A direct descendant of Ecuador’s liberators; his grandfather, Jose Maria Saenz, was the grandson of Ecuador’s hero of independence, also named Jose Maria Saenz, and brother of Manuela Saenz, the “Liberator of Liberator Simon Bolivar”, of whom all Ecuadorians and Latin Americans proudly honor.

 

Nelson Serrano was born in Quito, Ecuador in September 1938 and was educated at the University of Rosario in Argentina.

 

He arrived in the United States in May, 1964 and soon after married Maria Polit, also an Ecuadorian, in New York, where they established themselves and Mr. Serrano began working for Tangel Automated Systems.  That job was the beginning of his career in material handling for various textile related industries.

 

In March, 1965, his son, Francisco, was born.  Soon after, in January, 1968, came the birth of their first daughter, Cristina. Finally, in June, 1971, the second daughter, Michelle, was born.  That year, in 1971, Mr. Serrano began working for W&H Conveyor Systems in New Jersey.

 

On December, 3, 1971, Mr. Serrano became a United States citizen.

 

Mr. Serrano worked for two more companies, Rapistan and Pace System before returning to Ecuador for three years. He returned to the United States in 1981 after accepting a position as a consultant with Sedlak Management in Ohio.

 

Mr. Serrano left this company in 1984 to start his own business, Garment Conveyor Systems.

 

Five years later, after becoming partners in business with Felice “Phil” Dosso and George Gonsalves of Erie Manufacturing in New York, a company that manufactured slick-rail parts that Mr. Serrano used for his conveyor systems, they all decided to relocate to Bartow, Florida.  Mr. Serrano became a partner with Erie Manufacturing and, reciprocally, Mr. Dosso and Mr. Gonsalves with Garment Conveyor Systems.

 

In 1990, his son, Francisco, began working for the business. Sales went from $750,000 for 1991 to more than $9 million in 1996. In May, 1997, the Serrano’s discovered large amounts of money missing and his partners, Phil and George, admitted to taking the money but would not say what they did with it. As President, Nelson issued a lawsuit against his partners for the return of the money. As majority shareholders, George and Phil ousted Mr. Serrano as president and took over the control of the companies. Nelson left the companies to form another company with his son and continued with the lawsuits against his partners.

 

In the year 2000, Nelson retired and began making more frequent and longer trips to Ecuador where he had bought some real estate and planned to live his retirement since that is where the majority of relatives, brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, etc. lived, and also all his good friends.  To make his more frequent and longer trips to Ecuador easier, he obtained his cedula and an Ecuadorian passport in May, 2000. The Ecuadorian Constitution guarantees since 1998 that being born in Ecuador you automatically have Ecuadorian citizenship for life even if you have citizenship elsewhere. 

 

Email your support or suggestions to: justicia@nelsonserrano.org