You couldn’t play soccer at any serious level in Charlotte during the 1970s and '80s and not have shared the pitch with a Suárez. Seven of Roberto and Miriam Suárez’s twelve children were boys, and six of them became staples in the small but expanding soccer scene.
They were fast and feisty, competitive and combative; fun to play with, and more than a challenge to play against.
Tony Suárez, the second son, was already famous in local soccer circles well before he became a Charlotte sports icon in 1981, helping the Carolina Lightnin’ to the American Soccer League title and being named the ASL Rookie of the Year.
From Cuba to the Queen City
The family had come to Charlotte in 1972 when Roberto became the controller for the two Knight Ridder (now McClatchy) newspapers here, the Charlotte Observer, delivered in the mornings, and the Charlotte News, distributed in the afternoon. He had previously worked for the company’s Miami Herald after the family fled communist Cuba in 1960.
Well before that happened, Roberto was a smart kid and a good athlete. Attending the Belen Jesuit Preparatory School in Havana, which had been founded in 1854 by Queen Isabel II of Spain, he met two people who would change his life. Foremost was the school’s athletic director, Otilio “Capy” Campuzano, a Cuban sports legend. Suárez would marry Campuzano’s daughter Miriam. The other was his friend and teammate on the school’s basketball and baseball teams, Fidel Castro.
Belen Preparatory School basketball team in Havana, featuring Tony’s father, Roberto Suarez (far left), his grandfather Cappy Campuzano (center), and Fidel Castro (right of coach).
After leaving Cuba to attend college in the United States, Suárez returned to Havana to help his friend overthrow the dictator Fulgencio Batista, whose repressive government was exploiting the country’s commercial interests through corrupt deals with the American Mafia and U.S corporations, while suspending the constitution, revoking political liberties, and censoring the media. Castro put him in charge of the country’s largest bank, but that could not sway Suárez from seeing how power had warped his friend.
He sent Miriam and eight children to safety in Miami, joined the resistance to Castro, and eventually joined them as a refugee.
It was not a straight path to Charlotte. Though he came from a well-respected Cuban family and had a degree in finance from Villanova, his first job in the newspaper business was menial, working in the Herald’s mail room. The situation improved, but not to the level he felt was deserved, and he moved the family to Honduras for a better business opportunity in 1969.
Finding Futbol
The athletic genes were already there. As noted, Roberto played basketball and baseball. Tony’s mother, Miriam, described her dad, his grandfather, “My father was really the Jim Thorpe of Cuba.” He had captained the Cuban Basketball team at the 1926 Central American Olympics held in Mexico, and competed in baseball, crew, swimming, and track and field events. Though Capy also had kicked the ball around, Cuba was not big on futbol in the 50’s and 60’s.
It was the exposure to the game in Honduras where soccer became a family sport. Tony was 13 then and became enamored with the beautiful game.
His older brother, Roberto Jr., would play high school football in Miami and was an All-American in the Eastern Lightweight Football League version of the game at Rutgers University, but Tony chose real futbol, and his five younger brothers, who were 7-12 during that time in Central America, would follow his path.
The Suarez family in Charlotte, 1972. Standing, left to right: Miriam, Miguel, Roberto Jr., Tony, Armando, Carlos, and Elena. Front row left to right: Gonzalo, Esperanza, Roberto Suarez, Miriam Suarez, Ana, and Raul. Middle, seated behind Gonzalo: Teresa.
In 1972, Roberto Sr. was offered and accepted the job in Charlotte. He would eventually become the president of the Observer before moving back to Miami to launch El Nuevo Herald, the paper’s Spanish edition.
Finding Futbol
The athletic genes were already there. As noted, Roberto played basketball and baseball. Tony’s mother, Miriam, described her dad, his grandfather, “My father was really the Jim Thorpe of Cuba.” He had captained the Cuban Basketball team at the 1926 Central American Olympics held in Mexico, and competed in baseball, crew, swimming, and track and field events. Though Capy also had kicked the ball around, Cuba was not big on futbol in the 50’s and 60’s.
It was the exposure to the game in Honduras where soccer became a family sport. Tony was 13 then and became enamored with the beautiful game.
His older brother, Roberto Jr., would play high school football in Miami and was an All-American in the Eastern Lightweight Football League version of the game at Rutgers University, but Tony chose real futbol, and his five younger brothers, who were 7-12 during that time in Central America, would follow his path.
In 1972, Roberto Sr. was offered and accepted the job in Charlotte. He would eventually become the president of the Observer before moving back to Miami to launch El Nuevo Herald, the paper’s Spanish edition.
No Hablo Español
While it was the largest city in North Carolina with about 250,000 residents at the time - 241,178 at the 1970 Census count - Charlotte felt more like a big Mayberry than a smaller Atlanta. No one asked where you were from, but what hospital you were born in. Charlotte was a destination from Monroe, not Manhattan.
Even though Charlotte’s first Sister City, Arequipa, Peru, was chartered in 1962 at the urging and organization of transplants from that city, the Hispanic/Latino population was small. There were also families from Ecuador and Uruguay, perhaps Chile and Venezuela, but Charlotte’s first Mexican restaurant that many remember, Pedro’s, way out on Independence Boulevard, didn’t open until the early 70’s.
So, anyone who could speak Spanish was considered to have an advantage when it came to soccer. It was not unheard of for American kids just learning the game to yell out whatever Spanish words or phrases they might know, even those from a Speedy Gonzales cartoon, in an attempt to intimidate an opponent.
It was more speed than Spanish that helped Tony become an instant star playing at Myers Park High School, while the twins, Carlos and Miguel, would compete for South Mecklenburg. Armando would also play at South, and Raul, better known as Coco, would play there for a year and one at West Charlotte, before transferring to Providence Day. Gonzalo would play at Myers Park.
Before Tony left to play at Appalachian State and Belmont Abbey, he was both a lightning bolt and a lightning rod, as were his brothers in elevating the Charlotte version of the passionate Bogota, Buenos Aires, and Rio de Janeiro rivalries. Here it was the triple-edged derby of the no-love-lost battles between Myers Park, East Mecklenburg, and South Mecklenburg high schools.
The tackles were hard, every goal was celebrated fervently, and no grudges were ever forgotten. Those rivalries still live on.
Tony’s story is well documented. A key player on the four-time state champion Press Box/Lowenbrau club team, he tried out for the Lightnin’ and didn’t quite make the cut, but joined the team as a bus driver and practice player. He worked hard, and when injuries to other players left coach Rodney Marsh looking for help, he threw Tony into the mix. It’s both cliché and correct to say that lightning struck as Suárez had instant impact,
“Tony got on the field and he was just dynamite,” Marsh said in a 2021 interview with the Observer. “So quick. So good at putting the ball in the back of the net.”
At 25, the rookie scored 15 goals, made the All-Star team, became a local celebrity beyond the soccer-centric, and finished the season with honors as the team brought the national championship to Charlotte in front of 20,163 fans at American Legion Memorial Stadium.
Injuries would limit his career, which weighed heavily on him. Marriages failed. Bad decisions would lead to jail time. Depression would exacerbate all of these things, and Tony would take his own life in 2007. But he and what he was part of with the Lightnin’ will live forever.
His brothers kept the family name in the game and were coveted by club teams. Miguel, Coco, and Gonzalo would also play in college, and all would be fixtures in the local leagues.
Carlos is now locally famous in another way as the proprietor of the immensely popular Suárez Bakery at Park Road Shopping Center, and Suárez Bakery & Barra at Optimist Hall.
The two youngest sisters also got into the game. Girls' soccer had yet to become a thing when Espe and Ana were at Charlotte Catholic. Espe had learned enough from her brothers to get invited to play on the boys' team when it was started during her senior year. Ana was more like her brothers, fiercely competitive, and focused on basketball, bringing it full circle from her father and grandfather. After playing basketball at Belmont Abbey, she joined the early women’s soccer leagues in Charlotte and married Tom Fleming, a local high school coach. Currently the Senior Director of Production Planning for NASCAR Productions, Ana helped produce ESPN’s nightly highlight show for the 2002 FIFA World Cup out of the network’s studios in Ballentyne.
Estrellas del Relámpago (Stars of the Lightnin’)
Suárez wasn’t the only Hispanic star for the Lightnin’. Born in Cartagena, Colombia, Miguel Avila came to the U.S. to play collegiately for Santa Clara University. He played indoors for the Atlanta Chiefs in 1981 before heading up to join the Lightnin’ for their three seasons. Avila scored the first goal in Charlotte’s pro soccer history on May 2, 1981, in a 2-2 draw with New York United.
Santiago “Santi” Formoso was born in Vigo, Spain, and came to the U.S. at 16 with his family, becoming another legendary player to come out of Kearny (NJ) High School. After playing at the University of Pennsylvania and gaining American citizenship, he turned pro. After two seasons with the NASL Hartford/Connecticut Bicentennials, he joined the New York Cosmos for the 1978 and 79 campaigns, playing with the likes of Carlos Alberto, Franz Beckenbauer, and Giorgio Chinaglia.
In 1980, he played for the Los Angeles Aztecs and Houston Hurricane NASL sides before moving indoors for the MISL club in Buffalo. Formoso, who earned seven caps with the U.S. National team, came to Charlotte in 1982 for two seasons with the Lightnin’ and one with the Charlotte Gold.
The Latino link continued with a number of Hispanic/Latino players helping to lead the Charlotte Eagles and Charlotte Independence to success. Foremost would be Jorge Herrera, who played in his native Colombia for clubs including Independiente Santa Fe and Millionarios, before coming to the Queen City. Herrera has been helping to shape the future of Charlotte FC as an Academy coach since 2020.
Hispanic influence on the college game
While Charlotte is now a city that is producing professional players, soccer was a niche sport here in the 70’s. The first soccer team at UNCC, alma mater of the Crown’s Brandt Bronico, didn’t hit the pitch until 1976, eleven years after the former Charlotte College, founded in 1949, became the University of North Carolina at Charlotte in 1965.
Soccer quickly became the big fall sport at the school, which did not have gridiron football until 2013. By 1996, they had made the NCAA College Cup. They made it to the Cup final in 2011 against UNC-Chapel Hill.
Helping to seed that growth early on was Fernando “Ferd” Sosa, who still holds the records for goals scored in a game (6), season (28), and career (66) during his 1978-81 career as a 49er. Sosa’s family emigrated from Uruguay to Charlotte, where he played at Garinger High School.
Texas-born Mexican-American Gabe Garcia (1988-91) was the 49ers' first All-American in 1991. He ranks third in career goals (39) and points (97).
(photo: https://charlotte49ers.com/news/2020/7/24/dyk-sosa-is-the-49ers-all-time-leading-goal-scorer)
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Acknowledgement: Thanks to the Foundation of the Carolinas, the Charlotte Observer, Ana Suárez Fleming, Carlos Suárez, and other sources for information used in this article.
