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Cartographer Maps Cuba, And A Personal History

The National Geographic Society has released its first official map of Cuba in more than a century. <a href="http://media.npr.org/assets/artslife/arts/2011/09/cuba-map_3500.jpg">Click here for a closer look.</a>
Courtesy of the National Geographic Society
The National Geographic Society has released its first official map of Cuba in more than a century. Click here for a closer look.

Last July, the National Geographic Society released its first comprehensive map of Cuba in more than 100 years.

The new, detailed map includes two new Cuban states and is worthy of recognition in its own right — but the real story is the cartographer behind the project.

Cartographer and geographer Juan Jose Valdes fled Cuba for the United States when he was a young boy. Today, he's not just any geographer, but the geographer at National Geographic.

In a special broadcast in front of a live studio audience, Valdes explains the features of the new map of his homeland and what it meant to him to create it. (Click here for a closer look of Valdes' map of Cuba.)

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