Book VI Prints 22-25: Fidel Castro visit to farming cooperativeYale University. Department of Manuscripts and Archives1959engspaImages of Fidel Castro's visit to a state-owned farming cooperative in the Sierra Maestra of Oriente province organized by INRA, the Instituto de Reforma Agraria. Founded in May of 1959, INRA confiscated lands belonging to former members of the dictator Fulgencio Batista's corrupt government or brutal intelligence forces through much of 1960. During this time, INRA came under Fidel Castro's leadership, the most powerful institution in the country, exercising greater authority than even the executive or the cabinet ministers. In Print 23, a "Tienda del Pueblo" is seen in the background. Tiendas del Pueblo were government-owned and subsidized dry goods stores that supplied peasants on cooperatives with cheap basic goods and foods; in many cases, they replaced company stores where peasants had previously redeemed coupons they received for their labor rather than cash and purchased goods from their employers at greatly inflated prices. Prints 23, 24, and 25 show Fidel Castro's party on their expedition as they relax in a tight group on the ground. Frames 7-11 of Print 22 show René Vallejo, director of Agrarian Reform for INRA in Oriente Province. Frames 13-15 of Print 25 and frames 33-36 of Print 23 show an unidentified former guerrilla veteran of Fidel Castro's column in the Sierra Maestra, whom St. George photographed repeatedly during the war, sitting to Fidel's left-hand side.