Ramón Leonarte family members visit Mestalla

Valencia CF and the VCF Foundation, together with the Valencian Football Federation, have prevented the remains of Ramón Leonarte Ribera, president of Valencia CF between 1922 and 1924, from being exhumed.

Ramón Leonarte played a key role in the first chapters of the club's history, and oversaw almost the purchase of the land where Mestalla currently stands. At the end of the 1960s, the former president passed away.

Fifty years after his death, his remains were at risk of exhumation at the Municipal Cemetery in Valencia.

A fan informed the club of this situation and Valencia CF, in order to preserve his memory, paid for the renovation of his gravesite in collaboration with the FFCV -a body of which he was president and co-founder.

A new tombstone designed and sculpted by artist Javier Poncé Tormo – from the CARVED STONE®️ company – bears the shield of the two entities, together with that of the Referees Association, of which he was also a co-founder.

Valencia CF and the FFCV had the approval of Leonarte’s closest living relatives, among them his nephew, Jorge Sempere, who visited Mestalla with his son. During the tour of the stadium and in front of the photograph of Leonarte in the Sala Juan Cruz Sol, he told VCF Media of his gratitude.

“What Valencia CF and the VCF Foundation have done to not let this memory be lost is very important. It gives us enormous tranquility, because it was a problem that the whole family had, a moral problem for all of us that we have put to rest. I want to thanank Valencia CF from the bottom of my heart for this occasion to remember Ramón Leonarte,” he said.