Pathfinder editorial director Steve Clark spoke on the lessons of Pathfinder’s newest book, October 1962: The "Missile" Crisis as Seen from Cuba by Tómas Diez Acosta, at meetings in Newark, New Jersey, and Brooklyn on September 20 and 21.

Naomi Craine reports from Newark that the event there brought in more than $1,200, including a contribution by a meatpacking worker who is a new reader of Pathfinder books.

At the Brooklyn meeting another new contributor was won in the course of Clark’s talk and the animated discussion that followed, and $535 was collected, as well as $135 in new or increased pledges.

The nearly $13,000 collected to date is already being put to work, as Pathfinder’s editors, international "reprint army" of volunteers, and printshop editors organize to carry out an ambitious publishing program for the rest of 2002.

Hundreds of copies of October 1962: The "Missile" Crisis as Seen from Cuba have been shipped from the new Pathfinder distribution center in Atlanta. Supporters of Pathfinder will aggressively promote the new title at book fairs in New York, Baltimore, Detroit, and Houston, all happening on the weekend of September 28–29.

Emily Fitzsimmons, who is organizing the Pathfinder stall at "New York Is Book Country" September 29, reports that 150 copies of the Diez book will be prominently featured at that event. Volunteer sales representatives will meet book buyers there in an effort to get orders or appointments.

As the 40th anniversary of the October crisis approaches, Pathfinder promoters will take advantage of the special opportunities for discussion on that historic episode, in which the workers and farmers of Cuba stood up with courage and dignity as Washington prepared to invade the island and took the world to the brink of nuclear war.

The conferences, newspaper and magazine articles, and television and radio presentations on the subject will create special openings to publicize and sell the title, which makes available for the first time the Cuban side of the story.

One such event is the October 1 conference titled "On the 40th Anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis" to be held at the City University of New York. Panelists will include Arthur Schlesinger, a special assistant to U.S. president Kennedy during the 1962 events, and Carlos Alzugaray, the deputy director of Cuba’s Institute for Higher International Studies.

In the coming week, fund organizers will step up their efforts not only in winning new contributors but in collecting the money already pledged. At present, the collection stands about $15,000 behind the $28,350 mark--or 27 percent of the total--that we should have reached by now. If fund participants in every city build on the momentum that is growing, we can get the fund on track for completion in full and on time. Contributions to the fund can be sent to the Militant, 410 West Street, New York, NY 10014, with checks made out to Pathfinder.  
 
 
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