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Sergio Teixeira Lins de Barros Loreto was born in the Pernambuco city of Águas Belas on 9 September 1870, to teacher Galdino Eleutério Teixeira de Barros Loreto and Luiza Lins de Albuquerque Barros.

From modest family, he worked in the Post Office – a job he managed to get by sitting a public contest. He concluded his secondary education in 1887 and also studied at the Arts and Crafts Lyceum, where he later became an Arithmetic teacher. Working and studying, he managed to finish the Bachelor of Law course at the Recife Faculty of Law, in June 1892.
 
He resigned his post office job and moved to São Leopoldo, in Espírito Santo, where he was district attorney and became State Chief of Police in 1897. At that time, he was already married to Virginia de Moraes Freitas Barbosa, from a renowned family of Pernambuco, with whom he had two sons: Sérgio Loreto Filho and Aspásia.
 
He was fired for political problems and moved from Espírito Santo to Rio de Janeiro, where he practiced law from 1901 to 1904, when he won a public contest for federal judge in Espírito Santo and went back to live in Vitória, the state capital.
 
In 1905, he returned to Recife to hold the office of federal judge in Pernambuco.

He was governor of Pernambuco from October 1922 to October 1926. During his administration, he carried out several works in Recife and also in the interior, including the completion of the Barracks and the square of the Derby; the construction of Beira-Mar Avenue (today Boa Viagem Ave); the dredging of the Recife Port and expansion of some docks and warehouses to allow entry of large ships; the construction of the second line of the Gurjaú pipeline to expand the water supply of the city. He built roads between Floresta, Cabrobó and Boa Vista and between Floresta, Salgueiro, Leopoldina and  Ouricuri; restored school buildings and gave special attention to teacher training. It was he who established the Anthem of the City of Recife, through Law No. 108 of 10 July 1924, with lyrics by Manoel Aarão and music by Nelson Ferreira.

In the area of public hygiene and health, whose Secretary was his son-in-law Dr Amaury de Medeiros, he created specialised sectors to combat malaria, tuberculosis, syphilis and treat mental illness. He opened a network of hospitals that served the municipalities of Goiana, Cabo, Bonito, Canhotinho, Olinda, Nazaré da Mata and Ribeirão, and 26 health posts in the State. He reformed the Santa Águeda Hospital, now called Oswaldo Cruz, created visitors services and health education, managing to eradicate smallpox, yellow fever and significantly lower the mortality rate of children and adults.
 
Sergio Loreto left the government in October 1926, was elected federal representative for Pernambuco, and left politics in 1930.

He died on 6 March 1937.
 
His name is still remembered through a public area in Recife: the Sergio Loreto Square and Sérgio Loreto College, attached to the square, in the neighbourhood of São José.
 
Recife, 11 July 2003.
(Updated 8 September 8 2009.)

Translated by Peter Leamy, March 2012.