Community Corner

Decorated Veteran, Celebrated Artist and now Author: Robert Sanabria

Leesburg resident Robert Sanabria, a retired Lt. Colonel in the U.S. Army and professional sculptor has written two books: one a memoir of his life in an orphanage, and now a novel about a Mexican journalist's struggle against corruption.

Robert Sanabria, of Leesburg, said writing his memoir was a catharsis.

Growing up in an orphanage during the height of the Great Depression left a mark of shame on his life that he knew was irrational, but he had no other way to purge it than by writing about it.

This process took 10 years. Afterward, he brought part of his manuscript to a writing workshop held during . There, a woman told him she wanted to read the rest of his manuscript. She worked for Sterling-based publisher Capital Books. This lead to his first book, “Stewing in the Melting Pot: The Memoire of a Real American,” published in 2001.

Find out what's happening in Leesburgwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

But his research into the book, which involved contacting others who had lived at the orphanage and researching the surrounding community Sierra Madre, Ca., he learned it had once been part of the Rancho Santa Anita, a Mexican land-grant that predated the addition of California to the United States.

He said “writing what you know” —a maxim for authors, journalists and other people of words— leads one down many paths. In his case, his life had touched an interesting piece of history. This lead to his novel, “The Last Californio,” which pulls together the various strands of his personal and ethnic history into a story about a Mexican journalist who struggles to expose a corrupt government official’s hand in the murder of his family. The protagonist, Gar Montalvo, illegally crosses the Rio Grande to flee his pursuers, ending up in Los Angeles, where he discovers his own connection to the Californios and the legacy of the 1846-48 Mexican-American War.

Find out what's happening in Leesburgwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

However, Sanbria’s path to becoming an author was far from a straight line.

He was born in El Paso, Texas, though he left for California when he was 4 years old.

“When asked, I don’t admit to being Texan,” he joked, adding that this was not a slight to the great state of Texas. He simply has no memory of his life there.

After living in the orphanage, he lived again with his mother and stepfather in Los Angeles, and attended college there for less than a semester. With no financial support from his family with which to pursue a higher education, he enlisted in the United States Air Force.

However, he switched to the Army because his term of service would be shorter. He was deployed to Korea just at the close of hostilities.

“Fortunately, I arrived just as the shooting stopped,” Sanabria said. But while he was tasked with patrolling the demilitarized zone, where he caught tuberculosis.

Rather than leaving the army, at which point his care would have been turned over to the Veterans Adminstration, “which was not held in high regard at the time,” Sanabria chose to stay in the Army. He retired years later as a Lt. Colonel.

After leaving the Army, he devoted his life to his great passion: sculpture. He has supported himself as a professional artist for 35 years.

Examples of his commissioned work can be seen throughout the Washinton, D.C. metro area, as well as throughout the East Coast. Sanabria said the largest work he has ever done is 20 feet tall. His works tend to be in “monumental size,” and the cost of crating and shipping his sculptures to a client “usually kills” orders from other parts of the country.

However, he does have works in museums and private collections throughout the country and in Europe.

Sanabria has lived in Loudoun County for the past 26 years with his wife and fellow artist, Sherry Zvares Sanabria.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here