et, Gonzalez’s journey to West Point and success was not always smooth. Gonzalez, known as “Manny” by friends and family, left Cuba in 1961 as an 8-year-old boy. His father had worked against the Fidel Castro regime and supported the Bay of Pigs invasion. Soon after Castro’s takeover, Gonzalez’s family left Cuba in exile for Miami. “When I arrived in the United States, I did not know how to speak English,” said Gonzalez. “I was completely immersed. It was a challenging time, but I learned a lot.” Despite graduating from Miami Dade Junior College, Gonzalez always had his sights set on the United States Military Academy. He was rejected twice before he was finally accepted into the Long Grey Line. “I think that my determination and persistence had a positive effect on the congressmen and the senators in my district,” said Gonzalez. “It shows that if you want something badly enough and if you apply yourself, you can get it.” During his time at West Point, Gonzalez said that other cadets were well aware of his Cuban heritage. “Everyone knew. I had a pretty strong accent,” said Gonzalez. “Still, it was never really an issue. West Point teaches you how to handle extreme pressure and to become an effective leader. That applies not only to the military but is important for life in general.” After six and a half years of active service, Gonzalez accepted a job with Exxon as a drilling engineer in Texas. Between 1992 and 1998, Gonzalez was the President of MANCO Oil & Gas Technologies, and he would go on to co-found the company Isotag in 1992. Gonzalez is also responsible for facilitating the relationship between Chevron and the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in Los Alamos, New Mexico. He worked alongside LANL to start a math and science academy, providing training for teachers, kindergarten through twelfth grade, to better help them teach in the STEM field (science, technology, engineering and math). “Those teachers now have a foundation to grow upon,” said Gonzalez. “I worked with Chevron, and now, every year Chev-
Manny Gonzalez and his wife, Rosemarie Gonzalez, have been married for 38 years.
“West Point teaches you how to handle extreme pressure and to become an effective leader. That applies not only to the military but is important for life in general.” ron makes a contribution. Together with Los Alamos and the teachers, we concentrate on poor, disadvantaged kids in New Mexico, of traditionally Hispanic and Native American communities, and we identify kids with very big potential.” Gonzalez cited the example of Srinivasa Ramanujan, a poor Indian child born in the late 1900s who became a remarkable physicist at Cambridge because of the help of Dr. G.H. Hardy. Gonzalez stressed the importance of identifying individuals with talent, who might not otherwise be able to reach their full potential. In 2012, Gonzalez was the recipient of the Hispanic Engineer National Achieve-
ment Awards Corporation (HENAAC) Lifetime Achievement Award. HENAAC, a nonprofit organization that promotes careers in STEM, gives this award to individuals who are not executives but who have 30 or more years of “amazing service and commitment to STEM.” Gonzalez, currently working on an effort called Project Sapphire, said that the STEM industry is thriving and that more and more Latinos are rising through the ranks in what Gonzalez calls “a strong pipeline.” “It is extremely important to identify young leaders with talent,” said Gonzalez. “Identifying these kids and nurturing them will help us all in the long run.”