People Profiles

Brian Travers stopped counting how many bones he’s broken “years ago.” Born with osteogenesis imperfecta, known as brittle bone disease, Travers started breaking bones at six weeks old. The condition led to multiple surgeries and visits to the ER where Travers became used to doctors assuming he was too young to answer questions—except for one

The episode: In December 1988, Susie Levan was the chief operating officer at I.R.E. Financial Corp., a publicly traded real estate company that originally hired her as a secretary nearly two decades earlier. Her new husband, Alan, was the CEO of BankAtlantic. Three days before Christmas, the couple entered their Coral Gables home and found

Scout Lessons When Madeleine Gonzalez sold the Girl Scouts’ famous cookies, she wasn’t just satisfying customer cravings for Thin Mints. She also was tapping into a passion for business and marketing. The lessons she learned from selling cookies—never giving up and letting her voice be heard—were put into action when the Miami Beach resident made

Pictured above: Connor Serrano with his mom, Jessica   On a humid summer evening, Julie, a single mom clad in a blue dress, black blazer and sensible pumps, enters a meeting room at the Boca Raton Community Center. It’s where a transgender support group is about to begin. A mix of transmen, transwomen and nonbinary

After living with her husband Matthew in Chicago for six years, Stefanie Harris was ready to head home to Miami. It wasn’t just about missing her family and the sunshine—it was the community. “The warmth of the people who live here and the sense of culture and community—I just think it’s very unique to Miami

Growing up in an Italian and Colombian household, Valentina Mussi developed a love for international foods, but she never thought she would transform that appreciation into a full-time job. Now 21, Mussi commands the attention of more than 100,000 Instagram users with her hundreds of lavish, over-the-top food-focused photos and videos on her account, @SweetPortfolio.

There are days, by his own admission, when the seemingly never-ending battles against hate, discrimination and extremism take their toll on David Barkey. But as the Southeastern area counsel for the Anti-Defamation League quickly points out, “sticking your head in the sand isn’t going to help.” “Nothing is going to change unless people of goodwill

He doesn’t mind being knee-deep in algae. In fact, scientist H. Dail Laughinghouse will tell you it’s where he feels most comfortable. But Laughinghouse admits to having his “Oh, my gosh. This is what I do for a living?” moments from time to time. “So, there I was at Lion Country Safari [in Loxahatchee] sitting

Anna Noriega doesn’t believe in luck—hates the word, actually. To her, making it in life is a matter of commitment, dedication and hard work in pulling what you want from the universe. But Noriega admits there was something serendipitous about her being in the right place at the right time when she accompanied her friend

When Joseph Zolobczuk thinks about being bullied at his religious school in New York, he remembers the pain of hiding himself. “I didn’t even know what gay was,” he says. “I thought I liked girls like all the other guys did because that’s what all the guys talked about. In an environment where I got

With greater attendance comes greater responsibility, or so it would seem for Joe Cox in his role as president and CEO of the Museum of Discovery and Science. The sprawling facility in downtown Fort Lauderdale attracts more than 400,000 people each year—more than double the number of annual visitors at the EcoTarium Museum of Science

He is the grandmaster of his destiny, and Jean Phoenix Le Grand believes anyone can be the master of their own fate, too. “It’s about respect, values, consistency, integrity, obedience, and learning what your life’s purpose is,” he says. That’s what Le Grand teaches in his program, Lost Legacy Systems, in addition to martial arts