In celebration of Basque Diaspora Day 2025, which on Monday, September 8 in Markina, Bizkaia, will recognize the contribution of pelota to the Diaspora, the authors of this blog publish the previously untold story of the jai-alai player from Eibar, Agustín Guisasola, a World War II veteran with the United States Army.

---

This year, the International Day of the Basque Diaspora 2025 is being celebrated in Markina (Bizkaia). This year’s celebration pays tribute to the Basque pelotaris who brought “jai-alai” or cesta punta to courts all over the world. Among those young men who pursued their professional careers in America was Agustín Guisasola of Eibar, whose life story exemplifies the intersection of sport, emigration, and commitment to his adopted country.

Born in 1906 in Eibar, Gipuzkoa, Guisasola set sail for Florida, United States (U.S.), at the age of 19 as part of a large group of professional jai-alai players who inaugurated a second fronton in Miami, the Biscayne, on April 1, 1926. Its opening was warmly received by the local press as a major event, which even included Basque traditional dances performed by the young puntistas. The first court, the Hialeah, inaugurated in January 1925 in the city of Hialeah in Miami-Dade County, was forced to close after its first season due to the success of the Biscayne. The Biscayne had become a cultural and sporting landmark in Miami.

Just a few months later, in September 1926, a devastating hurricane left the Biscayne in ruins, but it was soon rebuilt and reopened in June 1927. Nevertheless, it never returned to its former glory until it changed ownership [1]. Chronicles of the time highlight its Basque players, among them Guisasola, as the stars of a spectacle that drew thousands of spectators in South Florida.

Agustín also took part in the inauguration of the Summer Casino in Havana in 1928, and in 1930 he played at the Habana-Madrid court, also located in the Cuban capital.

In 1928, Agustín married French-born Therese Yvonne Savoli in New York. During the 1930s the couple alternated their residence between the United States and France. Upon returning to New York, he played—already a veteran—at the Biscayne until 1940 and afterward worked in the textile industry. Naturalized as a U.S. citizen in 1943, only a few months later, in October, he enlisted in the United States Army during World War II (WWII). He is very likely the first and only professional Jai-Alai player (identified to date) who served with the United States during WWII.

After the war, Agustín and his wife continued to reside in New York, and later in Florida, where he passed away in 1982 at the age of 76.

The story of Agustín Guisasola is that of an emigrant whose trade was pelota, who participated in the early days of cesta punta in America and who, when the time came, put on the U.S. uniform to fight under his new flag. His name is now added to the nearly 2,100 Basque and Basque-American veterans of WWII whose memory we seek to preserve and honor.

---

If anyone has photographs, newspaper clippings, or memories of Agustín Guisasola as a jai-alai player in Miami or Havana, we would be most grateful if you could contact us at sanchobeurko@gmail.com. A photograph of him would be a valuable testimony to accompany his story and enrich our project to preserve the memory of the Basques in World War II.