{{Short description|Peruvian-Cuban biologist and political activist}} {{Infobox person | name = Laura Meneses | image = UNMSM Contenta a Laura Meneses del Carpio 1913 (cropped).jpg | caption = Laura Meneses del Carpio. First woman in Lima who obtained a degree in San Marcos (''Variedades Magazine'', 1913). | birth_name = Laura Meneses del Carpio | birth_date = March 31, 1894 | birth_place = Arequipa, Peru | death_date = April 15, 1973 | death_place = Havana, Cuba | burial_place = Colón Cemetery | alma_mater = National University of San Marcos, Radcliffe College/Harvard University | occupation = Biologist, political activist | known_for = | spouse = Pedro Albizu Campos | children = Pedro, Rosa, Laura | mother = Emilia del Carpio Tupayachi | father = Juan Rosa Meneses del Pino }} '''Laura Meneses del Carpio''' (Arequipa, Peru, March 31, 1894 - Havana, Cuba, April 15, 1973) was the first Latin American in 1920 to be accepted into Radcliffe College, the women's educational institution affiliated with Harvard University. She earned a doctorate in natural sciences and became active in the movement for Puerto Rican independence from the United States.
== Biography == Laura Meneses del Carpio was born on March 31, 1894, in the city of Arequipa, Peru, the youngest daughter of Emilia del Carpio Tupayachi and Juan Rosa Meneses del Pino, who was a colonel in the Peruvian army.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|title=Laura Meneses de Albizu Campos|url=https://www.preb.com/apuntes4/lauram1.htm|access-date=2020-09-11|website=www.preb.com}}</ref>
=== Education === Meneses studied natural sciences at the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos in Lima, Peru, graduating with a bachelor's degree in biology in 1913.<ref name=":0" /> In 1918, she was awarded a doctorate in natural sciences at the same university.<ref name=":0" /> She spoke Spanish and English fluently as well as two indigenous languages from South America, Quechua and Aymara.<ref name=":1" /><ref name=":3" />
In 1920, on the recommendation of the family of a Peruvian composer residing in Boston,<ref name=":0" /> Meneses enrolled in the all-female Radcliffe College in Cambridge, Massachusetts (which today is a part of Harvard). While there she met her future husband, the budding attorney and Puerto Rican activist Pedro Albizu Campos. They married two years later. With her husband, she became an important activist in a popular movement seeking independence for Puerto Rico from control by the United States. By doing so, Menses and Albizu Campos both became targets of American officials.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|last=Albizu73|title=Laura Meneses, The Woman Behind the Myth – Speculative Tertulia|url=https://ingmaralbizu.com/laura-meneses-the-woman-behind-the-myth/|access-date=2020-09-11|website=ingmaralbizu.com|language=en-US}}</ref><ref name=":3">{{Cite web|title=Recuerdan en Cuba a Laura Meneses: Una mujer que trascendió a su tiempo luchando por la causa de Puerto Rico|url=https://www.resumenlatinoamericano.org/2019/03/20/laura-meneses-una-mujer-que-trascendio-a-su-tiempo-luchando-por-la-causa-de-puerto-rico/|access-date=2020-09-11|website=Resumen Latinoamericano|date=20 March 2019 |language=es}}</ref>
In 1937, Albizu Campos and the other Puerto Rican Nationalist leaders were sentenced to the federal penitentiary in Atlanta; he was not released for almost eleven years. Because her husband spent decades in detention (he spent 25 years in U.S. prisons), the couple was able to spend only 13 years together out of their 43 years of marriage.<ref name=":1" /><ref name=":2">{{Cite web|date=2009-05-02|title=Dr. Pedro Albizu Campos|url=http://albizu.8m.com/|access-date=2020-09-16|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090502011405/http://albizu.8m.com/|archive-date=2009-05-02}}</ref>
=== Mexican years === Her husband was jailed again in 1950 after the defeat of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party Revolts.<ref name=":1" /> Later that same year, Meneses moved with her children to Havana, Cuba, on behalf of her husband to denounce American imperialism there and in Puerto Rico. However, because of harassment from the U.S.-backed military dictator President Fulgencio Batista in Cuba, she moved again, this time to Mexico City.<ref name=":0" /> There she came to know Fidel Castro, Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara, and other members of the July 26 Movement, and she actively supported the Cuban revolutionaries by writing press releases and other literature supporting their cause.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" />
For many years, Meneses sought permission from the United States to visit Puerto Rico to see her husband who was ailing there, but she was denied on technicalities. Thereafter, she was repeatedly denied visas to visit Puerto Rico as well as the U.S. mainland.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" />
=== Cuban years === When the Cuban revolution succeeded in 1959, Meneses was granted Cuban citizenship and was appointed a special envoy from the Cuban mission to the United Nations, which allowed her to legally visit New York City. While there, she took advantage of the opportunity to pursue the liberation of political prisoners like her husband as well as the island of Puerto Rico itself.<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{Cite book|last=Activities|first=United States Congress House Committee on Un-American|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eudRAQAAIAAJ&q=Laura+Meneses|title=Communist Activities in the Chicago, Illinois Area: Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-ninth Congress, First Session|date=1965|publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office|pages=844|language=en}}</ref>
Meneses attended the first Latin American Women's Congress in Santiago, Chile in 1959 and, according to the Chilean press, "she was the most applauded delegate."<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" /> In 1960 she was allowed to attend the International Women's Federation and this invitation, in turn, gave her the opportunity to visit other international destinations, including Denmark, the United Kingdom, France, Spain, and China.<ref name=":1" />
Because of diplomatic pressure from the Cuban government, she was finally allowed to travel to Puerto Rico in 1965 to visit her ailing husband. He died shortly thereafter in San Juan.<ref name=":1" /><ref name=":2" />
Meneses returned to Havana and died on April 15, 1973. Her remains were buried in the city's old Colón Cemetery.<ref name=":0" />
== See also == *Pedro Albizu Campos *Puerto Rican Nationalist Party revolts of the 1950s
== References == {{Reflist}}
== External sources == * Austin, Dolores Stockton Helffrich. ''Albizu Campos and the Development of a Nationalist Ideology'', 1922–1932. N.p., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1983. * Lora Gamarra, Silvia, et al. ''Una vida de amor y sacrificio''. Puerto Rico, [https://books.google.com/books?id=nOPLtAEACAAJ Publicaciones Puertorriqueñas, 2009.]
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Meneses, Laura}} Category:1894 births Category:1973 deaths Category:Radcliffe College alumni Category:Puerto Rican independence activists Category:Naturalised citizens of Cuba Category:People of the Cuban Revolution Category:Cuban revolutionaries Category:20th-century Peruvian women Category:Peruvian women activists Category:Peruvian emigrants to Cuba Category:National University of San Marcos alumni Category:Harvard University alumni Category:Cuban women diplomats Category:Peruvian biologists Category:Women in the Cuban Revolution