taking care of the farm work while Lina balanced the books, ran the company store, and raised a family. The couple would have seven children in total, all of them born before they were married in 1943.
4 Fidel Castro, pictured here as a young boy, was born on August 13, 1926, on his parents’ vast farm in Birán, in what was then Oriente Province. Castro credited growing up alongside the children of his father’s Cuban and Haitian laborers with inoculating him against the snobbery and racism prevalent among many wealthy Cubans.
5 The Castro farmhouse. The area underneath provided shelter for animals and farm equipment, while the generous porch was the site of social gatherings, card games, and political wrangling.
6 The one-room schoolhouse on the Castro property. Castro always appreciated the value of education but never had much patience for the give-and-take of the classroom.
7 At age seven, Castro was sent away for private tutoring to this home in Santiago de Cuba, where he passed six long months at the hands of an incompetent tutor. Starved for intellectual nourishment, as well as food, he regarded the experience as a form of banishment.
8 The next year, Castro, at left with brothers Raúl and Ramón, entered Colegio de La Salle, an elite private school in Santiago de Cuba, where he relished the contact with peers and recreational excursions around Santiago Bay.
10 On school holidays, Castro loved to ride and hunt in the countryside above Birán, much of it owned or leased by Ángel, sometimes in the company of friends and siblings, but often on his own. So much time spent alone in the wilderness instilled in him the virtue of self-reliance, which proved useful as he moved from boarding school to boarding school, from university to politics, and from politics to guerrilla warfare.
11 Castro, standing at left, surrounded (moving clockwise) by sister Angela, brother Ramón, sister Juanita, an aunt, and brother Raúl.
12 At the age of twelve, having worn out his welcome at La Salle, Castro, second from the left in the front row, moved up the hill to Colegio de Dolores, one of the most prestigious schools on the island. Peers and prefects alike were impressed by his curiosity and athleticism.
13 In autumn 1942 Castro departed Santiago de Cuba for the nation’s capital and Colegio de Belén, a veritable factory of politicians and businessmen. Castro, second from the left in both photographs, quickly made a name for himself as a top athlete and student leader.
15 Though accomplished at soccer and basketball, Castro (second from left, above, and at left, below, in Pino del Río) also loved hiking and mountain climbing, sometimes helping his teachers get the boys out of dicey situations.
17 In his last year of high school, Castro was selected as one of several Belén seniors to defend private school education before an audience of alumni, family, and political luminaries. Castro, who would later dismantle Cuba’s private education system, delivered a much lauded performance.
18 One of three valedictorians of the class of 1945, Castro’s caption reads: “He stood out in all subjects related to letters. Excellent and dependable, he always defended the School flag with valor and pride. . . . He goes on to a career in the Law and we have no doubt that he will fill the book of his life with brilliant pages.”
