Vilma Espín

Vilma Espín Guillois was born on 7 April 1930, in Santiago de Cuba. She was the daughter of a wealthy Cuban lawyer, Jose Espín and wife Margarita Guillois. She had four siblings, Nilsa, Iván, Sonia and José. Espín attended Academia Pérez-Peña for primary school and studied ballet and singing at the Asociación Pro-Arte Cubano during the 1940s. In the 1950s, she studied chemical engineering at Universidad de Oriente, Santiago de Cuba (one of the first women in Cuba to study this subject). In university, Espin met her mentor Frank Pais in a university group called Oriente Revolutionary Action (ARO), which was responsible for the assault on the Moncada barracks. When she finally acquiesced, her brief academic career at MIT left her with even more animosity toward the United States, as she officially joined the 26th of July Movement on her way back to Cuba through Mexico. Espin only completed one semester at MIT. ==Role in the Cuban revolution==

Returning home, she became more involved with the opposition to the dictator Fulgencio Batista. Pepín Bosch, an executive of the Bacardi Corporation, arranged a meeting between CIA Inspector General Lyman Kirkpatrick and representatives of the 26th of July Movement in 1957. Espín, as both a revolutionary leader and the daughter of a Bacardi executive, told Kirkpatrick that the revolutionaries only wanted "what you Americans have: clean politics and a clean police system." She also acted as an interpreter for an interview of Fidel Castro by New York Times reporter Herbert Matthews in 1957, which served the dual purpose of spreading news of the revolution and assuring Cubans and the international community that Batista's claims of Castro's death were false. == Role in the Federation of Cuban Women ==

during the formation of the Federation of Cuban Women, August 1960 Vilma Espín was an outspoken supporter of gender equality in Cuba, but distinctly separated herself and the goals of the Federation of Cuban Women from traditional feminism, insisting advocacy for 'feminine' not 'feminist'. Her involvement in the revolution helped transform the role of women in Cuba and in 1960, Espín became the president of the Federation of Cuban Women, and remained in that position until her death in 2007. The organization's primary goals were educating women, giving them the necessary skills to seek gainful employment, and above all encouraging them to participate in politics and support the revolutionary government. In 1960, when sugar mills and cane fields were under attack across Cuba shortly before the Bay of Pigs invasion, the Federation of Cuban Women created the Emergency Medical Response Brigades to mobilize women against counter-revolution. The Cuban government and the Federation encouraged women to join the labor force, even going so far as to pass the Cuban Family Code in 1975, a law mandating that men must help with household chores and childcare to lighten the workload for working mothers. ==Role in the Cuban government==

Espín served as a member of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party from 1965 to 1989. She also held many other roles in the Cuban government, including chair of the Commission for Social Prevention from 1967 to 1971, director of Industrial Development in the Ministry of Food in 1969, president of the Institute of Childcare in 1971, and member of the Cuban Council of State in 1976. Espín took on the role of Cuba's First Lady for 45 years, initially taking on the role as the sister-in-law to Fidel Castro, who was divorced at the time he came to power. She officially became the First Lady in 2006 when her husband, Raúl Castro, became president. Espín headed the Cuban Delegation to the Congress of the International Federation of Democratic Women in Chile in September 1959. == Family ==

Espín was married to Raúl Castro, the former First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba, who is the brother to former First Secretary Fidel Castro. Their wedding took place in 1959, only weeks after the 26th of July Movement had successfully overthrown dictator Fulgencio Batista. She had four children (Deborah, Mariela, Nilsa, and Alejandro Castro Espín) and eight grandchildren. Her daughter, Mariela Castro, currently heads the Cuban National Center for Sex Education, and her son, Alejandro Castro Espín, is a Colonel in the Ministry of Interior. ==Death and legacy==

Espín died in Havana at 4:14 p.m. EDT on 18 June 2007, following a long illness. An official mourning-period was declared from 8 p.m. on 18 June until 10 p.m. on 19 June. A funeral ceremony was held at the Karl Marx Theatre in Havana the day after her death. Thousands of Cubans paid their respects in a receiving line at the Plaza of the Revolution in Havana. Raúl Castro was in the receiving line, but Fidel Castro was not present. The Vilma Espín elementary school was opened in Havana in April 2013. Espin founded the Frente Continental de Mujeres Contra la Intervención (Continental Women’s Front Against Intervention, FCMCI) and the Regional Center of the International Democratic Federation of Women for the Americas and Caribbean. ==Notes==