Salvador Massip Valdés

Cuban geographer and educator who also distinguished himself as a politician, journalist, and diplomat.

He was born in Artemisa, province of Pinar del Río. He began secondary education at the Provincial Institute of Secondary Education of Pinar del Río, but graduated with a degree in Sciences and Letters from the Provincial Institute of Secondary Education of Santa Clara, in 1909. At the University of La Habana, he graduated as a doctor in Pedagogy and doctor in Philosophy and Letters, in the years 1912 and 1915. He completed specialization courses at Columbia University, New York, United States, where he received the title of "Master of Arts" in the Faculty of Pure Sciences, in 1922.

In 1916 he was appointed Full Professor of the Chair of Geography and History at the Provincial Institute of Secondary Education of Matanzas. From 1920 he was a professor at the School of Cadets, in the Castillo del Morro, La Habana, until 1930.

In 1924 he was appointed by competitive examination Auxiliary Professor of the Chair of History, in the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters at the University of La Habana. The center of higher studies lacked a chair or department of Geography in the first two decades of the twentieth century, and it was not until 1927 that, through the efforts of Salvador Massip, the teaching of this discipline was officially established, included in the curricula of the Schools of Pedagogy and Philosophy and Letters. Salvador Massip held the Full Chair of Geography in the latter and also served as Dean of that Faculty, by election of the faculty.

Although the Geographic Society of Cuba had been founded in 1914, its scientific activities were very limited and the corporation was languishing. This situation was reversed when Salvador Massip became part of it in 1922. In 1928 the official journal of this association was founded.

Massip was a director of various professional associations and representative of Cuba at several international events. In 1921 he participated in the Congress of History and Hispanic-American Geography in Seville and in 1924, in the Pan-American Scientific Congress in Lima, Peru. From 1929 to 1932 he was President of the Pan-American Institute of Geography and History. In the period 1933-1934 he was ambassador of Cuba in Mexico. In that country he served as professor of Geography at the National University of Mexico, from 1935 to 1937.

In 1938, he represented the University of La Habana and the Geographic Society of Cuba at the International Congress of Geography in Amsterdam and in 1940, at the Pan-American Scientific Congress in Washington. In 1942 at the initiative of Salvador Massip, the Society organized the I National Congress of Geography of Cuba.

He was professor of Geography at the University of Miami, Florida, 1941-1942; professor of Geography at Smith College (Northampton, Massachusetts), 1943-1944; professor of Geography at the University of Puerto Rico, 1946-1947; professor of Geography at Northwestern University (Evanston, Chicago, Illinois), 1948; professor of Geography at the University of Austin, Texas, 1949.

He was professor of Military Geography at the Superior School of War, La Habana, 1946-1952. He represented the Geographic Society of Cuba and the University of La Habana at the International Congress of Geography in Lisbon, 1949; that same year he was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters at the University of La Habana, in which he founded the José Martí Chair. He donated to this faculty the bibliography he had collected in 1935, during his stay in Mexico. He represented the University of La Habana at the II International Congress of Universities, held in Nice, under the auspices of UNESCO, in 1950. In 1952, he participated in the International Congress of Geography in Washington.

In 1953 he attended the I General Assembly of the Union of Latin American Universities, which took place in Santiago de Chile and, a year later, the commemoration of the Second Centenary of the founding of Columbia University, in Nueva York. In 1955 he attended the III International Congress of Universities, under the auspices of UNESCO, in Istanbul.

In this last year of 1955, Salvador Massip, in the company of his wife, also a professor of Geography, Sarah Ysalgué, made a trip around the world and, the following year, he attended the International Congress of Geography that took place in Rio de Janeiro, in representation of the University of La Habana.

After the triumph of the Revolution in 1959 he was appointed Ambassador of Cuba in Mexico and in Poland. Upon ceasing these functions, he again joined as professor of Geography at the University of La Habana, but almost immediately he was appointed to integrate the National Commission of the Academy of Sciences of Cuba, in 1962, as one of the founding members, and he was assigned the direction of the Institute of Geography and Geology.

In 1970 the National Atlas of Cuba was published, a scientific and cartographic achievement, under the direction of doctor Antonio Núñez Jiménez, which had his collaboration as vice president. This work was a fitting culmination for someone who had worked, for more than 40 years, in the research, teaching and dissemination of geographic science in Cuba.

The prestige gained as a professor and scientist of geography allowed Salvador Massip Valdés to be invited to belong to different professional associations. He was a Full Member and President of the Geographic Society of Cuba, President of Honor of the Institute of Geography, and Outstanding Educator in 1971. He was a member of the Society of Friends of the National Library, of the Society of Historical and International Studies, of the National Board of Anthropology and Ethnology, of the Ateneo de La Habana, of the Cuban Society of International Law and of the University Society of Explorations.

He knew how to conceive the teaching of Geography in its important relationship with socioeconomic development, and gave it high significance to Cuba's own conditions. He wrote important articles in the pedagogical journals, Alrededor de la Escuela, Revista de Instrucción Pública and Revista de Educación, among others.

He died in La Habana, on October 16, 1978.

Source: EnCaribe.org