Cuban dictator Fidel Castro was born near Birán, Cuba, in 1926. Beginning in 1958 Castro and his forces began a campaign of guerrilla warfare to successfully overthrow Cuban dictator, and Castro became the country's new leader.
His communist domestic policies and military and economic relations with the Soviet Union led to strained relations with the United States that culminated in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. He was also responsible for fomenting communist revolutions in other countries around the world. Under Castro, improvements were made to health care and education, while civil liberties were severely eroded. However, the 1991 collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and its negative impact on Cuba's economy led Castro to relax some restrictions over time. Amidst failing health, in 2008 Fidel Castro officially handed over power to his brother Raúl Castro, but still wielded some political influence in Cuba and abroad. Fidel Castro died on November 25, 2016 at the age of 90.
1. Fidel Castro led Cuba for five decades and was the world's third longest-serving head of state, after Britain's Queen Elizabeth and the King of Thailand.
2. Despite assassination plots, an invasion and five decades of economic sanctions, Fidel Castro outlasted nine U.S. presidents, from Eisenhower to Clinton.
3. The CIA had a plot to use a depilatory chemical on Fidel Castro to cause his beard to fall out.
4. Fidel Castro holds the record for the longest speech ever delivered to the United Nations: 4 hours and 29 minutes, on Sept. 26, 1960.
5. Fidel Castro was born on a Friday the 13th.
6. In 1940, 12-year-old boy Fidel Castro wrote a letter to President F. Roosevelt to request a $10 bill because he had never seen one before.
7. The CIA operation to invade Cuba and take down Castro was dubbed "Operation Castration."
8. Fidel Castro has said that he saved ten working days a year by not bothering to shave.
9. In 2007, the CIA released documents that revealed the agency's collaboration with the italian mafia in a failed 1960 attempt to assassinate Fidel Castro.
10. There's one kosher butcher in Cuba. Fidel Castro personally allowed him to stay and serve 1,500 people practicing Judaism.
11. Three of Fidel Castro's sons are named after Alexander the Great: Alexis, Alejandro, and Alexander.
12. When Fidel Castro seized power in Cuba, he immediately ordered all game sets of Monopoly to be destroyed.
13. Nelson Mandela co-authored a book with Fidel Castro.
14. Because Fidel Castro has chosen not to create a cult of personality, inside Cuba there are no streets, buildings, institutions or localities named for him.
15. Fidel Castro took personal responsibility for the persecution suffered by homosexuals in Cuba.
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