Birth and Early Life
Cornelius Cacho was born in Stann Creek Town on 2 October 1926, as the only child to parents Lorenzo and Ignacia Castillo Cacho. His parents migrated to Belize City when he was six years old. He grew up on King Street, and after attending primary school in the Methodist system, he went on to receive his secondary education at St. Michael’s College. The main reason for his parents coming to Belize City was because there were no high schools in Stann Creek in those days, and his father was adamant that his son got a secondary education. At that time Belize was under a British Colonial regime, with labour conditions suffering under the economic crisis which started in 1929, known as the Great Depression. In addition to that, in 1931 a devastating hurricane hit Belize, which compounded the social and economic problems.
In 1942, after graduating from St. Michael’s, like most young persons at that time with a high school education, he joined the civil service and was employed as a messenger in the Treasury Department. Being a member of the civil service in those days meant that decisions were made only by the governor and expatriate officers, and even while moving up in the ranks to junior clerk and third-class clerk, Cornelius found that the native civil servant had no say in decision making and administration; and the only way they could display any efficiency was to handle the stream of paperwork to and from the administrator.
Higher Education
Ever seeking upward mobility, Cacho took correspondence courses from the Certified Public Accountants Association (ACPA) in England. He soon became one of the two qualified accountants in Belize, and was awarded a scholarship to the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), from which he graduated with upper-class honours in Economics. It was while studying abroad that he developed a keen liking for Economics, thus earning his bachelor’s degree in that subject.
On returning home, he was promoted to the post of Assistant Secretary to the Member for Natural Resources, Leigh Richardson, and working with Premier George Price, where he became engaged in negotiating the conditions for the arrival of the Mennonites to Belize. He was also responsible for starting the Planning Unit, charged with economic intelligence.
He again went to LSE to acquire a Master’s degree in International Trade, and on his return to Belize he was promoted to the post of Economic Secretary and Head of the Planning Unit. That job exposed him to an opportunity to have a six-month attachment to the World Bank. Following Hurricane Hattie in 1961, Cornelius was central to the recovery planning, and contributed to the move to Georgetown in the south, and the selection of Belmopan as the new capital.
New Careers
Cornelius Cacho resigned from the public service of Belize in 1965, and along with his wife Laura Louisa Noguera, who he had wed on 23 July 1950, and their five young children, moved to Trinidad and Tobago to serve as Bursar to the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine campus. His children were: Myrtle, Carolyn, Joyce, Denise, and Lawrence. He spent four years in Trinidad and Tobago, during which he was also a lecturer on international economics at the university.
In 1969 the World Bank in Washington DC, through which he had previously made many professional contacts, offered him a job as an operations officer. In posts ranging from Economist to Operations Officer, Cornelius was to remain there for nearly 30 years in various capacities, including: World Bank representative to Somalia for four years, resident Agricultural Development Officer to Zambia, and missions dealing with the East African Development Bank.
Contributions to Education
After retiring from the World Bank, Cornelius and his wife Laura moved to Naples in Florida where they started a campaign to give back to community and country. In getting acclimatized to their new community, Cornelius saw what he described as ‘large and disturbing gaps in education and training among African American children and educational deficiencies in the Black population generally’. In taking that up as a mantra, because even as a child he valued education above most things, he volunteered his services to the Collier County school, where for the next 18 years he tutored high school and middle school students who were primarily Black. He especially urged the students to pursue careers in science, as he believed that ‘there is a great need for more people of colour in STEM fields’. He and his wife were dedicated to similar activities until her death in 2007. Cornelius then married Leonie Samuels, a former teacher from Punta Gorda, who shares his community interests.
In appreciation for his many contributions to the Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU), on 12 May 2022, at the age of 95, Cornelius Cacho was awarded an honorary doctorate degree from FGCU. Along with his wife, they contributed time and money to educational institutions in Florida; and since establishing a scholarship fund at that FGCU, some 44 students have been assisted, and 23 have graduated.
In Belize, Cacho’s contributions to Belize have been great, including:
- The University of the West Indies Open Campus
- The University of Belize
- Methodist High School in Belmopan
- Methodist Church and schools in Belize City
- COVID Food Program
- Donated the land and funded the building of the Ignacia Cacho Library in Dangriga
Cornelius Cacho’s financial and social impacts on Belize are great indeed, especially coming from a family with humble beginnings in Belize. Particular mention must be made of the Lorenzo Cacho Memorial Scholarship Fund, named after his father, which endowed the University of Belize with BZ$250,000.00 as a way to increase students access to a university education. In 2019, the University of Belize named 11 recipients of the scholarship to complete their final two years of undergraduate studies. This is an ongoing program, and is the first for the national university of Belize.
Ignacia Cacho Library
Since the inception of public library services in Belize, through the opening of Jubilee Library in December of 1935, the well-intentioned efforts of the Library Committee resulted in the establishing of sub-libraries in the district towns. The one in Stann Creek Town was accommodated in the District Commissioner’s office in 1936. It was moved to the old Town Hall building in 1952 under the supervision of the Town Board Chairman. In 1956 it occupied a rented room on Commerce Street, then moved to Shipmates Hall on the same street. After that building was destroyed by Hurricane Hattie in 1961, the following year the library was housed in a building near to the District Commissioner’s office; after which it was accommodated in the Multi-Purpose building in 1965.
Interestingly enough, in 1975 the Baron Bliss Trust allocated money to construct a library building for the Town, but as the Town Board felt that there was a greater need for a Civic Centre, it was decided that the money be used for that purpose. In an attempt at restitution, as a compromise the Baron Bliss Trust then made some funds available for the renovation and improvement to the ground floor of the Town Hall for library use. It remained in that location until it was able to occupy its own library-designed building, the Ignacia Cacho Library, for which ground-breaking ceremonies had taken place in 1996, and the building itself inaugurated on 31 July 2003. The library building was named after the mother of Cornelius Cacho, who donated the land, and provided some funding for the building, books, and computers. His donation towards the construction was US15,000.00; while the Belize Ministry of Works pledged $90,000.00 towards the construction.
Over the years the Ignacia Cacho Library successfully and adequately gave bibliographic services to both the adult and juvenile residents of Dangriga, but with the increasing population there arose the need to create more space to accommodate its growing users. In this regard, because of the information shift and increased demands placed on the library, this caused the parent body, the Belize National Library Service and Information System (BNLSIS), to rethink its strategies. This involved the placing of new emphasis on equipping, promoting and developing the library as a centre for advocating literacy, facilitation of teaching and learning, projecting culture, and contributing more directly to development in the community.
A First Floor for the Library
Once again coming on the library scene, and offering financial support to build the first floor to the existing structure was Cornelius Cacho. In this regard, the BNLSIS composed a project proposal which was submitted to him. This project, at an estimated cost of BZ$200,000.00, would enable the library to achieve many of its objectives, and is in keeping with the Mission of the BNLSIS: ‘to promote an informed, aware, and literate community that will foster development and sustain Belize’s cultural heritage’. The overall objective of the project, as listed in the proposal, is to enable the Ignacia Cacho Library to accommodate as many in the community to have access to creative spaces, designed to:
- Provide study areas for self-learning and acquisition of knowledge.
- Operate as a centre for the promotion of history and culture.
- Create a language centre to teach Garifuna and other languages.
- Create a learning environment whereby techniques like drum making and other life skills are taught.
- Promote literacy at all levels.
- Establish audio-visual facilities to enable musical and video recordings, and experimenting therewith.
- Provide a comfortable auditorium to accommodate lectures, meetings, and sessions with students and the wider community.
Apart from having an overall impact on library development in Dangriga, it is envisaged that the project will create increased vibrancy within the library, and the library will become even more flexible and activity-oriented.
Based on Cornelius Cacho's acceptance of the proposal, the first floor was constructed then opened to the public on January 22, 2025.
Other Interests
Cornelius Cacho, as a man of many talents, experiencing hardships, joys, and successes during his lifetime, enjoyed giving back. He took every opportunity to learn and better himself, and in a letter to the Amandala newspaper in January 2019, while he was writing his autobiography, he shared a paper which he had written almost three decades before, entitled: An Economic Framework for the Formulation of a Land Policy. He stated, in summary, that a land policy based on economic criteria will yield three important benefits:
- Serve the country’s economic/social development – output/incomes/jobs best
- Preserve the quality of the land as a basic resource
- Diffuse the budding ethnic particularism which underlies much of the request to review the country’s land policy.
A Social Role Model
It cannot be stressed sufficiently the major role that Cornelius Cacho has played, and is playing, in his sterling efforts to enable people to develop an awareness of themselves, not only through education, but through encouraging them to be efficient both in the workplace and in the community. His affectionate contribution to continue to build on a library in his hometown can only result in heightening the interest of the residents of Dangriga, and endow him with the label as one of Belize’s greatest philanthropists.