Election Section

Octavio I. Romano, Ph.D., founder and senior editor of Tonatiuh-Quinto Sol Publications, and emeritus professor in the School of Public Health at UC Berkeley, passed away on Feb. 26 in Berkeley at the age of 82. 

Dr. Romano was born in Mexico City, Mexico, on Feb. 20, 1923 and raised in Tecate, Mexico and later in National City, Calif. The youngest child of Maria and Manuel Romano, he enlisted in the Army in 1943 and served two and a half years with service in Normandy, northern France. He was awarded the European African Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, Good Conduct Medal, Meritorious Unit Award, and World War II Victory Medal. 

Dr. Romano attended college on the G.I. Bill. He was a state championship tennis player during his community college years. 

He graduated from the University of New Mexico with a degree in Anthropology in 1952. He received his master’s degree in Cultural Anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley and then worked for the Public Health Department in Santa Fe, N.M. He received his Ph.D. in anthropology at UC Berkeley in 1965. He taught in the School of Public Health at Berkeley until his retirement in 1989. 

Survived by his wife, Olga, sons Octaviano and Emiliano “Branko,” and brother, Ovidio, he will be missed by everyone who knew him. 

He enjoyed gardening, artistic pursuits and music. Octavio will be remembered for his sense of humor and his love of family, as well as his warmth, congeniality and deep love of literature. He was well loved and admired by many friends and colleagues for his wit and insights. 

In 1965 Dr. Romano founded Quinto Sol Publications, the pioneer publisher of Mexican-American authors. Dr. Romano was president and senior editor of Quinto Sol throughout its history. Quinto Sol published El Grito, the Journal of Mexican-American Thought, and numerous landmark novels and anthologies. Quinto Sol also awarded the annual Premio Quinto Sol, the first national awards for Chicano literature. 

From the 1980s onward Dr. Romano continued to work and write as senior editor under the company’s new name of Tonatiuh-Quinto Sol, a.k.a. TQS Publications. During the last 10 years of his life he published a successful newsletter of Mexican American Thought, with subscriptions worldwide. He was honored at the Breaking Barriers award ceremony sponsored by NHEA, the National Hispanic Employee Association, in San Jose. 

Memorial plans have not yet been announced. The family requests donations, in lieu of flowers, be made in Dr. Romano’s memory to La Clinica de la Raza, 1515 Fruitvale Ave., Oakland, 94601 (laclinica.org), or the charity of your choice.