Editing Operation Peter Pan (section)

== Operations ==
=== Emigration ===
By January 1961, 6,500 Cuban children were enrolled in Miami and Miami-adjacent schools.<ref name="Shnookal 2020 Operation Pedro Pan and the Children Who Could Fly"/> By September 1962, that number had jumped to 19,000.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Shnookal |first1=Deborah |chapter=The Dark Side of Neverland |pages=160–196 |jstor=j.ctv12sdxzr.11 |doi=10.2307/j.ctv12sdxzr.11 |title=Operation Pedro Pan and the Exodus of Cuba's Children |date=2020 |publisher=University of Florida Press |isbn=978-1-68340-155-1 |s2cid=242704360 }}</ref> And while Pedro Pans are often depicted as babies, infants or elementary-school-aged children, most of them were actually teenaged boys.

A lack of limitations placed on how many were admitted coupled with federally-funded foster care made the Cuban Children's Program one unlike any other. It only continued to grow and get more complex.

In January 1961, the U.S. embassy of Cuba closed, but Operation Peter Pan persisted. Instead of visas, children received waivers in the form of simple letters signed by Walsh effectively gaining them entrance into the country. Airlines were instructed to accept these letters as official documents and, as an added incentive, the U.S. government covered the cost of flights.<ref name="Shnookal 2020 Operation Pedro Pan and the Children Who Could Fly"/>

From there, things continued to spiral. In September of that year, the State Department began allowing Cuban child refugees to apply for visa waivers on behalf of their parents. For many who could not otherwise afford it or did not already have other relatives in the United States, this became a fairly regular means of familial immigration.<ref name="Shnookal 2020 Operation Pedro Pan and the Children Who Could Fly"/>

=== Funding ===
By late 1960, Castro had expropriated several companies that made up the American Chamber of Commerce in Havana, including [[Standard Oil Company|Esso Standard Oil Company]] and Freeport Sulfur Company. The leaders of these companies moved to Miami while they analyzed the actions of Cuba's new government. Under the impression that Castro's rule would be brief, they agreed to aid the Cuban children by providing funding for Operation Peter Pan. Through collaborations with Baker, these business leaders agreed to help secure donations from multiple US businesses and send them to Cuba.

Because Castro was supervising all major monetary transactions, the businessmen were very careful in how the funds were transferred. Some donations were sent to the Catholic Welfare Bureau and others were written out as checks to citizens living in Miami. These individuals then wrote checks out to the W. Henry Smith Travel Agency in Havana, which helped fund the children's flights to the United States. It was necessary to send the funds in American currency because Castro had ruled that plane tickets could not be purchased with [[Cuban peso]]s.

=== Housing ===
As the need for shelters grew as the children arrived in increasing numbers, several prominent locations were converted to house them, including Camp Matecumbe, the [[Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport|Opa-locka Airport]] Marine barracks. Special homes, authorized by state officials and operated by Cuban refugees, were formed in several hundred cities across the nation including [[Albuquerque, New Mexico]]; [[Lincoln, Nebraska]]; [[Wilmington, Delaware]]; [[Fort Wayne, Indiana]]; [[Jacksonville, Florida|Jacksonville]] and [[Orlando, Florida]].

Many children were placed in foster care, some were placed in positive living environments and others endured emotional and physical neglect. Laws prevented any relocated children from being housed in reform schools or centers for juvenile delinquents. Further, the minors were not made available for adoption.

=== End ===

The Cuban Children's Program remained a secret until February 1962, when ''[[The Plain Dealer]]'' introduced its readers to the masses of unaccompanied Cuban minors who made their way across the country for three years unnoticed. On March 9 of the same year, the ''[[Miami Herald]]''<nowiki/>'s [[Gene Miller]] also ran a story about the event, in which he coined the term Operation Pedro Pan.<ref name=Bradford2016>{{cite journal |last1=Bradford |first1=Anita Casavantes |title=Remembering Pedro Pan: Childhood and Collective Memory Making in Havana and Miami, 1960–2000 |journal=Cuban Studies |date=2016 |volume=44 |issue=1 |pages=283–308 |id={{Project MUSE|613549}} {{ProQuest|1785500897}} |doi=10.1353/cub.2016.0011 |jstor=44111920 |s2cid=147381213 }}</ref>

The American portion of Operation Peter Pan ended when all air traffic between the United States and Cuba ceased in the aftermath of the [[Cuban Missile Crisis]] of October 1962.<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Bolender |first=Keith |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt183p8v9 |title=Voices From the Other Side: An Oral History of Terrorism Against Cuba |date=2010 |publisher=Pluto Press |doi=10.2307/j.ctt183p8v9 |jstor=j.ctt183p8v9 |isbn=978-0-7453-3040-2}}</ref> Cuban immigrants were instead re-routed to Spain and other countries following the Cuban Missile Crisis, and Cuban immigrants would have to travel via Spain or Mexico to reach the United States until 1965.

In December of 1965, the United States established a program of [[Freedom Flights]] (''los vuelos de la libertad'') to unite Cuban parents with their children. The Catholic Welfare Bureau reported that, once the Freedom Flights began, nearly 90% of the minors still in its care were reunited with their parents.<ref>{{Cite web |title=History |url=https://www.pedropan.org/history |access-date=2022-04-01 |website=www.pedropan.org}}</ref>

Remnants of the program would continue up until 1981. An estimate of 25,000 children were affected by the program.<ref name=":1" />