Cuban professor José Antonio Portuondo used to say that if José Martí, our National Hero, had been asked to fill out a form, in the field Profession he would have written without any waste of time: ‘'Journalist''. It's a reality; it was his permanent profession, his professional labor, what put bread in his pocket along his short but hard-working life.

Since his very early adolescence, Martí was related to the journalist exercise. He was 16 years old when, taking advantage of the scarce press freedom conceded to the Cubans by General Captain Domingo Dulce, he published his first journal, El Diablo Cojuelo, edited by him and his friend Fermín Valdés Domínguez and published on October 14, 1869.

Only nine days after his first publication of El Diablo Cojuelo, José Martí reloaded his efforts on October 23 with a new newspaper La Patria Libre having a larger format, more pages and better paper quality. This time he had contributions in edition not only by his friend Fermín, but also, by their professor Rafael María de Mendive and attorney Cristóbal Madan. In La Patria Libre, Martí published his famous poem Abdala.

Judged and convicted in Havana under the accusation of unconfidence, Martí was in jail and finally exiled to Spain , where he collaborated in diverse newspapers: among them, Diario de Avisos ( Madrid ), La Soberanía Nacional (Cádiz) and El Jurado Federal (from Madrid also).

Despite his journalist labor at the Spanish territory, Martí definitely appeared as journalist in Mexico, where he lived among 1875 and 1877 and collaborated on La Revista Universal writing parliamentarian critics of theater, art critics and newspapers signed under the nickname of Orestes. In Mexico, he also collaborated on El Socialista Magazine.

Backed up by his previous experiences in Spain and Mexico, Martí developed an extraordinary journalist labor in United States, where he arrived in January, 1880. His initial labor as a art critic in The Hour joined his insertion in The Sun, headed by the notable Charles Dana.

In addition to the intense journalist labor he perform at United States, José Martí was in charge of the inauguration in our language and of course in Latin America of another sort of journalism, that is the foreign correspondent, and this is the main reason for his excellent relation with the best journals from Hispanic America: La Opinión Nacional (Caracas), La Nación (Buenos Aires), La Opinión Pública (Montevideo), El Partido Liberal (Mexico), La República (Honduras) and some others.

Readying the continuity of the war for the Cuban independence, duty that demanded Martí`s greatest attention, he founded Patria, newspaper for Cuban immigrants to which he devoted his best efforts, reviewing in its pages an atmosphere of total adherence to his ideal of freedom and above all, the extremely American character of the struggle that finally conceded to our country the possibility of get free from the colonial chains.

Written by Joaquín G. Santana for Radio Habana Cuba.