A Community Bank Chief Comes Out of Retirement (Sort Of)

He's baaack.

Cattaraugus County Bank in Little Valley, N.Y., has named Salvatore Marranca chairman less than two years after he retired as its chief executive.

Marranca, who retired in 2014 after 30 years as president and CEO, was put in charge of the board in April, the $207 million-asset bank said in a press release on its website. He had remained on the board in the interim.

Marranca was one of the subjects of an American Banker profile last fall of two bankers whose Vietnam War experience shaped their careers. Before he was drafted in 1970 and immediately after his service with the 518th Adjutant General Company as company clerk, Marranca worked as a Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. examiner.

Vietnam, the Buffalo native said in the article, "showed me there was a big world out there. It taught me the price of freedom." But after his return home he didn't tell people about his participation in the controversial conflict. "I literally threw out everything I had with any connection to the Army," he said.

After 14 years with the FDIC, Marranca joined Cattaraugus County Bank as senior vice president and served on its board starting in 1983, and the following year he was appointed president and CEO. Marranca retained his seat on the board after he retired in 2014 and was succeeded as chief by Michael Wimer.

Marranca took over the chairmanship from Robert Irwin, who will remain on the board, Buffalo Business First reported on Friday. Irwin has served as chairman since 2004, according to a Bloomberg business profile.