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Biography of Ramón Grau San MartinName: Ramón Grau San MartinBirth Date: September 13, 1887 Death Date: July 28, 1969 Place of Birth: Pinar del Río, Cuba Nationality: Cuban Gender: Male Occupations: physician, president Ramón Grau San Martin Ramón Grau San Martin (1887-1969) was a Cuban physician. Appointed provisional president of Cuba in 1933, he was elected to the presidency in 1944.Ramón Grau San Martin was born in Pinar del Río Province on Sept. 13, 1887. Although his father, a prosperous tobacco grower, wanted him to continue in the business, Grau dreamed of becoming a doctor. Despite family opposition he entered the University of Havana, receiving his degree of doctor of medicine in 1908. He then traveled to France, Italy, and Spain to round out his medical training. He returned to Cuba and in 1921 became professor of physiology at the University of Havana. He wrote extensively on medical subjects, including a university textbook on physiology.Political CareerGrau's reputation, however, rests not on his medical achievement but on his political involvement. In the late 1920s he supported student protests against dictator Gerardo Machado and in 1931 was imprisoned. After …showed first 150 words…
…showed last 150 words…determined opposition in Congress and from conservative elements in his own party. For many Cubans, Grau failed to fulfill the aspirations of the anti-Machado revolution.After turning over the presidency to his protégé, Carlos Prío, in 1948, Grau virtually withdrew from public life. He emerged again in 1952 to oppose Batista's coup d'etat. Grau ran for president in the 1954 and 1958 Batista-sponsored elections but withdrew just prior to each election day, claiming government fraud. After Castro came to power in 1959, Grau retired to his home in Havana, where he died on July 28, 1969. Further Reading For valuable information on Grau's first administration see Commission on Cuban Affairs, Problems of the New Cuba (1935). Grau's political career is discussed in detail in William S. Stokes, Latin American Politics (1959), and in Ramon Eduardo Ruiz, Cuba: The Making of a Revolution (1968). See also Hubert Clinton Herring, A History of Latin America (1955; 3d ed. 1968). |