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The morning of June 6, 1950, found Puerto Rico waking up to radio newsflashes and newspaper headlines relating the crash of a plane carrying sixty-two Puerto Rican farmhands (the majority from Mayagüez) some 275 miles east of Florida. The aircraft, a converted C-46 belonging to the "nonscheduled" airline Westair Transport, was en route from San Juan to Wilmington, North Carolina. The passengers were contract workers hired to harvest beets in the state of Michigan. Twenty-eight passengers lost their lives during the ditching of N1248N, many by drowning or to savage shark attacks before a dramatic rescue involving the United States Navy, Coast Guard, and Merchant Marines. This essay narrates the story of this fateful voyage. [Key Words: contract labor, migration, agricultural workers, Puerto Rico, airplane crash, Michigan]

In 1950, 5,300 Puerto Ricans were contracted to Michigan despite a plane crash in June that killed 29 of the 65 passengers en route to Michigan.

- Whalen (2001)

An airplane carrying 62 workers to Michigan crashed on June 5, 1950, a few days after the airliftbegan, killing 27 of the men.

- Findlay (2006)

"this is it," were juan vélez martí's words as he closed his eyes and gripped the edge of the wooden bench he sat on, bracing for the worst. The air stank of burned oil and fear; but he knew that if he opened his eyes, he would only see panic and chaos. A curse here, a prayer there, and men calling on their loved ones made him wonder for a moment whether he should thank the fact that the pandemonium helped drown out the roar of the engine and the racket of the trembling aircraftin rapid, uncontrolled descent. "My two children": those were his last thoughts as the plane hit the water at full speed.

The ditching of Westair Transport's N1248N on June 5, 1950, stands out as a tragic event that has gone relatively unnoticed by subsequent generations. If anything, the event has been reduced to a footnote, usually sandwiched between facts about the labor/migratory/economic history of Puerto Rico.

Overview of Labor Contracts and Migration to the United States

Among the historical accounts of labor contracting of Puerto Ricans for destinations in the United States-usually attached to studies of Puerto...

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