Charles Lindbergh visited Cuba in 1929 during his worldwide “hero” tour: With Party of Seven He Arrives at Santiago After a Brief Stop at Havana. He was a hit everywhere he went, and Cuba was no exception. The Cuba Post Office even released a stamp celebrating his heroics.
Jimmy Stewart’s The Spirit of St. Louis is a great movie, especially thanks to the scenes of Charles Lindbergh trying to stay awake over the Atlantic Ocean.
On May 21 in 1927, Charles Lindbergh did something that had never been done before:
At 7:52 a.m. EST on May 20, The Spirit of St. Louis lifted off from Roosevelt Field, so loaded with fuel that it barely cleared the telephone wires at the end of the runway. Lindbergh traveled northeast up the coast. After only four hours, he felt tired and flew within 10 feet of the water to keep his mind clear. As night fell, the aircraft left the coast of Newfoundland and set off across the Atlantic.
At about 2 a.m. on May 21, Lindbergh passed the halfway mark, and an hour later dawn came. Soon after, The Spirit of St. Louis entered a fog, and Lindbergh struggled to stay awake, holding his eyelids open with his fingers and hallucinating that ghosts were passing through the cockpit.