Award-winning exhibit 'Cuban Pathways' showing at Tampa Bay History Center

TAMPA, Fla. - Hispanic Heritage Month just ended, but an award-winning exhibit called "Cuban Pathways" is showing at the Tampa Bay History Center. 

"The unique thing about this exhibit is that we chronicle certain pathways through Cuban history," said Brad Massey Saunders, foundation curator of public history at the Tampa Bay History Center. "We chronicle a Chinese pathway, an Afro-Cuban pathway, and the pathway of a Spaniard through Cuba. So we tell very diverse stories in this exhibit." 

The display has more than 100 objects for visitors to see. 

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"That's really important to us, because one thing we do here at the museum is we want people to engage with really, you know, things what we call the material history of the past," Massey said.  

The show has a lot of interesting items, including a tugboat that was used by people just last year to cross from Cuba to Florida. They also have a map from 1511, which was one of the first European maps to identify the island of Cuba. 

The exhibit won the 2022 Southeastern Museums Conference Gold Exhibition Award.  

"We were very fortunate in that the team put together a great exhibit. So when we found out that we won a gold award in our professional museum world, if you will, we were very happy, but not surprised because we realized all the hard work that the team had put into this exhibit," Massey said. 

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Cuban Pathways is on exhibit now until Feb. 11, 2023 at the Tampa Bay History Center