Carlos José Arboleya Quirós

"As a banker, he emphasized helping his community understand banking operations and the very important role it played in development," added Armesto, noting that when other banks denied loans to small business owners and those exiles who wanted to buy "their little home," Arboleya opened opportunities for them.

Arboleya was honorary president of the Association of Former Scouts of Cuba, and was also president of the South Florida Council of the Boy Scouts of America, volunteer work to which he dedicated most of his free time.

"He was in love with the idea that youth is one of the most important resources we have. He said that good leaders were distinguished because they prepared those who would eventually replace them, and that we had to invest in youth."

A graduate of business administration and accounting from the University of Havana and with a distinguished banking career in Cuba, Arboleya went into exile in Miami in 1959 after the Cuban government confiscated the banks.

He arrived in this city with only $40 along with his wife Marta and his two-year-old son Carlos Jr.

The future banker had a great advantage; he knew English, which he learned when he was sent to live with an aunt in Brooklyn after his father became ill with cancer. In New York he had graduated from Stuyvesant High School.

In the early years of his exile, unable to find work in banking, he began working as an employee in a shoe factory, a company where he eventually became vice president.

Later, upon entering Miami banking, it took him only seven years to become president of a bank of national scale, which represents not only a milestone in his career but in the history of exile, because he is the first Cuban-American to hold such a high position.

"Arboleya has tremendous merit. He was a very professional banker, very well regarded in Florida and also an extraordinary human being," said businessman Diego Suárez, who received credit lines from Barnett Bank for his company Inter-American Transport Equipment Company.

"He was an individual concerned with the well-being of society," he added about Arboleya. "He always responded to everything related to Cuba."

A graduate of business administration and accounting from the University of Havana and with a distinguished banking career in Cuba, Arboleya went into exile in Miami in 1959 after the Cuban government confiscated the banks.

Arboleya was also president of the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce. He received numerous recognitions including the Horatio Alger Award in 1976, presented to outstanding Americans. He was nominated to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

"He was a person who cared about helping everyone, involved in many activities," said Jorge Iglesias, who was a colleague and student of Arboleya on the South Florida Council of the Boy Scouts.

Arboleya received numerous international recognitions for his work with the boy scouts. In Miami he was founder of the Lincoln Martí camp, which has members from several countries, "who meet in January to commemorate Martí's birthday and the memory of President Abraham Lincoln."

The event is held in Robert King High Park, on Flagler and 70th Avenue, where a section was named Arboleya Camping and Picnic Grounds, in recognition of 40 years of leadership in the boy scouts.

Armesto said that in recent years Arboleya was deeply affected by the loss of his son, lawyer Carlos Joaquín Arboleya, who died at age 56 in 2015.

Two years later, Arboleya's wife, Marta, died, a fundamental pillar in his life.