Diario las Américas Newspaper, May 16, 1954, Page 23

INTERVIEW OF THE WEEK “ Harold Shapiro, Mayor Of Miami Beach A true friend of Latin America, Mayor Shapiro has great plans for attracting more visitors from the southern countries to this beautiful resort city. “More people in this country should learn how to speak Spanish,” he declares. He speaks the language of Cervantes quite well. The Mayor of miami _ Beach, Harold Shapiro, was born in Rus- sia 46 years ago, came to this country at the age of five. His family settled at Milwaukee, Wis- consin, which he considered his home town up to the time when he fell in love with Miami Beach and decided to make it his new home. He went through elementary and high schools in Milwaukee, obtain- ed his law degree from Marquet- te University, and attended the Wisconsin College of Music, where he studied violin. It is said that he is not only a good player, but a competent instructor in that ins- trument. While studying there, he began to like the Latin American rhythms, learned Spanish and Lat- ods in the Naval Air Base of San Julian, province of Pinar del Rio, and made frequent visits to the nearby towns of Guani and Men- doza, where he made many friends. Also while in Key West, he often visited Havana, a city that holds a very special attraction for him. Stationed for a while at San Diego, he made frequent trips to Tijuana, Aguascalientes, Ensenada and Gu- adalupe, always in search of the Latin atmosphere he seems to en- joy so much. We shall take leave, for a few moments, from the Mayor of Mi- ami Beach, to speak about a very interesting and intensely human person, Harold Shapiro, known to his many friends and acquaintan- By ANTONIO RUIZ nal. In it he gives as the place of birth of the rumba the slave ships coming to Cuba, and says he learned that “it was started by the Negroes of the Nanigo tribe, who were being brought to Cuba as slaves and were herded together in the limited space of the hold of a ship, who moved their feet and their knees to this unusual repetitive rhythm, while others be- at their hands in time.” He continu- es mentioning the Moorish influ- ence as brought to Cuba through the Spanish music, and describes many instruments used to play the genuine Afro-Cuban rhythms. He also mentions several types of rumbas and other Cuban dances, and states that “it took three cen- CORDIALITY IS THE WORD. — Mayor Harold Shapiro of Miami Beach (right) cordially receives An- _tonio Ruiz (left) representative of The Americas Daily, as he was introduced to the Mayor by Marcus A. Kohly, director for Latin America of the Miami Beach News Bureau, for an interesting interview. There are plans in Miami Beach for attracting an even greater number of tourists from Latin America, and Mayor Shapiro is certainly the man to carry them to a happy conclusion, ‘$n American dances, and began also to study the Spanish language a@s a member of the Spanish Club . of Milwaukee, which he joined for that purpose. A great interest in ’ ple, a natural enjoyment of ife through association with them, an inquisitive mind, together with . an extraordinary driving power, _ are the characteristics of this hum- an dynamo, which brought him up, from just one of the millions of oe visitors eight years ago, to irst Citizen of the world’s gre- atest resort city today. Besides his multiple duties as Mayor, he is active as Commander of Miami Beach Post, Jewish War Veterans; chairman, Miami Beach Division, Combined Jewish Appeal; Director Miami Beach Music arid Arts Le- ague; member, Veterans Commit- tee, Dade County Bar Association, and very often, he is requested to speak for such worthy causes as the Community Chest, Cancer Fund, etc. His “spare time” he devotes to his family and music. During the war, Shapiro was in the Navy, as Legal Officer, with the rank of Lieutenant, and was stationed in the Key West Naval Base, which has under its legal jurisdiction the bases in Cuba and the Caribbean. He spent long peri- ces a few years back as The Rum-turies of Spanish, Indian, Cuban ba King. With his great zest for living and his love for Latin Ame- rican music and dances, he be- came an expert in pasodoble, sén, danz6n, rumba, etc., and any place with a Latin American orchestra was like a magnet to him (he was single then). Prompted by his fri- ends, at first, he took part in many dance contests, and began collecting dozens of trophies, until he became the proud possessor of the largest collection of such tro- phies in Miami Beach. The great- est prize he ever won, however, was in a rumba contest about seven years ago, when he took the first prize, consisting of a three-day all expenses paid cruise to Havana, stopping at the luxurious Hotel Nacional. Incidentally, that con- test also confirmed his title as The Rumba King among. his fri- ends. He enjoyed the Afro-Cuban music so much, that he decided to make a special study of it, and in every opportunity he had, he questioned musicians and dancers about the different aspects of the rhythms, until he became such an expert, that he wrote an excellent article entitled “After 300 Years the Rumba Won Acceptance in Society”, for the Milwaukee Jour- and American influence for the tumba to evolve into the socially accepted dance we know today”. A very interesting article, by an expert. Almost as much as his dancing, he enjoys speaking Spanish, which he does very well. As a matter of record, it should be stated that a good portion of our conversation was in that language, and I found his pronuntiation excellent. He started to learn it in Milwaukee, then took a short course offered by the Navy, and later for two years at the Berlitz School of Lan- guages, under the benefits of the G.I. Bill of Rights. Now he has an opportunity to practice it right at home, since his lovely wife, Sylvia Chinié, a native of Israel, is of Sephardic or Spanish Jewish des- descent and speaks Spanish fluent- ly, as well as half a dozen other languages. Her mother, who came from Israel to visit them, also has helped a great deal in his practice of Spanish, since she also speaks it very well. Last year, by special invitation of the Mayor of Cartagena, he was Presiding Judge in a beauty con- test in that Colombian city, where he met, and became a good friend of Lt. Gen. Gustavo Rojas Pinilla, President of Colombia. The Mayor is very proud of the fact that on that occasion he made a speech in Spanish, which drew enthusiastic aplause. He also visited Barran- quilla, where he was given a great reception by the Jewish commun- ity, and had an opportunity to see the secret rooms in the cellar of a building, where, he was told, secret plans of the Nazis were fo- und, to take over Colombia and to use that country later as a base for attack on the Panama Canal, and eventually, the United States. After they were discovered, the bu- ilding was purchased for the Jew- ish Community Center, and today they have the Star of David in all the places where the swastika used to be. When asked if he had any im- mediate plans to promote friend- ship with the Latin American co- untries, the Mayor pointed out that on May 20th and 21st a “sem- inary” is going to take place, in which they will discuss the means to attract more tourists from Lat- in America, and the best ways to make things easier for them and make them feel at home. They will study a plan to have Spanish speak- ing policemen, wearing some bad- ge of identification, and also they will consider imposing fines on those merchants who advertise in their windows that “Spanish is Spoken”, when actually inside no- body understands the language. There will be an educational cam- paign among the residents, show- _ ing them the best ways to make things more pleasant for the visit- ors. To this seminary are invited hotel men, members of different merchants associations, representat ives of the Chamber of Commerce, the air lines, and any other or- ganizations that have anything to do with the movement of visitors. The Mayor feels that more people should try to learn Spanish, and says that this “is too much of a one language country”, and obser- ves that there are many wonder- ful things in the countries where the visitors come from, and that ‘3 ¢ a Ee f FRIEND OF LATIN AMERICA. — Harold Shapiro, dynamic Mayor Americans should not assume airs of superiority when the visitor does not understand, or does not like, something typically american. “We have the hot dog”, he says, “but they have the arroz on _ pollo, which I think is delicious.” He then explained that with the completion of a new city owned building, which will be inaugurat- ed at the end of this month, it will be much easier to coordinate a “real” campaign of friendship with “our neighbors to the south.” In this building will be the Conven- tion, Public Relations and “ews Bureaus of the City, with a speci- al Latin American Department un- der the direction of Mr. Marcus A. Kohly. It has a large meeting room, where visitors will be received. Also housed in the building, which is located at 17th St., near Washington Avenue and next to the Auditorium, will be the Miami Beach Chamber of Commerce which will occupy beautiful and comfortable quarters. The building is a beautifui structure, with very pleasant surroundings, and has all the facilities required to make any visit to it very pleasant. After our talk with the Mayor, Mr. Kohly kindly took us in a tour of ins- pection of it. With the City. public- ity and convention agencies hous- ed under the same roof with the Chamber of Commerce things should run very smoothly in the future, and we hope it will heip to double the number of visitors, which, by the way, in 1953 were over 122.000 from the Latin Ame- rican countries. After a very pleasant conversa- tion, we left however, with more or less of a sense of frustration, sin- ce both, the Mayor and Marcus, pi- qued our curiosity with hints that “something really big is brewing” with regard to relations with Latin America, but they couldn’t possibly disclose yet what it is. Well, if it is something “really big”, we think that nobody could be better qualifi- ed to carry it to a happy conclu. sion than Harold Shapiro, dynamic, youthful Mavor of Miami Beach, of Miami Beach, who is a real friend of Latin America, according to statements he made during an interview for The Americas Daily. He has plans, good ones, for promoting friendship with our neigh- bors to the south.