Victor Díaz Aponte and Diego Ureña
Victor Díaz Aponte was born on August 26, 1918 in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. At the age of 19, he sailed with his sister and her two children from the Dominican Republic to New York on the steamship Coamo, arriving October 4, 1937. They came to live in Portsmouth, Virginia with Aponte's brother-in-law. Eventually, Aponte settled in Annapolis, Maryland where he made his living as a guitarist and professional musician playing at ballrooms, clubs, and society parties.
Diego Ureña was born on July 24, 1918 in Sánchez, Samana, Dominican Republic. At age 7, he sailed with his mother, Obelinda Ureña, from Santo Domingo to the Ellis Island Port of New York on the steamship Huron, arriving on March 30, 1926. Ureña and his mother lived with a relative in Brooklyn, New York. Eventually, Ureña and his mother settled in the upper West Side of Manhattan, in where he worked as an assistant photographer at a private photography studio.