A legend in the Bay Area soccer community passed away last week.
Salvador ‘Don Chava’ Lopez Monroy, founder and owner of El Farolito Taqueria and a successful soccer team named after his restaurant that won the US Open Cup title in 1993, died on Jan 5, the club announced. He was 70.
Lopez was born on November 9, 1950, in Guanajuato, México. He immigrated to the Bay Area in 1975 and first worked at a nursery in Half Moon Bay, according to a 2007 SF Weekly profile. He then opened Taqueria San Jose with two other friends at the intersection of 24th and Mission in San Francisco. He sold his share in the business and, in 1983, opened the iconic first outpost of El Farolito Taqueria across the street.
In 1985 he founded the El Farolito soccer club, and in 1986 the club joined the San Francisco Soccer Football League (SFSFL). In particular, Lopez had a knack for acquiring some of the best talents in the Bay Area. Many of the players on his team were former professionals from Latin America. The team rocketed up divisions in the SFSFL to quickly became one of the dominant sides in the soccer league’s premier division.
“It would do Don Chava a disservice to simply call him the owner of a soccer club because while he was that, he represented much more,” wrote the San Francisco Glens, another prominent SFSFL club, in a social media post. “He was a coach, leader, father figure, and friend to so many people.”
“When I first came to the U.S. from Brazil, Don Chava and his son Santi gave me my first opportunity to play here,” added SF Glens forward Marco Iubel. “They treated me well, and it was an awesome experience. Don Chava ran the club and was at every game.”
El Faro’s crowning triumph was winning the US Open Cup, America’s premier soccer tournament open to any amateur and professional club, in 1993. Before the tournament, Farolito changed their team name to Club Deportivo (CD) Mexico. That year they defeated the defending champions, the San Jose Oaks. In the finals, they crushed the United German Hungarians from the Philadelphia area, 5-0, to raise the crown.
In 1994, Lopez bought a lower-division soccer team in Mexico, Gallos of Aguascalientes. Under his ownership, he nearly helped the team get promoted to the top Mexico soccer league before selling the team in 2001 due to debt the club amassed during its ambitious run up the Mexican soccer league table.
Still in charge of El Farolito, the club’s fortunes waxed and waned over the following decades. More often than not, they remain one of the top teams in SFSFL and the winner of regional and California state titles.
In 2018, El Farolito joined the National Premier Soccer League, the fourth soccer division in the United States. The club won a division title during their first season under the current coach and Salvador’s son, Santiago Lopez.
“You knew with how much he supported us whether we won or lost. He really cared about us,” noted Iubel. “Rest in peace.”
