Adventures in Autographs, The Cuban Connection Part I

[Exhibitman]

Neat! It must be so interesting to pick in a place like Cuba. There are so many card issues that emerge from Latin America that have barely been cataloged. Here are some offbeat Cuban boxing pieces of interest:

This card is from a set that commemorates episodes during the successful 1933 revolution. The card depicts the arrival in Havana of the former Spanish light-heavyweight amateur champion Lorenzo Gomez Naya. Gomez Naya went on to an undistinguished career in Cuba and the USA ending with WWII. Royal Cigars branding and back that mentions it is part of a series of cards depicting scenes from the revolution.



This card is a promotional issue of Cuban brandy maker 3 Toneles. The card dates to December 1959 and carries the three year boxing record [1956-1959] of Florentino “The Ox” Fernandez, a Cuban middleweight contender with a blank space to write in the result of his December 1959 fight. Fernandez fought a bout in Cuba in April 1960 then fled to the USA. My suspicion is that the card had a very short issue life since the Cuban government rapidly outlawed professional boxing. I suppose he did hit like an ox; he was voted #57 on The Ring’s list of alltime greatest punchers. He lost a split decision to Gene Fullmer for the middleweight title, lost fights to Emile Griffith and Ruben Carter, beat Gaspar Ortega twice and KO’d Jose Torres. Overall he was 50-16-1 in a career that ran from 1956-1972.