On May 15, Aldo Romanelli died at the age of 85. He has long been recognized as the engineer
who co-developed the industry’s first steel raised-panel garage door and the first Stanley raisedpanel entry door.
Romanelli came to the U.S. from Italy in 1928 and hung his first door in 1936 in Detroit, Mich.
In 1958, he started working at Berry Door, which was bought by Stanley around 1964. He was an
engineer for Berry Door and then served as a project manager at Stanley until his retirement in 1992.
Romanelli helped develop an operator and the first steel entry door for Stanley. Around
1974, Stanley engineers Aldo Romanelli and Jim Sealy began working on a prototype for a steel raisedpanel garage door. In 1978, Stanley introduced the industry’s first steel raised-panel (SRP) garage door.
According to best recollections, the door was 1-3/8″ thick and named the Sta-Lite 500.
Within the next five years, every garage door manufacturer in America rushed to make its own SRP
door. Today, that type of door can be found in virtually every town in America and throughout the world.
Romanelli died in Pompano Beach, Fla., the home of Allied Doors, which was founded by the
Romanelli and Santa Lucia families in 1966. The business is still family-run and has three locations with
more than 50 employees.
We extend our sympathy to Aldo’s wife, Evelyn, and to the families of his four sons, Allen, Dennis, Steven, and Michael.