Centro Asturiano - History and Culture

History and Culture

The Centro Asturiano de Tampa (Centro) is a social club for immigrants and the descendants of immigrants from Asturias, Spain. Historically, a hospital, cemetery and health insurance all came with membership, and the purpose of the club was to take care of members from before birth until after they died. Membership declined following the close of the hospital in 1990. The hospital was renovated in 2005 to provide affordable housing for seniors. All that remains of the old Centro is the social aspect and the cemetery.

The Centro is one of many Centros Asturianos that span Spain, the US, and the world.

In the late 1880s most of the traffic from Spain to the Americas consisted of bachelors going to Havana, Cuba looking for work. Those men who were married often immigrated alone, only to send for their families once well established in their new homeland. In Havana, there were many organizations, representing various regions of Spain, whose sole mission was to provide health assistance and “a little taste of home” for their members. The Centro Asturiano de La Habana was founded on May 2, 1886 to provide medical assistance, social activities, education, and recreational opportunities.

The cigar industry soon established many factories in Tampa that brought a wave of new immigrants from Spain, but especially from Cuba. At the time, US immigration law restricted immigration from Europe, but not from Cuba. Antonio Gonzales Prado, the first president of the Havana club, traveled to Tampa at the end of the century and was appointed chair of a committee whose purpose was to rectify the problem of no health care for the cigar workers. A social club already established in Tampa, El Centro Español de Tampa, made a brief but ultimately unsuccessful attempt at creating a health care system. Approval from the parent club in Havana for the new branch was crucial. Cigar manufacturers, local doctors and pharmacists had formed the Latin Medical Association to prevent the new club’s creation. The name of the club was official changed to The Centro Asturiano de Tampa, Inc. in 1968.