On November 6th, 1940, a young boy later to be known as El Presidente, Fidel Castro, wrote a letter to then U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt.

This letter is on display at the National Archives in Washington, and I am reprinting it here. The handwriting is a bit rough, but for the most part I can figure out the words. Still, Spanish words I do not know may have some errors. For this I apologize. (please /msg me if you can better glean the words from the letter, URL below.) Beyond that, I am reproducing the original spelling and phrasing.

Hey, English is a second language for him. Cut young Fidel some slack.


President of the United States.
If you like, give me a ten dollar bill green american, in the letter, because never I have not seen a ten dollar bill green american and I would like to have one of them.

My address is:
Sr. Fidel Castro
Colegio de Bolover
Santiago de Cuba
Oriente, Cuba

I don't know very English but I know very much Spanish and I suppose you don't know very Spanish but you know very English because you are American but I am not American.

Thank you very much, Good by. Your friend, Fidel Castro

If you want iron to make your ships I will show you the bigest mines of iron of the land. They are in Mayori, Oriente Cuba.


The actual letter can be seen at http://www.nara.gov/exhall/originals/castro.html

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