Strug & LaPorte to Discuss Research on "Pedro Pan" Refugees

Dr. David Strug, a professor at WSSW and Dr. Heidi Heft LaPorte, an associate professor at Lehman College, are conducting research on the Child Welfare Cuban Refugee Service Program, better known as Operation Peter Pan, or more commonly Operation Pedro Pan.

Operation Pedro Pan, run by the US Department of Health, Education and Welfare, sent more than 14,000 Cuban children to the United States as unaccompanied minors in 1961 and 1962. Among them were 400 Jewish children. Doctors Strug and LaPorte have interviewed close to 50 of these Jewish Cuban-American children, now in their fifties and sixties and living mostly in South Florida, to learn how this uprooting has affected their lives.

Strug and LaPorte will be talking about their research and interviews with former Peter Pan children at a conference sponsored by the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research on November 2, 2009. The conference, entitled “New York and the American Jewish Experience,” will take place at the Center for Jewish History in NYC, at 15 W. 16th St. Click here for map and directions.

The conference is free and open to the public.