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Article: SINGING THE MAINE: THE POPULAR IMAGE OF CUBA IN SHEET MUSIC OF THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR.
- Article from:
- The Historian
- Article date:
- June 22, 2001
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2001 Phi Alpha Theta, History Honor Society, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Thirty-three years after the last battle of the Civil War, a call to arms again rang out across the United States when the battleship Maine exploded and sank under mysterious circumstances in Havana harbor. Called to Cuba in early 1898 by U.S. consul Fitzhugh Lee after Spanish troops mutinied and joined Cuban rebels in their three-year bid for independence from colonial Spain, the Maine quickly became a focal point of American policy and popular sentiment. Politically, the ship sailed to Cuba as the material delegate of longstanding American interest in the island, a reminder of the United States' "no transfer" policy that Cuba must be either a Spanish or an American ...