USA HISTORY

Cuba was a colony of which country before the US took it over?

(A) France

(B) ** Spain

(C) Colombia

(D) Mexico

Concept note-1: -From the 15th century, it was a colony of Spain, and slavery was abolished in 1886, remaining a Spanish colony until the Spanish–American War of 1898, when Cuba was occupied by the United States and gained independence in 1902.

Concept note-2: -In 1898 Cuba was a geopolitical aberration. Lying only 90 miles from the Florida keys, astride the entrance to the Gulf of Mexico, it was separated from Spain by the vast expanse of the Atlantic Ocean. Yet Cuba remained one of Spain’s two colonies in the New World.

Concept note-3: -The island of Cuba was inhabited by various Amerindian cultures prior to the arrival of the Genoese explorer Christopher Columbus in 1492. After his arrival on a Spanish expedition, Spain conquered Cuba and appointed Spanish governors to rule in Havana.

Concept note-4: -The period began in 1902 following the end of its first U.S. military occupation years after Cuba declared independence in 1898 from the Spanish Empire. This era included various changing governments and US military occupations, and ended with the outbreak of the Cuban Revolution in 1959.