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Museum At the Battle of Ideas. First museum dedicated to this theme in Cuba and the world, inaugurated by Commander in Chief Fidel Castro Ruz, on July 14, 2001.
 
 
 Background
The concept of Battle of Ideas
When the kidnapping of the Cardanian boy Elián González Brotons occurs, at the end of November 1999, by his relatives in Miami, and the Cuban-American mafia begins to do everything possible to prevent his return to Cuba, despite the fact that his father, Juan Miguel González, claimed it, in front of the United States Interests Office, the Battle of Ideas becomes tangible.

On December 5, 1999, the 12-year-old student at the Félix Varela basic secondary school in Cárdenas, Yarían Daniel Medina, who was participating as a delegate in the VIII Conference of the Youth Technical Brigades (BTJ), at the Palacio of the Conventions, he proposes to the participants to go all in front of the SINA and demand the return of the Cuban child to his homeland.
This act, which is organized spontaneously, became the first open platform of this new stage, in the ideological confrontation with US imperialism; It had more than 1,000 participants. What the SINA officials could not foresee at that time, is that this would be the longest and most massive popular movement of those that until now had been carried out since January 1, 1959.

The idea
The Museum of the Battle of Ideas arose during the fight for the return of the boy Elián González Brotons, kidnapped in the United States. The event gave rise to the energetic response of millions of Cubans and of women and men around the world; Thousands of letters, poems, and posters expressing their pain and outrage were written by the people.
On December 6, 1999, Fidel Castro visits the Marcelo Salado School for the first time, and there is a meeting between the head of the Cuban Revolution, the children and the teachers. It is then when the Commander-in-Chief raises the need to set up a place where the testimonies of the struggle carried out by the people of Cuba will be preserved, demanding the return of the child to the homeland.
Immediately, colleagues from the Project Company, led by the Cardena architect Augusto Bueno, along with Lázaro Miranda, Historian of the City at the time and Director of the Oscar María de Rojas Museum, Ernesto Álvarez Blanco, museologist of this institution, and Many others took on the task of creating a project for the restoration of the old Fire Station and the assembly of said museum.

Structure
It consists of six exhibition rooms on its first floor. In the main room, the struggle waged by the Cuban people for the return of the boy Elián González to his homeland is shown.
But being a cultural complex, on the second floor there is a conference room and a computer room.
On the third floor is the temporary exhibition room in which local artists and others of national importance have exhibited; There is also the Rubén Martínez Villena Library and in the highest part of the building there is a viewpoint considered as the highest point in the city with public access. They are part of the Institution, the store and the Patio de los Cangrejos located in the area in front of the Museum.
Exhibition halls
• Introductory Room A: Historical Conflict United States - Cuba before 1959.
• Introductory room B: Historic United States - Cuba Conflict after 1959.
• Gallery of anti-imperialist figures
• Martiana Room
• Hall of the achievements of the Revolution
• Classroom - Museum: Classroom - Museum of the Primary School Marcelo Salado.
• Main Room: it is dedicated to the Cardenas child Elián González and to the battle that our people waged for their return and against anti-Cuban laws.

Others
• Conference hall
• Computer room
• Rubén Martínez Villena Library
• Temporary exhibition room
• Lookout
• Store
• Patio of the crabs

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