For five decades the Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro ran a communist state on the doorstep of the United States. But in September 1960, he crossed into the US and paid a visit to New York. Simon Hall joins Dan Snow in this episode from the archive to talk about Castro’s trip. Based at Harlem’s Theresa Hotel, Castro met with a succession of political and cultural luminaries, including Malcolm X, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Nikita Khrushchev, Amiri Baraka, and Allen Ginsberg. We discuss the coming together of revolutionaries embracing the politics of anti-imperialism, racial equality, and leftist revolution. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.