Msgr. Bryan Walsh, 71; Helped Children Flee Cuba

Msgr. Bryan O. Walsh, the Roman Catholic priest who led Operation Pedro Pan, which brought 14,000 children out of Fidel Castro’s Cuba to Florida 40 years ago, died Dec. 17 of cardiac arrest. He was 71.

In 1960, the Irish-born priest set up the Cuban Children’s Program to help Cuban parents evacuate their children from Castro’s new communist state.

The program, which became know as Operation Pedro Pan, accepted its first two children Dec. 26, 1960. Within the next two years, 14,000 unaccompanied children would arrive. The Miami archdiocese sent them to camps, relatives’ homes, foster homes and orphanages until their parents could join them.

Among them were U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Mel Martinez and Miami Mayor Joe Carollo.

“Words cannot express the depth of appreciation in my heart for Msgr. Walsh, whose perseverance and courage made it possible for me to taste freedom,” Martinez said in a statement. “Few people have touched the lives of thousands of immigrant children in such a profound way.”

Walsh also gained attention for writing a 1963 condemnation of segregation as a sin, for helping Haitian refugees and for working to improve the Catholic Church’s relations with Jews.

Walsh was born in Portarlington, Ireland, and studied at Mungret College, where he was recruited to minister in Florida. He became assistant director of Catholic charities there in 1955, and by the time he retired as director in 1996 had built the organization from 10 staff members to 420 and from a budget of $100,000 a year to $20 million.

In addition to aiding immigrants and minorities, he worked to help the poor and elderly. Many referred to the 6-foot-4 Walsh as their “kindly giant.”

Walsh is survived by one sister and one brother.