Lincoln Diaz-Balart, the Cuban-born Republican congressman from Miami, is retiring. And I have a little tribute today in my column. I wrote a piece about him and his politically prominent family in 2003: It is “Meet the Diaz-Balarts,” here.

I received a letter which I thought might be of interest.

Hi Jay,
My father was in his junior year at Virginia Tech when the Cuban revolution took away his father’s livelihood and property. His mother was able to leave, with his younger sister. Sadly, she developed leukemia and died, here in Miami. Her hospital bill used up all the money that my grandfather had been able to send from Cuba. My father, who knew the Diaz-Balart family in Cuba (his mother was at the wedding of Lincoln’s aunt and Castro), asked them for a small loan to enable him to finish college. That wonderful family complied with glad generosity.
My father became an engineer and paid back the loan. He also supported his mother and raised a family, 100 percent Cuban and 100 percent American. He will always be grateful for their timely help.
Sadly, my grandfather died all alone in Cuba, soon after his little daughter died here. He died at 55, of stomach cancer. His wife and son could not be with him, of course. This is the kind of tragedy our Cuban stories are full of. Families separated even unto death, by a totalitarian, freedom-crushing ideology.

By the way, when she says “100 percent Cuban and 100 percent American,” she is using Rafael Diaz-Balart’s description of his four boys, including Lincoln and his brother Mario, who also serves in Congress.