Retrato: Filipinas Photo Collection

[[dx]]

More photos from Life Magazine's Photo Archive made available via Google Image Search


Dewey Blvd. running along the water's edge.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


An aerial view of the harbor dividing the city.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


An aerial view showing a joint storage farm.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


An aerial view of a $30 million Caltex refinery.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


Glittering chandeliers lit by electric candles in the main reception hall of the Malacanan Palace, residence of the President.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


A stone fountain with maidens in long dresses standing on seashell-decorated base & supporting big shallow bowl-outside the Malacanan Palace, the President's residence.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


A stone fountain with maidens in long dresses standing on seashell-decorated base & supporting big shallow bowl-outside the Malacanan Palace, the President's residence.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier

[[dx]]

More photos from Life Magazine's Photo Archive made available via Google Image Search


Dewey Blvd. running along the water's edge.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


An aerial view of the harbor dividing the city.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


An aerial view showing a joint storage farm.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


An aerial view of a $30 million Caltex refinery.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


Glittering chandeliers lit by electric candles in the main reception hall of the Malacanan Palace, residence of the President.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


A stone fountain with maidens in long dresses standing on seashell-decorated base & supporting big shallow bowl-outside the Malacanan Palace, the President's residence.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


A stone fountain with maidens in long dresses standing on seashell-decorated base & supporting big shallow bowl-outside the Malacanan Palace, the President's residence.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier

[[dx]]

Some photos of Ramon Magsaysay from Life Magazine's Photo Archive


Ramon Magsaysay marking Huk target with smoke bomb from a spotter plane.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: April 1951
Photographer: Howard Sochurek


Magsaysay supporters listening to the Presidential campaign.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


Ramon Magsaysay dancing the "Magsaysay Mambo" during the Presidential campaign.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


Ramon Magsaysay (C) singing during the Presidential campaign, while a hat is held up to block the sun from his eyes.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: December 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


(L-R) Wife of the ambassador to the Philipines Mrs. Homer Ferguson, Cambodian Prince Norodom Sihanouk, wife of Philipino official Mrs. Ramon Magsaysay, and Philipino Vice President Carlos P. Garcia attending a dinner.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: February 1956
Photographer: John Dominis


Vice President Richard M. Nixon (3L) and wife w. Phillippine President Ramon Magsaysay (2L) and wife informal dress at July 4th celebrations.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: July 1956
Photographer: John Dominis


Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: 1957
Photographer: John Dominis


Acting President Carlos Garcia attending Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: 1957
Photographer: John Dominis

Carlos Garcia attending Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: 1957
Photographer: John Dominis


Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: March 1957
Photographer: John Dominis

[[dx]]

Some photos of Ramon Magsaysay from Life Magazine's Photo Archive


Ramon Magsaysay marking Huk target with smoke bomb from a spotter plane.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: April 1951
Photographer: Howard Sochurek


Magsaysay supporters listening to the Presidential campaign.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


Ramon Magsaysay dancing the "Magsaysay Mambo" during the Presidential campaign.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: September 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


Ramon Magsaysay (C) singing during the Presidential campaign, while a hat is held up to block the sun from his eyes.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: December 1953
Photographer: Michael Rougier


(L-R) Wife of the ambassador to the Philipines Mrs. Homer Ferguson, Cambodian Prince Norodom Sihanouk, wife of Philipino official Mrs. Ramon Magsaysay, and Philipino Vice President Carlos P. Garcia attending a dinner.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: February 1956
Photographer: John Dominis


Vice President Richard M. Nixon (3L) and wife w. Phillippine President Ramon Magsaysay (2L) and wife informal dress at July 4th celebrations.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: July 1956
Photographer: John Dominis


Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: 1957
Photographer: John Dominis


Acting President Carlos Garcia attending Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: 1957
Photographer: John Dominis

Carlos Garcia attending Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: 1957
Photographer: John Dominis


Ramon Magsaysay's funeral.
Location: Philippines
Date taken: March 1957
Photographer: John Dominis

[bitoy]

Thanks! DX! ~ hindi nakakasawang tingnan ang mga nakaraan.

[bitoy]

Thanks! DX! ~ hindi nakakasawang tingnan ang mga nakaraan.

[[dx]]

Originally Posted by bitoy

Thanks! DX! ~ hindi nakakasawang tingnan ang mga nakaraan.

oo nga e. nakakamangha. iniisa isa ko yung mga pic haha. kung pwede lang i-post lahat dito.

[[dx]]

Originally Posted by bitoy

Thanks! DX! ~ hindi nakakasawang tingnan ang mga nakaraan.

oo nga e. nakakamangha. iniisa isa ko yung mga pic haha. kung pwede lang i-post lahat dito.

[bitoy]

Maganda talaga nuon ang buhay, In the late 50s and early 60s, I was a kid then but I still remember how my relatives especially my aunts on how they dress up nicely during those days.
My father with his white sharkskin suits and shiny dress shoes when going to work in Escolta and after a few years change into a barong or just a white crisp polo shirt when he became a plant manager of a textile company and all their employees even though working in a plant really dress in a very decent way.

[bitoy]

Maganda talaga nuon ang buhay, In the late 50s and early 60s, I was a kid then but I still remember how my relatives especially my aunts on how they dress up nicely during those days.
My father with his white sharkskin suits and shiny dress shoes when going to work in Escolta and after a few years change into a barong or just a white crisp polo shirt when he became a plant manager of a textile company and all their employees even though working in a plant really dress in a very decent way.

[Taga Bogo]

This is how Cebu City was described by my parents and my grandmother who lived through the time. I had oftened wondered how to picture those stories in my mind. The pictures brought up some GOOD MEMORIES. THANK YOU

Originally Posted by [dx]

^Here are some photos of Cebu from Life Magazine's Photo Archive made available via Google Image Search


Cebu City dock area is popular in inter island shipping.
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns

Small interior island shipping jamming the dock area.
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns


American ads covering the refreshment stands..
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns


Men building up sandbags on the waterfront.
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns

[Taga Bogo]

This is how Cebu City was described by my parents and my grandmother who lived through the time. I had oftened wondered how to picture those stories in my mind. The pictures brought up some GOOD MEMORIES. THANK YOU

Originally Posted by [dx]

^Here are some photos of Cebu from Life Magazine's Photo Archive made available via Google Image Search


Cebu City dock area is popular in inter island shipping.
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns

Small interior island shipping jamming the dock area.
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns


American ads covering the refreshment stands..
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns


Men building up sandbags on the waterfront.
Location: Cebu, Philippines
Date taken: September 1949
Photographer: Jack Birns

[Animo]

Ex-mayor Atienza should never had ordered the Jai Alai to be demolished! He just wasted a Landmark in Manila/Philippines.

---










Jai Alai Building (Taft Avenue, Manila)
July 25, 2006

Jai Alai Building

* Location: Taft Avenue, Manila
* Completed: 1940
* Architect: Welton Becket, a friend of Hollywood celebrities and designer of the homes of such screen legends as James Cagney and Cesar Romero, as well as of Los Angeles airport
* Style: Art Deco
* Design: The Jai Alai’s sleek, cylindrical glass front was said to evoke the velocity of the game, in which pelotaris use curved scoops to hurl a rubber ball at speeds of up to 200 km an hour against three walls of a court
* Significance: Among the jewels of that period was Taft Avenue, a mini-Champs Elysee, with grand homes, sparkling movie houses, colleges and spectacular Art Deco buildings. One of the finest buildings was the Jai Alai stadium, opened in 1940 as a home for the Basque game of the same name and quickly adopted as a playground by the rich and glamorous.
* Status: Demolition began on July 15, 2000 on the orders of Mayor Lito Atienza

Remember the Jai Alai?
By Augusto Villalon
MARK the 15th of July on your calendars.

On that date in 2000 began the demolition of the Jai Alai, one of Asia’s finest Art Deco buildings, a structure that was to have given way to a new Hall of Justice for the City of Manila.

Its demolition was one of the “defining moments,” as Inquirer columnist Bambi Harper called it, in the uphill battle to preserve Philippine architectural heritage.

Public protest was loud. Conservationists negotiated with city officials to save the building. But the Jai Alai building went down anyway.

The Hall of Justice was never built.

How far has heritage preservation gone since then?

Today, five years later, construction looms in both Mehan Garden and the Arroceros Forest Park located in central Manila close to the site of the former Jai Alai.

Both sites are designated as nationally significant archeological sites by the National Museum. Furthermore, Arroceros has the added value of being the only full-grown inner city forest in Manila. Just think of its contribution to the city’s stressed ecology.

Construction excavation is underway at Arroceros. Tempers continue to fly on either side of the issue and negotiation is near deadlock. Compromise does not appear to be on the agenda of either side.

Although there are hard and fast rules followed both in preservation as well as in development, agreement might be reached that satisfies the requirements of both sides.

Who knows? An innovative solution might be reached that provides the smallest construction footprint to maximize open space in Mehan Garden or the Arroceros forest. Buildings and nature can be designed to coexist.

Countless architectural and environmental possibilities exist. It is just a great pity that none of these possibilities were given the opportunity to be talked about and tested.

The Philippines sorely lacks a model of how preservation and development go hand in hand. With the Jai Alai, Mehan Garden, and Arroceros Forest Park, we missed the opportunity to construct such a model. However, I still am hopeful that such a model will arise in the near future.

When all sectors of society join to complete a conservation project where all issues are discussed before the design of the structure is completed, then we will know that the Jai Alai building was not a senseless loss.

27 July 2000
Waiting for the demolition domino
“After Jai Alai building, what’s next?”
By Alfred A. Araya Jr.

Last Saturday, close to a hundred protesters could only watch helplessly outside the compound of the Jai Alai building on Taft Avenue, Manila.

Repeated pleas to stop the demolition fell on deaf ears. The wrecking crew, using a backhoe, a mean-looking machine equipped with what looked like a huge hammer, continued to pound on the concrete wall of the old structure. Some tried to reason with the man controlling the machine, but to no avail. They were answered by loud methodic thuds produced with every pounding that tore up portions of the wall.

Manila Mayor Lito Atienza ordered the building torn down to give way to a 12-story Hall of Justice for Manila that would house 100 courtrooms and prosecutor’s offices, now packed into the nearby City Hall. The project, expected to cost P500 million, has the blessings and financial support of Malacañang,

The building had seen better days, and better treatment.

‘Game of a thousand thrills’

The old building was where jai alai, the Basque game of handball, was played. Almost every night, at the peak of the game’s popularity, the building and its premises attracted not just aficionados of what was touted as the “game of a thousand thrills” but hundreds, sometimes thousands, of bettors pinning their hopes on the winning combinations.

Its famous Sky Room drew the city’s elite as a place for receptions, ballroom dancing and other social affairs. It was at the Sky Room, too, that well-heeled patrons dined and wined while watching the game.

But Atienza, rejecting calls for the retention of at least the building’s façade, had said: “We want the new structure to represent respect for justice and rule of law, not promote memories that tend to venerate gambling.”

Art Deco design

The demolition drew the ire of artists, students, urban groups and others concerned with protecting not just an old structure but something they strongly consider as “pamana ng bayan (national heritage).” The building was held up as an example of the Art Deco style, popularized during the Commonwealth era and the early years of the Republic, and therefore worth preserving for present and future generations.

Expectedly, the protesters’ anger was directed mainly at Atienza, whom they accused of wrecking a part of the country’s architectural heritage.

Bambi Harper, president of the Heritage Conservation Society (HCS) which headed the protest rally, accused the mayor of lying, saying he had promised not to tear down the building in a meeting a few weeks back, and reneged on his promise. The HCS is a non-profit organization advocating the protection of the country’s historic buildings, districts, and sites.

The promise turned out to be “lista sa tubig (written on water),” said HCS legal counsel Attorney Rose Beatrix Cruz-Angeles said Filipinos should realize that a structure like the Jai Alai building is part of their culture. “Once it’s gone, it’s gone [forever].”

‘Manifestations of history’

Backing up Harper, sculptor Carlos Celdran described such structures as “physical manifestations of our history.” Destroying them is like destroying one’s culture, “the very foundation of society,” he said. “You cannot be united as one people unless you have a culture.”

The conservationists are worried that the destruction of the Jai Alai building could happen to other historic buildings in the country. “After the Jai Alai building, what’s next?” asked one banner held by a protester.

Warning of “a domino effect”, Celdran said: “If the Jai Alai building goes down, another one will later go down, and then another. The demolition of historical buildings should be stopped now. If not, all will eventually be lost.”

The past as pictures

Or all will be reduced to just being pictures in coffee table books, warned Gigi Salome of Dakilang Pamana Project, a group doing a photo-documentation and inventory of architectural structures around Metro Manila that are considered part of the national heritage.

At the rate cultural relics are being ruined, she said, present and future generations wishing to see structures of the past may later have to make do with looking at souvenir photographs.

Why destroy the Jai Alai building when it can be restored? the protesters asked. They made it clear that they were not against Atienza’s plan of putting up a justice building. But they said there’s nothing wrong with preserving the building’s façade.

To Atienza, however, a preserved or restored façade would only serve as a reminder of the building’s “negative past, when it gained notoriety as a place of game-rigging, syndication and other forms of cheating, and as a place where people’s lives were ruined due to addiction to gambling.”

And so the demolition continued

Several elderly people who joined the protest appeared to cringe with each pounding of the mechanical backhoe. What used to a very popular landmark in their younger years was now being reduced to rubble.

Gone were the days when the four-story building was “the place to be in.” It was built in 1939 just before the outbreak of World War II and designed by the American architect Welton Becket.

‘It was always elegant’

“It was always very elegant,” Sister Christine Tan, who came with members of the urban group Alay Kapwa, said of the Sky Room. “I remember the dancing. My parents went there to see jai alai. It is heartbreaking to see it demolished.”

Even before the demolition started, the Jai Alai building was already not much to look at, some observers said. Old and dirty, it hardly appealed to those who knew nothing about its history.

But those in the know say it was the government that allowed the structure to deteriorate. “In 1986, that building wasn’t like this,” Harper said. She disclosed that when the government sequestered the building and placed it under the Presidential Commission on Good Government after the Edsa Revolution, it became neglected and soon became a haven for squatters.

Angeles said this only shows how the government hardly gives any weight to the national heritage. Instead, she said, it allows the putting up of structures that “do not conform with the historic fabric of the area,” citing as an example a newly built mall near City Hall.

http://heritagesentinel.wordpress.co...avenue-manila/

P.S.

Great sets of photos!

[Animo]

Ex-mayor Atienza should never had ordered the Jai Alai to be demolished! He just wasted a Landmark in Manila/Philippines.

---










Jai Alai Building (Taft Avenue, Manila)
July 25, 2006

Jai Alai Building

* Location: Taft Avenue, Manila
* Completed: 1940
* Architect: Welton Becket, a friend of Hollywood celebrities and designer of the homes of such screen legends as James Cagney and Cesar Romero, as well as of Los Angeles airport
* Style: Art Deco
* Design: The Jai Alai’s sleek, cylindrical glass front was said to evoke the velocity of the game, in which pelotaris use curved scoops to hurl a rubber ball at speeds of up to 200 km an hour against three walls of a court
* Significance: Among the jewels of that period was Taft Avenue, a mini-Champs Elysee, with grand homes, sparkling movie houses, colleges and spectacular Art Deco buildings. One of the finest buildings was the Jai Alai stadium, opened in 1940 as a home for the Basque game of the same name and quickly adopted as a playground by the rich and glamorous.
* Status: Demolition began on July 15, 2000 on the orders of Mayor Lito Atienza

Remember the Jai Alai?
By Augusto Villalon
MARK the 15th of July on your calendars.

On that date in 2000 began the demolition of the Jai Alai, one of Asia’s finest Art Deco buildings, a structure that was to have given way to a new Hall of Justice for the City of Manila.

Its demolition was one of the “defining moments,” as Inquirer columnist Bambi Harper called it, in the uphill battle to preserve Philippine architectural heritage.

Public protest was loud. Conservationists negotiated with city officials to save the building. But the Jai Alai building went down anyway.

The Hall of Justice was never built.

How far has heritage preservation gone since then?

Today, five years later, construction looms in both Mehan Garden and the Arroceros Forest Park located in central Manila close to the site of the former Jai Alai.

Both sites are designated as nationally significant archeological sites by the National Museum. Furthermore, Arroceros has the added value of being the only full-grown inner city forest in Manila. Just think of its contribution to the city’s stressed ecology.

Construction excavation is underway at Arroceros. Tempers continue to fly on either side of the issue and negotiation is near deadlock. Compromise does not appear to be on the agenda of either side.

Although there are hard and fast rules followed both in preservation as well as in development, agreement might be reached that satisfies the requirements of both sides.

Who knows? An innovative solution might be reached that provides the smallest construction footprint to maximize open space in Mehan Garden or the Arroceros forest. Buildings and nature can be designed to coexist.

Countless architectural and environmental possibilities exist. It is just a great pity that none of these possibilities were given the opportunity to be talked about and tested.

The Philippines sorely lacks a model of how preservation and development go hand in hand. With the Jai Alai, Mehan Garden, and Arroceros Forest Park, we missed the opportunity to construct such a model. However, I still am hopeful that such a model will arise in the near future.

When all sectors of society join to complete a conservation project where all issues are discussed before the design of the structure is completed, then we will know that the Jai Alai building was not a senseless loss.

27 July 2000
Waiting for the demolition domino
“After Jai Alai building, what’s next?”
By Alfred A. Araya Jr.

Last Saturday, close to a hundred protesters could only watch helplessly outside the compound of the Jai Alai building on Taft Avenue, Manila.

Repeated pleas to stop the demolition fell on deaf ears. The wrecking crew, using a backhoe, a mean-looking machine equipped with what looked like a huge hammer, continued to pound on the concrete wall of the old structure. Some tried to reason with the man controlling the machine, but to no avail. They were answered by loud methodic thuds produced with every pounding that tore up portions of the wall.

Manila Mayor Lito Atienza ordered the building torn down to give way to a 12-story Hall of Justice for Manila that would house 100 courtrooms and prosecutor’s offices, now packed into the nearby City Hall. The project, expected to cost P500 million, has the blessings and financial support of Malacañang,

The building had seen better days, and better treatment.

‘Game of a thousand thrills’

The old building was where jai alai, the Basque game of handball, was played. Almost every night, at the peak of the game’s popularity, the building and its premises attracted not just aficionados of what was touted as the “game of a thousand thrills” but hundreds, sometimes thousands, of bettors pinning their hopes on the winning combinations.

Its famous Sky Room drew the city’s elite as a place for receptions, ballroom dancing and other social affairs. It was at the Sky Room, too, that well-heeled patrons dined and wined while watching the game.

But Atienza, rejecting calls for the retention of at least the building’s façade, had said: “We want the new structure to represent respect for justice and rule of law, not promote memories that tend to venerate gambling.”

Art Deco design

The demolition drew the ire of artists, students, urban groups and others concerned with protecting not just an old structure but something they strongly consider as “pamana ng bayan (national heritage).” The building was held up as an example of the Art Deco style, popularized during the Commonwealth era and the early years of the Republic, and therefore worth preserving for present and future generations.

Expectedly, the protesters’ anger was directed mainly at Atienza, whom they accused of wrecking a part of the country’s architectural heritage.

Bambi Harper, president of the Heritage Conservation Society (HCS) which headed the protest rally, accused the mayor of lying, saying he had promised not to tear down the building in a meeting a few weeks back, and reneged on his promise. The HCS is a non-profit organization advocating the protection of the country’s historic buildings, districts, and sites.

The promise turned out to be “lista sa tubig (written on water),” said HCS legal counsel Attorney Rose Beatrix Cruz-Angeles said Filipinos should realize that a structure like the Jai Alai building is part of their culture. “Once it’s gone, it’s gone [forever].”

‘Manifestations of history’

Backing up Harper, sculptor Carlos Celdran described such structures as “physical manifestations of our history.” Destroying them is like destroying one’s culture, “the very foundation of society,” he said. “You cannot be united as one people unless you have a culture.”

The conservationists are worried that the destruction of the Jai Alai building could happen to other historic buildings in the country. “After the Jai Alai building, what’s next?” asked one banner held by a protester.

Warning of “a domino effect”, Celdran said: “If the Jai Alai building goes down, another one will later go down, and then another. The demolition of historical buildings should be stopped now. If not, all will eventually be lost.”

The past as pictures

Or all will be reduced to just being pictures in coffee table books, warned Gigi Salome of Dakilang Pamana Project, a group doing a photo-documentation and inventory of architectural structures around Metro Manila that are considered part of the national heritage.

At the rate cultural relics are being ruined, she said, present and future generations wishing to see structures of the past may later have to make do with looking at souvenir photographs.

Why destroy the Jai Alai building when it can be restored? the protesters asked. They made it clear that they were not against Atienza’s plan of putting up a justice building. But they said there’s nothing wrong with preserving the building’s façade.

To Atienza, however, a preserved or restored façade would only serve as a reminder of the building’s “negative past, when it gained notoriety as a place of game-rigging, syndication and other forms of cheating, and as a place where people’s lives were ruined due to addiction to gambling.”

And so the demolition continued

Several elderly people who joined the protest appeared to cringe with each pounding of the mechanical backhoe. What used to a very popular landmark in their younger years was now being reduced to rubble.

Gone were the days when the four-story building was “the place to be in.” It was built in 1939 just before the outbreak of World War II and designed by the American architect Welton Becket.

‘It was always elegant’

“It was always very elegant,” Sister Christine Tan, who came with members of the urban group Alay Kapwa, said of the Sky Room. “I remember the dancing. My parents went there to see jai alai. It is heartbreaking to see it demolished.”

Even before the demolition started, the Jai Alai building was already not much to look at, some observers said. Old and dirty, it hardly appealed to those who knew nothing about its history.

But those in the know say it was the government that allowed the structure to deteriorate. “In 1986, that building wasn’t like this,” Harper said. She disclosed that when the government sequestered the building and placed it under the Presidential Commission on Good Government after the Edsa Revolution, it became neglected and soon became a haven for squatters.

Angeles said this only shows how the government hardly gives any weight to the national heritage. Instead, she said, it allows the putting up of structures that “do not conform with the historic fabric of the area,” citing as an example a newly built mall near City Hall.

http://heritagesentinel.wordpress.co...avenue-manila/

P.S.

Great sets of photos!

[[dx]]

^yeah, what were they thinking? we lost an art deco gem. i hope we still have architectural plans of this building so we can reconstruct it in the future


A view of the Plaza de Goiti in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of the swimming pool at the Army and Nacy Club in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of an old house on Carriedo Street in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of clothes drying in a sunken garden next to the city wall of Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of the main shopping street in Manila called the Escolta.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of Muralla Street in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


An exterior view of City Hall of Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of the government owned Manila Hotel.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of a man diving into the swimming pool at the Manila Hotel.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


People enjoying the newly constructed Manila Hotel.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: May 1948
Photographer: Jack Birns

[[dx]]

^yeah, what were they thinking? we lost an art deco gem. i hope we still have architectural plans of this building so we can reconstruct it in the future


A view of the Plaza de Goiti in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of the swimming pool at the Army and Nacy Club in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of an old house on Carriedo Street in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of clothes drying in a sunken garden next to the city wall of Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of the main shopping street in Manila called the Escolta.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of Muralla Street in Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


An exterior view of City Hall of Manila.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of the government owned Manila Hotel.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


A view of a man diving into the swimming pool at the Manila Hotel.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: 1942
Photographer: Carl Mydans


People enjoying the newly constructed Manila Hotel.
Location: Manila, Philippines
Date taken: May 1948
Photographer: Jack Birns

[Animo]

Thanks Dex! I would like to re-post this that I made a couple of years ago to those who haven't seen it. The nostalgia in this thread is on a high scale!

---

Arrival of the tranvia


This is a document about a planned project of a construction of railway and ship in Manila and Malabon (1882)


Puente de España, Manila, Filipinas

In 1878, Leon Monssour, an official of the Department of Public Works, submitted a proposal to Madrid for a streetcar system. Apparently inspired by the systems in New York and Paris, Monssour envisioned a five-line network with a central station outside the walls of Intramuros, the fortress-like seat of Spanish power in the Philippines. From Plaza San Gabriel in Binondo, the lines were to run to Intramuros via the Puente de España (today's Jones Bridge), to Malate Church, Malacañang (where the Philippine President now lives and works), and Sampaloc and Tondo, large districts north of the Pasig River today. The proposal found favor with the government, but it had to wait for an entrepreneur's initiative.


Compaña de los Tranvias de Filipinas

That entrepreneur was Jocobo Zobel de Zangroniz. Together with Spanish engineer Luciano M. Bremon and Madrid banker Adolfo Bayo, in 1882, the three formed La Compañia de tranvias de Filipinas to operate the concession awarded by the government. The Malacañang Line was not built and was replaced by the Malabon Line. These five routes became popular with commuters. The Manila-Malabon Line was the first to be finished, opening for business on 20 October 1888. All five were constructed between 1885 and 1889. The first tranvias were horse-drawn omnibuses for 12 seated and 8 standing passengers. The system was 16.3-km long—slightly longer than today's only operating LRT line.



Escolta, Main Buisness Center of Manila: horse-drawn

While four lines were horse-drawn, the Malabon ran on steam. Some 4 years later, the Manila Railroad Company, the country's first long-distance rail line north to Dagupan, 196 km away, started operation. So strictly speaking, the first steam railroad in the islands was a modest streetcar! Malabon's transfer points were Tondo, Maypajo, a working-class neighborhood in the suburb of Caloocan and Dulu, at the north end of that community.


Calle Escolta (1911)

The long communication line between Madrid and Manila, plus much delayed economic reforms, conspired to slow development of the Philippines, particularly Luzon, the archipelago's largest island. While other countries were in the throes of the Industrial Revolution and the wave of mercantilism, Spain lagged behind. As early as 1842, a study mission headed by Don Sinibaldo de Mas came to the Philippines to find the best way to carry out reforms—reforms later promoted by Filipinos like Dr Jose Rizal and his contemporaries, known collectively as the Propagandists.

The 1890s were turbulent years for the Spanish colony. The clamored-for reforms prompted Rizal to pen two novels, Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo, required reading in schools today. Though fiction, the stories were too close to the truth for the Spanish to tolerate. Eventually, Rizal was charged with sedition and executed in 1896—four years after the Manila-Dagupan railroad was completed. Less than 18 months later, Filipinos declared their independence from Spain. The revolution to assert that claim soon followed.

New Colonizers


Paseo de Bagumbayan

Meanwhile, the Americans were also at war with Spain. After winning the conflict and claiming the Philippines under the Treaty of Paris, US forces soon arrived. Early in 1899, war (some called it an insurrection) between the Filipinos and the Americans broke out. The Spanish imprint was already etched indelibly on the Philippine landscape, and by the turn of the century, an air of uncertainty characterized everyday conversation as Filipinos wondered what life would be like under the new colonizers.

Transition for tranvia


Manila streetcar, early 1900s

By 1902, La Compañia had long since stopped expanding or improving its system. An average of only 10 streetcars plied the five lines daily. This was a far cry from the hourly service that provided 14 runs in each direction on the Malabon Line alone.

One year later, Manila city officials blamed slow economic growth and population congestion to ‘the antiquated horse-car system and the poorly constructed, unsatisfactory, and generally undesirable system of public vehicles,’ to quote from their official report. These leaders reasoned that with improved transport, the railroad was specifically named, ‘many of those now paying high rents for small and unhealthy quarters will take advantage of this quick transportation and secure comfortable dwellings in better localities.’

Birth of Electric Streetcar




Calle Escolta de Manila

The Philippine Commission on 20 October 1902 passed a law that set into motion franchises to be awarded to bidders for the construction and operation of electric power and transportation networks. Although publicized in newspapers in America and the Philippines as well as in a leading US railway journal, only one bid was submitted. On 24 March 1903, the Municipal Board of Manila passed Ordinance 44, accepting the bid of Charles M. Swift of Detroit. Three days later, a New Jersey company was established which eventually became the Manila Electric Railroad and Light Company—better known as Meralco. Today, Meralco is still in the electric power business in Metro Manila and neighboring provinces. Later, the Philippine Commission allowed Meralco to take over the properties of La Compañia de tranvias. Meralco paid a small fee for its streetcars to La Compañia's lines.

Swift was now under a deadline. He had 6 months to start building his systems and 20 months to get the job done. Ordinance 44 specified 12 lines. Today's LRT Line 1 closely follows the Meralco route to Pasay south of Manila and the Santa Cruz route . LRT Line 2, now under construction, also adheres fairly well to the original lines Meralco laid down. With the exception of the Binondo and Intramuros areas, the network was double-tracked and powered by an overhead catenary of 500 V maximum. The track was standard gauge.

By 1913, Meralco had completed nine of the 12 lines, still called the tranvia by commuters. Swift under another franchise granted in 1906, was also operating a 9.8-km extension line from Paco to Fort McKinley and Pasig. The operator, the Manila Suburban Railway, later merged in 1919 to form the Manila Electric Company. The extension line was one of the most profitable in the Meralco system.

Meralco's lines crossed the Manila Railroad Company's lines (now the Philippine National Railways (PNR)) at three points. Sometimes, I go to Blumentritt Station on the LRT just to see a PNR commuter train crawl directly under the elevated track as I wait for an LRT train to approach its station of the same name, 5 or so meters above. LRT Line 2 will cross the PNR at Santa Mesa in another repeat of history. The Santa Ana tranvia crossed not far from today's PNR Paco Station, currently under renovation.

Dr Leonardo Q. Liongson, Engineering Professor at the University of the Philippines, and railroad enthusiast, made an astute observation in a paper he presented last January: ‘It is also interesting to note from the 1913 (route) map that the three principal tranvia lines (Santa Cruz, Santa Mesa and Santa Ana) led directly to outlying cockpits in suburban La Loma, San Juan and San Pedro de Macati respectively.’ Cockfighting was and still is a popular form of gambling. He concluded, ‘From the point of view of city-wide commuter service, commerce and cockfighting, the Manila electric tranvia was indeed a complete system serving the city by the end of the first decade of the 20th century.’

As the road network improved, Meralco introduced electric- and gasoline-powered bus services in the 1930s. The company also promoted the use of electric appliances such as radios and refrigerators. The tranvia continued running but stopped expanding.

Photos here: http://www.jrtr.net/jrtr16/pdf/f33_satre.pdf
More in the Philippine archives.

---



In 1905, Manila's first tranvia, or tram, opened in Manila and soon grew to five lines servicing many parts of the city of Manila and its outskirts. At that time, the trams were hailed as an efficient system for the city's 220,000 inhabitants of that time. The trams were operated by the Manila Electric Railroad and Light Company (Meralco), which now provides power to the city.


Pre-war Corregidor

The Philippines once had a tram network in Manila, but it was destroyed during World War II. The system has been replaced with the LRT and MRT.




CORREGIDOR is a two-square-mile mountainous island at the entrance to Manila Bay. The site of Fort Hughes, a U.S. Military Defense Unit with extensive tunnels through the mountains, the island was originally fortified by the Spanish in the 18th Century. It became a U.S. military station in 1900 and, after invasion by the Japanese in 1941, was chosen as a major defense position which was the site of a famous battle in 1942. The electric tram system, which opened in 1910, was operated by soldiers of the U.S. Army Quartermaster Corps. Eleven passenger cars ran on a winding network of lines connecting the docks and wharves with the barracks, schools and administrative offices. One line ran through a tunnel. The postcard shows Topside Station.


MANILA is located on the Island of Luzon on the east shore of Manila Bay. It is the principal port and commercial, cultural and industrial center of the Philippines. Founded in 1571, Manila became an important commercial center under Spanish rule and was captured by U.S. forces on Aug. 13, 1898, during the Spanish-American War. A horse tram system was opened in the 1880s and a steam tramway ran north to Malabon. The electric tramway system opened on April 10, 1905, and by the 1920s had 17 routes, 33 miles of track and 110 cars. Thirteen cars served a separate 12-mile interurban line to Pasig. Service ended in 1944 during the Japanese occupation. The postcard shows a tram in the silk-stocking district.

[Animo]

Thanks Dex! I would like to re-post this that I made a couple of years ago to those who haven't seen it. The nostalgia in this thread is on a high scale!

---

Arrival of the tranvia


This is a document about a planned project of a construction of railway and ship in Manila and Malabon (1882)


Puente de España, Manila, Filipinas

In 1878, Leon Monssour, an official of the Department of Public Works, submitted a proposal to Madrid for a streetcar system. Apparently inspired by the systems in New York and Paris, Monssour envisioned a five-line network with a central station outside the walls of Intramuros, the fortress-like seat of Spanish power in the Philippines. From Plaza San Gabriel in Binondo, the lines were to run to Intramuros via the Puente de España (today's Jones Bridge), to Malate Church, Malacañang (where the Philippine President now lives and works), and Sampaloc and Tondo, large districts north of the Pasig River today. The proposal found favor with the government, but it had to wait for an entrepreneur's initiative.


Compaña de los Tranvias de Filipinas

That entrepreneur was Jocobo Zobel de Zangroniz. Together with Spanish engineer Luciano M. Bremon and Madrid banker Adolfo Bayo, in 1882, the three formed La Compañia de tranvias de Filipinas to operate the concession awarded by the government. The Malacañang Line was not built and was replaced by the Malabon Line. These five routes became popular with commuters. The Manila-Malabon Line was the first to be finished, opening for business on 20 October 1888. All five were constructed between 1885 and 1889. The first tranvias were horse-drawn omnibuses for 12 seated and 8 standing passengers. The system was 16.3-km long—slightly longer than today's only operating LRT line.



Escolta, Main Buisness Center of Manila: horse-drawn

While four lines were horse-drawn, the Malabon ran on steam. Some 4 years later, the Manila Railroad Company, the country's first long-distance rail line north to Dagupan, 196 km away, started operation. So strictly speaking, the first steam railroad in the islands was a modest streetcar! Malabon's transfer points were Tondo, Maypajo, a working-class neighborhood in the suburb of Caloocan and Dulu, at the north end of that community.


Calle Escolta (1911)

The long communication line between Madrid and Manila, plus much delayed economic reforms, conspired to slow development of the Philippines, particularly Luzon, the archipelago's largest island. While other countries were in the throes of the Industrial Revolution and the wave of mercantilism, Spain lagged behind. As early as 1842, a study mission headed by Don Sinibaldo de Mas came to the Philippines to find the best way to carry out reforms—reforms later promoted by Filipinos like Dr Jose Rizal and his contemporaries, known collectively as the Propagandists.

The 1890s were turbulent years for the Spanish colony. The clamored-for reforms prompted Rizal to pen two novels, Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo, required reading in schools today. Though fiction, the stories were too close to the truth for the Spanish to tolerate. Eventually, Rizal was charged with sedition and executed in 1896—four years after the Manila-Dagupan railroad was completed. Less than 18 months later, Filipinos declared their independence from Spain. The revolution to assert that claim soon followed.

New Colonizers


Paseo de Bagumbayan

Meanwhile, the Americans were also at war with Spain. After winning the conflict and claiming the Philippines under the Treaty of Paris, US forces soon arrived. Early in 1899, war (some called it an insurrection) between the Filipinos and the Americans broke out. The Spanish imprint was already etched indelibly on the Philippine landscape, and by the turn of the century, an air of uncertainty characterized everyday conversation as Filipinos wondered what life would be like under the new colonizers.

Transition for tranvia


Manila streetcar, early 1900s

By 1902, La Compañia had long since stopped expanding or improving its system. An average of only 10 streetcars plied the five lines daily. This was a far cry from the hourly service that provided 14 runs in each direction on the Malabon Line alone.

One year later, Manila city officials blamed slow economic growth and population congestion to ‘the antiquated horse-car system and the poorly constructed, unsatisfactory, and generally undesirable system of public vehicles,’ to quote from their official report. These leaders reasoned that with improved transport, the railroad was specifically named, ‘many of those now paying high rents for small and unhealthy quarters will take advantage of this quick transportation and secure comfortable dwellings in better localities.’

Birth of Electric Streetcar




Calle Escolta de Manila

The Philippine Commission on 20 October 1902 passed a law that set into motion franchises to be awarded to bidders for the construction and operation of electric power and transportation networks. Although publicized in newspapers in America and the Philippines as well as in a leading US railway journal, only one bid was submitted. On 24 March 1903, the Municipal Board of Manila passed Ordinance 44, accepting the bid of Charles M. Swift of Detroit. Three days later, a New Jersey company was established which eventually became the Manila Electric Railroad and Light Company—better known as Meralco. Today, Meralco is still in the electric power business in Metro Manila and neighboring provinces. Later, the Philippine Commission allowed Meralco to take over the properties of La Compañia de tranvias. Meralco paid a small fee for its streetcars to La Compañia's lines.

Swift was now under a deadline. He had 6 months to start building his systems and 20 months to get the job done. Ordinance 44 specified 12 lines. Today's LRT Line 1 closely follows the Meralco route to Pasay south of Manila and the Santa Cruz route . LRT Line 2, now under construction, also adheres fairly well to the original lines Meralco laid down. With the exception of the Binondo and Intramuros areas, the network was double-tracked and powered by an overhead catenary of 500 V maximum. The track was standard gauge.

By 1913, Meralco had completed nine of the 12 lines, still called the tranvia by commuters. Swift under another franchise granted in 1906, was also operating a 9.8-km extension line from Paco to Fort McKinley and Pasig. The operator, the Manila Suburban Railway, later merged in 1919 to form the Manila Electric Company. The extension line was one of the most profitable in the Meralco system.

Meralco's lines crossed the Manila Railroad Company's lines (now the Philippine National Railways (PNR)) at three points. Sometimes, I go to Blumentritt Station on the LRT just to see a PNR commuter train crawl directly under the elevated track as I wait for an LRT train to approach its station of the same name, 5 or so meters above. LRT Line 2 will cross the PNR at Santa Mesa in another repeat of history. The Santa Ana tranvia crossed not far from today's PNR Paco Station, currently under renovation.

Dr Leonardo Q. Liongson, Engineering Professor at the University of the Philippines, and railroad enthusiast, made an astute observation in a paper he presented last January: ‘It is also interesting to note from the 1913 (route) map that the three principal tranvia lines (Santa Cruz, Santa Mesa and Santa Ana) led directly to outlying cockpits in suburban La Loma, San Juan and San Pedro de Macati respectively.’ Cockfighting was and still is a popular form of gambling. He concluded, ‘From the point of view of city-wide commuter service, commerce and cockfighting, the Manila electric tranvia was indeed a complete system serving the city by the end of the first decade of the 20th century.’

As the road network improved, Meralco introduced electric- and gasoline-powered bus services in the 1930s. The company also promoted the use of electric appliances such as radios and refrigerators. The tranvia continued running but stopped expanding.

Photos here: http://www.jrtr.net/jrtr16/pdf/f33_satre.pdf
More in the Philippine archives.

---



In 1905, Manila's first tranvia, or tram, opened in Manila and soon grew to five lines servicing many parts of the city of Manila and its outskirts. At that time, the trams were hailed as an efficient system for the city's 220,000 inhabitants of that time. The trams were operated by the Manila Electric Railroad and Light Company (Meralco), which now provides power to the city.


Pre-war Corregidor

The Philippines once had a tram network in Manila, but it was destroyed during World War II. The system has been replaced with the LRT and MRT.




CORREGIDOR is a two-square-mile mountainous island at the entrance to Manila Bay. The site of Fort Hughes, a U.S. Military Defense Unit with extensive tunnels through the mountains, the island was originally fortified by the Spanish in the 18th Century. It became a U.S. military station in 1900 and, after invasion by the Japanese in 1941, was chosen as a major defense position which was the site of a famous battle in 1942. The electric tram system, which opened in 1910, was operated by soldiers of the U.S. Army Quartermaster Corps. Eleven passenger cars ran on a winding network of lines connecting the docks and wharves with the barracks, schools and administrative offices. One line ran through a tunnel. The postcard shows Topside Station.


MANILA is located on the Island of Luzon on the east shore of Manila Bay. It is the principal port and commercial, cultural and industrial center of the Philippines. Founded in 1571, Manila became an important commercial center under Spanish rule and was captured by U.S. forces on Aug. 13, 1898, during the Spanish-American War. A horse tram system was opened in the 1880s and a steam tramway ran north to Malabon. The electric tramway system opened on April 10, 1905, and by the 1920s had 17 routes, 33 miles of track and 110 cars. Thirteen cars served a separate 12-mile interurban line to Pasig. Service ended in 1944 during the Japanese occupation. The postcard shows a tram in the silk-stocking district.

[Animo]

Meralco tranvia







































Photos by Wonderboy!

[Animo]

Meralco tranvia







































Photos by Wonderboy!