On Saturday, in the early morning hours of February 27th, 2021, Jorge Antonio Canizares, a loving husband of 54 years to Marjorie Sanchez and father of four children, passed away peacefully in his sleep at the age of 79 in Tampa, Florida.
Jorge was born on Aug 26, 1941 in Santi Espiritu, Cuba, to Jorge N. Canizares and Pilar Montenegro. He was forced to leave Cuba at the age of 16 and made his way to Miami, then made Tampa his home, living & working in Ybor City. While working 2 jobs at times, Jorge learned English and put himself through school, earned a scholarship to University of South Florida, and graduated with honors in Tampa in 1961. After meeting and marrying the love of his life, Marjorie from Costa Rica they wed in Ybor city and moved to New York to attend NYU on a full scholarship. He was then hired and worked for several prestigious firms including Price Waterhouse and the World Bank. He traveled the world with his next jobs at GTE then ZEROX. He became the Comptroller for XEROX, managing South America and moved the entire family to Sao Paolo and Rio, Brazil for 3 years in 1975, before moving him and the entire family back to Fairfield, Connecticut in 1978. In 1988 he decided retired and moved the family to Tampa so that his children could all attend USF and still live near him.
Jorge had his passions, one was reading, and at times he would read a book a week. He had his set routines, and Sunday was family day. After church, he always had plans. Sometimes it was a movie and dinner, and other times it was a trip to New York City to Radio City Music Hall to see a show and have dinner in China Town. He was known for his intellect, his deeply philosophical conversations about history and his ability to read, write and speak as well as sing, in 5 languages. He was always very formal, even with his children.
Jorge is survived by his wife Marjorie who was the greatest love of his live, saying many times that he could not live without her. Together they had four children, Anthony, Monica, George and Isabel and their spouse's Melanie, Andrew, Cecilia and Mathew. He was an only child but has many cousins, nieces and nephews living across the US. His greatest joy were his 9 grandchildren he loved dearly: Alexandra, Christopher, Sofia, Michael, Anthony, Andrew, Nicholas, Josefina and Wilhemina. A funeral service will be held on Monday, March 15th, 2021 at 2:30 pm at Saint Paul Catholic Church on 12708 N. Dale Mabry Hwy in Tampa, FL 33618. Flowers or donations may both be sent to the church. Donations can be made in lieu of flowers to St. Paul’s Church directly in Jorge’s name. Thank you
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