When Lionel died in 2019, aged 92, after a full productive life he left a loving family, many friends and acquaintances, several books, a substantial and comprehensive journalistic production and hundreds of drawings.

His journalistic work for several agencies (Prensa Latina, ABC, BBC, CBC) over a period of 37 years (1961- 1998) includes thousands of written reports and broadcasts as well as a number of feature articles. This extensive journalistic production reflects, in a very objective way, the events and everyday life in Cuba during those years. They are a historical chronicle of use for research. (See Sections WRITTEN REPORTS and AUDIO REPORTS in this website.)

He wrote and published two books: The Early Fidel: Roots of Castro’s Communism, published by Lyle Stuart in New York in 1975, which was translated into Spanish as El joven Fidel. Los origenes de su pensamiento comunista, and published by Grijalbo in Spain. His second published book was El Pueblo Negro de los Estados Unidos: Las raices historicas de su lucha actual written in 1974 and published under the pen name of Richard O’Reilly, by Editorial de Ciencias Sociales de la Habana, Cuba in 1984. (See Section BOOKS in this website.)

He also started writing two other books that were not finished and therefore not published, The Wildest of Dreams and his Memoirs.

He took part in writing projects for the Cuban Ministry of Education in the early 1960’s. These were textbooks for secondary education written by several authors led by Lionel. These were: Trabajo y Lucha (2 volumes) a study of the socio-economic development in the history of humankind (See images 1, 2 and 3 below.) and Historia Antigua (2 volumes) covering the ancient history of China, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece and Rome. (See images 4 and 5 below.) For these textbooks he produced teaching instructions and methodological guides that were used at a national level.

When he married Adrienne Hunter in 1972 he illustrated the dynamics of their new life together in a series of drawings that were compiled years later by Adrienne. Using these drawings she told their story in a little book entitled Life with Monsieur Pamplemousse. (See Section BOOKS in this website.)

Lionel was a very sociable person and was well liked by lots of people. During his lifetime he made many friends from all walks of life. He enjoyed a special relationship with animated filmmaker Juan Padron creator of Elpidio Valdes and internationally acclaimed animated film Vampires in Havana. He immortalized Lionel in a number of drawings that capture some of Lionel’s unique traits. Lionel and Padron set about to write a Traveler’s Guide to Cuba that unfortunately was never finished, but Padron produced a drawing of Lionel in the creative process of such guide. (See images 6 and 7 below.)

Lionel left behind a loving family: his wife Adrienne, his two children Julie and Curtis, his six grandchildren: Julie’s Nadia and Giovanni, Curtis’ Elena, Alejandro, Diego and Nicolas.

All his family members, friends and colleagues loved the person Lionel was. They remember him and miss him.

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