Digital Resources: Tulane University’s Collection of Cuban American Radionovelas, 1963–1970

The Latin American Library (LAL) at Tulane University is the repository for the Louis J. Boeri and Minín Bujones Boeri Collection of Cuban American Radionovelas (hereafter, Radionovelas Collection). The physical collection contains 8,934 individual reel-to-reel tapes containing audio recordings produced by Boeri’s Miami-based America’s Production Inc. (API). Boeri founded API in 1961 to create and license radio programming to serve an expanding commercial market of Spanish-language audiences across Latin America, Europe, and the United States. Boeri employed some of the best writing, acting, musical, and technical talent in the business, most of whom were recent emigres from Cuba, the wider Caribbean, and Mexico. API’s radio soap operas went silent after the company closed in 1970 and as the listening public and commercial sponsors increasingly turned to television for serialized entertainment. The LAL began a multiphase initiative in 2015 to digitize its aged audio tapes. With generous support from the Latin American Research Resources Project (LARRP) of the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) and the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR), the LAL converted one third of the collection’s audio recordings to digital. Beginning in 2020, forty-one of API’s “soaps,” most in their entirety, are accessible via a digital collection in the Tulane University Digital Library (TUDL). Available in the digital collection are programs that span multiple genres with titles like Agente Secreto 009 [Secret Agent 009]; La Hora de Misterio [Mystery Hour]; and Amarga Espera [Bitter Awaiting]. API print materials including advertising, program catalogs, and company photographs will also appear in digital. The Radionovelas Collection offers new perspectives and insights into the use of media for Cold War political and cultural propaganda by Cuba and the United States. It also provides a public resource to engage with and research the history of popular culture, sonic literature, and mass media among Spanish-speaking audiences all over the world.