Cuban historian Eusebio Leal enters American Academy of Arts and Sciences in the USA

October 14, 2019

Starting October 13, the historian of the city of Havana, Dr. Eusebio Leal, is now part of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in the United States (AAAS), as an International Honorary Member, a distinction received on his behalf by Cuba's ambassador to that country, José Ramón Cabañas.

The AAAS, headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is an independent research center that brings together leaders from all disciplines, professions, and perspectives in the world, and has elected more than 13,500 members since its founding in 1780.

According to a statement released by the AAAS last April, Dr. Leal's inclusion as a member of the American academy is based on his outstanding achievements in the academic world, the arts, business, government, and public affairs.

Also joining the AAAS as new members, among other international figures, are theologian Mona Siddiqui, from the United Kingdom; academic and former diplomat Kishore Mahbubani, from Singapore; and parasitologist Nadira Karunaweera, from Sri Lanka.

Among the notable figures who have been members of the academy are Benjamin Franklin (elected in 1781), Ralph Waldo Emerson (1864), Maria Mitchell (1848), Charles Darwin (1874), Albert Einstein (1924), Margaret Mead (1948), Martin Luther King, Jr. (1966), Nelson Mandela (2009), and Francis Ford Coppola (2010).

On October 5, Dr. Leal received the Rotondi Prize, awarded in Italy "to the saviors of art," in recognition of his rehabilitation work on Cuba's capital, the preservation of Cuban national heritage, and especially for his work in restoring the Havana Capitol.

Likewise, in October 2018, the distinguished Cuban historian was honored in New York City with the Hadrian Prize, from the World Monuments Fund, for "his heroic efforts to preserve and restore Old Havana."

Dr. Eusebio Leal is a corresponding member of the Royal Spanish Academy of History, also Corresponding member of the Venezuelan Academy of History, a Full Member of the Cuban Academy of Language, and Corresponding member of the Royal Spanish Academy.

He is also a Corresponding academic of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando, as a Fellow in Art; member of the Association of Latin American Historians, as well as a member of the Academy of History of Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, the National Commission of Monuments of Cuba, and an Honorary Member of the Ibero-American Organization of Inter-Municipal Cooperation, among other academic distinctions.