Miami remembers Felix Martínez — banker, Cuban prisoner, family man

Miami Herald

6 days ago

Rest never came easy.
'As long as there were minutes left to squeeze more moments out of life, Felix Justino Martínez did not want to rest,' his daughter Anne Vasquez wrote for her banker dad's funeral home obituary.
'A force of nature,' she called the businessman, family man and former Cuban political prisoner, in an email to the Miami Herald.
Martínez didn't rest much after multiple knee surgeries, a Stage 4 colon cancer diagnosis, or a spill off his beloved electric scooter he named 'Tesla.' He'd use that scooter to whisk him on errands to Publix and the UPS store.
'Even then, he thought all the fuss about bed rest was unnecessary,' Vasquez wrote.
Martínez died May 21 in his Miami area home at age 90. He was surrounded by the soothing sounds of singers Perry Como, Frank Sinatra and Placido Domingo, and the cheerful bustle of children, grandchildren, caregivers and his wife of 62 years.
Banking and mentoring
Retirement, but not an idle senior lifestyle, followed a 30-year banking career in Miami. Martínez had specialized in trust, estate planning and private wealth management at Flagship Bank, Sun Bank, Bank of America-International and the international office of London bank Coutts & Company in Miami.
Martínez mentored promising newcomers. Rudy Pages met Martínez at Bank of America-International after graduating from the University of Miami with an MBA in finance in 1990.
'Felix became a mentor from the very beginning,' Pages said. He'd follow Martínez to Coutts in the late-1990s. When Martinez retired, Pages became managing partner at Caoba Capital Partners in Miami and a founding board member of the South Florida charter school chain True North Academy. The lessons he learned from Martínez endure and are passed on to others.
'His work ethic and love of his profession provided a sense of grounding for me. Felix saw me as his 'work son' and would make sure to explain what he was doing and what I could do better. He demanded high-quality work and did not suffer fools gladly. He was an excellent banker because his clients trusted him,' Pages said in an email to the Herald.
'In some ways, my involvement in True North is my way of educating/mentoring future leaders inspired by my relationship with Felix,' he added.
Political prisoner in Cuba
From a young age, Martínez was driven by nature and by circumstance.
Born in Havana on Oct. 12, 1934, Martínez was the youngest of five siblings. He was orphaned at 7 when he lost both parents to illnesses within an 18-month span. His elder siblings guided and supported him. He turned to school, which he loved, and to attentive teachers who nurtured and sometimes fed him.
At 13, before he could continue into high school, Martínez had to help support his family. He eventually worked for Cuba's utility company. He attended correspondence school at night to learn the basics of English and trained as a stenographer.
'I never saw the sun while sitting in a classroom,' Martínez shared with his family about a year ago.
In his early 20s, Martínez met the woman who would, years later in the U.S., become his wife, María Guernica.
But before they could wed Martínez spent 10 months inside hell.
After Fidel Castro seized power during the Cuban Revolution in 1959, Cuba's utility company became nationalized. Hundreds were laid off, but not Martínez.
'He expressed a show of solidarity one late afternoon following the end of his shift, joining dozens of other former and current employees in a peaceful march to protest the communist regime,' Vasquez wrote. Martínez barely made it half a block.
'An officer jabbed him with a rifle in the stomach, and he was thrown into the back of a police car. The demonstration landed Martínez and others from the utility company in Cuba's infamous prison, La Cabaña, which by January 1961 housed 1,500 political prisoners,' she wrote.
Martínez had described hearing the execution of 57 men by a firing squad. Some were bunkmates in his cell as young as 18. Guernica fled the island by ferry with her two younger sisters.
After the U.S.-backed Bay of Pigs Invasion failed in April 1961, Martínez thought he was doomed. Inexplicably, he was released after 10 months in prison.
'Loved ones pooled their pennies to get him on a flight to Miami,' his daughter wrote. 'The Cuban government granted permission for Martínez to travel on the condition he would convince his fiancée to return with him to the island.'
Building a life in the U.S.
Instead, the couple married in Miami, relocated to Western Springs, Illinois, to live with sponsors, a couple named John and Betty Hicks. By the mid-1960s, the couple settled in Staten Island, New York, where Martínez found a job at a bank in Manhattan. He observed a common attribute others shared as they rose through the ranks: a college degree.
So at 30, Martínez enrolled part time in night classes at New York University and juggled a growing family with schoolwork. He earned a bachelor's degree from NYU.
The Martínez family moved back to Miami in 1971, bought a home on Sunset Drive in a suburb of Kendall and grew roots. That's where they had their third and youngest child, Anne. His banking career flourished until he retired at the start of the millennium to travel and celebrate his grandchildren with cruises through the Panama Canal, Alaska and Europe.
'He loved his family, and it showed. One of his pleasures in the last few months was to go with Anne to see True North play baseball at a park we refurbished a few blocks away from his home,' said Pages, his former colleague and mentee.
'My father was a tough man with a soft heart,' Vasquez said. 'He taught his children the value of working hard but also the importance of family. The road trips we used to take up the east coast when I was a child are some of my most vivid memories.'
She remembers one of those journeys when she was 5.
'I remember my dad sneaking our dog into the nation's Capitol Building. He didn't want to miss the chance to tour the Capitol. When that same dog tore through the carpet of our hotel room, my father grabbed a sewing kit and patched it up before the cleaning crew arrived the next morning.'
Survivors and services
Martínez's survivors include his wife, María G. Martínez; children Felix E. Martínez, Lillian M. Peters and Anne L. Vasquez; grandchildren Justin, Aria, Caitlin, Sophia, Randolph, Riley, Danny and Veronica.
Visitation will be 6:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Thursday, May 29, at Memorial Plan Westchester Funeral Home, 9800 SW 24th St. in Miami-Dade. Burial will be 10 a.m. Friday, May 30, at Miami Memorial Park Cemetery, 6200 SW 77th Ave.