Tag: Philippines Stamp

It is fun when a newer smaller country country introduces the stamp collector to one of it’s heroes from long before. In them you not only find bravery adventure and even deception. You can also spot the similarities of how different places dealt with similar issues. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

The most common image of Gabriela Silang is of an indigenous woman furiously riding a horse while swinging a bolo type machete. The image on the stamp shows her much more feminine in traditional garb and making more clear her mixed heritage. This may take her more relatable across the Philippines and a better picture of who she was.

Todays stamp is issue A250, a 15 Sentimos stamp issued by the Philippines in 1974. It was a 21 stamp issue that came out over five years that honored historical female figures of history. In the 1960s there was an earlier series of stamps in a very similar style showing the males. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used.

It is believed that Ilocano people migrated to Luzon from Borneo as part of a third wave of migration around 300BC. Gabriela Silang was born in 1731 to a family that was mostly Spanish on her father’s side and mostly Ilocano on her mothers’. Her father was a trader that sold his wares along the Abra River. She was abandoned by her family at an early age and was taken in and raised by the local Catholic Priest. The Priest arraigned for her marriage to a wealthy much older businessman. When her first husband died three years later Gabriela found herself a wealthy young widow.

For her second husband, Gabriela chose mailman Diego Silang. As part of his job, he made frequent trips between Ilocano and Manila and was distressed with how poorly the Spanish brought in from Spain were administering the area. He felt people born on the islands would do a better job.

Diego’s chance came during the Seven Years war, what Americans know as the French and Indian War. In 1762, Britain declared war on Spain and occupied Manila. Diego thought the time was right for Ilocano to rise up in rebellion against the Spanish. Diego offered to cooperate with the British and they in turn named him their governor of Ilocano. What happened next showed that perhaps Ilocano was not quite ready to manage itself. The Spanish colonial authority put a bounty on the head of Diego Silang and two of his coconspirators quickly assassinated him to collect. Traditionally Ilocano men wear their hair long and gather it under a turban called a potong. If the potong was red it meant the man had committed murder. If it was striped, multiple murders. You would think Diego would have been tipped off by this as to the danger he was in.

Gabriela escaped her husband’s killing and set up shop in the house of an uncle. From there she appointed new generals to continue the rebellion. She tried to put herself forward as a cult priestess that would lead her people to victory. In 1763, her rejuvenated rebel force tried to lay siege on the town of Vigan. Her force was defeated by the Spanish and when she tried to escape back to her uncle’s house, the Spanish were waiting for her and arrested her. Gabriela and other prisoners from her army were hung in the town square of Vigan. The British occupation of Manila lasted 20 months until it was returned under the terms of the Treaty of Paris. The news that Manila had fallen did not reach Spain till after it was all over.

Gabriela on her horse waving her machete. No doubt the Spanish Governor was tweeting law and order.

Well my drink is empty. Come again soon for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting. First published in 2020.

It is very hot in the Philippines. In the days before air conditioning it was common for men of means to have a summer place on the water. When one of those passed to the Spanish Colonial Government, the sweating profusely Spaniards saw the wisdom of moving their residence to Malacanang,(place of the fisherman in tagalog). So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

This stamp is from a strange period of the Palace. On one hand, the Palace is still described with the Americanized version of the name, without the g on the end and that still is an American flag flying over it. On the other hand, for the first time in the already long history of the place, a Filipino Bigshot, President Quezon was in residence.

Todays stamp is issue A73, a 6 Centavo stamp issued by the Commonwealth of the Philippines on November 15th,1939. The Commonwealth was the period from 1936-1946, rudely interrupted by the Japanese Second Republic, when the area was transitioning from being an American colony. It was a three stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog the stamp is worth 25 cents. In 1944, a batch of this stamp was overstamped by hand “Victory”, that raises the value to $350.

The now large complex was built as a summer residence for a private citizen Spanish Don in 1750 on the Pasig river. It was built in the bahay na bato style that takes influences of Spanish colonial, Chinese traders, and takes into account the flooding and earthquakes that it will be subject to. The interior was paneled in fine narra and molave wood. The house passed to the Spanish Colonial government in 1825. The Palace has been expanded many times as have the grounds especially during the American period. President Marcos even added an attic discotech. Well it was the 1970s and unfortunately the noise pollution coming from the attic was joined by a bad smell from the Pasig river that was becoming quite polluted. The Palace became home to 18 Spanish Governors General, 14 American Governors including future American President Taft and Douglas Macarthur’s father. Many, but not all Philippine Presidents took up residence. The clan nature of politics there saw Gloria Aroyo live there as a child when her father was President before her own term.

The period between the Spanish and the American colonial period around the turn of the 20th century was known as the First Filipino Republic under President Aquinaldo. He did not live in the Palace but after surrendering was held prisoner there. There was an incident when then young aid but future President Quezon surrendered to the Americans in order to confirm Aquinaldo was being held. He was taken to the Palace and presented to future Filipino Campaign hero Douglas Macarthur’s father. The General than showed Quezon in to Aquinaldo and Quezon whispered in tagalog. “Good evening Mr. President”.

Things got a little wild again in 1986 at the end of Marcos’ long rule. There was a contested election and both Corazon Aquino and Marcos declared victory. On the same day there were even rival inaugurations with Marcos’s reup happening in the Palace. What Cory Aquino’s People Power/Yellow Revolution (Aquino was of Chinese heritage), could not match was the last hurrah of First Lady Imelda. She went on the front balcony and sang to well wishers.

Because of you, I became Happy

Loving I shall offer you

If it is true, I shall be enslaved by you

All of this because of You

The broadcast of this spectacle kept interrupting as tv stations fell to the other side. Marcos ordered the jets flying over not to bomb the protesters and soon enough he was being flown out from the Palace grounds on an American search and rescue helicopter. When you give in to people power often they invade your house. Stealing Imelda’s many shoes is now pretty famous but the mobs have gotten in 3 more times since, in 1999 and twice in 2001.

Well my drink is empty and I will pour another to toast fine palaces and suggest strong gates. Come again soon for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting. First published in 2020.

Manila had been devastated by the fighting there near the end of the war. Yet a year later, the Philippines was finally independent and back to business. How about a stamp issue to get you in the mood for the mid century modern future? So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

This is part of the first stamp issue of the independent Philippines. The other stamps in the issue show old monuments or pleasant landscapes. In this stamp, the country shows it’s hoped for modern future. How quickly it was put right after the war must have given hope.

Todays stamp is issue A80, a 12 Centavos stamp issued by The Philippines on June 19th, 1947. It was a seven stamp issue in various denominations. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used. 12 Philippine Centavos would today be worth .25 of an American penny.

In 1901, American President Theodore Roosevelt stated regarding The Philippines, “We hope to do for them what has never been done for any peoples of the tropics-To make them fit for self government in the manner of the really free nations of the world.” Fifteen years later not much progress on self government had been realized. Then Democrat Congressman William Atkinson Jones authored the Jones Law that set up an elected bicameral Philippine legislature with much actual authority and further made it the law of the USA that independence was the goal. This made Representative Jones very popular in the islands and his name is still on this bridge and a medium sized town.

In 1914 at a site a few blocks away from the current bridge, a historic Bridge of Spain collapsed in a rain storm. Manila had a new urban plan  drawn up by the famous Daniel Burnham and a new bridge over the Pasic River was part of it. His plan was to emphasize the rivers in Manila in the style of Paris or Venice. Funding for the urban plan came mainly from the USA but the new Philippine legislature saw that Philippinos got most of the work. The Jones Bridge opened in 1921 under the direction of local architect Juan M Arellano. the design was quite beaux arts and featured 4 female virtue statues representing the Philippine Motherland.

In 1945 as Japanese forces evacuated Manila, see https://the-philatelist.com/2017/11/02/america-cellebrates-an-old-spanish-fort-a-decade-before-the-japanese-war-crime-there/   , they destroyed the original Jones Bridge. Again with American help the bridge was quickly rebuilt. In doing so the bridges structure stayed similar but it lost it’s elaborate decoration. The 3 surviving motherland statues were moved to other locations. In 1998 there was a refurbishment at the direction of then First Lady Ming Ramos. She added stone balustrades and Chinese style lamps. She also had the steel girders painted gold and backlit. She was trying to make the design less traditional and more in keeping with Asia. The design was not popular. In 2019 another refurbishment was started to return the bridge to the original 1921 appearance.

Stamp collectors will want me to point out the impressive riverfront building in the background of this stamp. It was and is Manila’s central post office. The design was also part of Daniel Burnham’s Manila plan and also built under the direction of Juan Arrellano. The building has managed to keep it’s original style throughout it’s life.

Well my drink is empty. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

Tuberculosis was and is a big problem in the Philippines. At first, a group of colonial wives raised money for a large sanitarium to fight the deadly disease. As the colonial period wound down, President Quezon saw that 25 percent of the then new sweepstakes proceeds were directed to the fight so the sanitorium could continue, of course now with Quezon’s name attached. Wait, who built it? So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

The stamp shows off the impressive façade of the Quezon Institute. The building was an early work in the art deco style of Philippine architect Juan Nakpil. Nakpil was trained at the University of Kansas and the Fontainebleau school in Paris. He had a prolific career in the Philippines and in 1973 was inducted into the order of the national artists. You might notice the denomination on the stamp includes a surcharge for the Quezon Institute. To make sure this generated maximum proceeds, this stamp was obligatory on all mail from August 19th – September 30th in 1958. I have never heard of any other country ever doing this.

Todays stamp is issue SP7, a 10 + 5 centavo semi postal stamp issued by the Philippines on August 19th, 1958. It was a two stamp issue with this the higher denomination. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 35 cents used.

In 1910 tuberculosis was estimated to be killing 40,000 people a year. That year a Philippine Islands Anti Tuberculosis Society was established. The Society’s first President was colonial wife Elanor Franklin Egan. The health facility seen on the stamp opened as the Santol Sanitarium in 1918.

In the 1930s it was realized that colonial wives could no longer be relied upon to keep institutions like the Santol Sanitarium operation with the country on it’s way to independence. President Quezon proposed and passed a national sweepstakes where 25 percent of the proceeds went to the anti tuberculosis society. The site was rededicated in 1938 as the Quezon Institute with President Quezon in attendance. During World War II the staff was reassigned to other hospitals and the site was looted. Post war the USA Army raised funds to get the hospital going again and the Philippine government agreed to an annual stipend of 800,000 Pesos again from proceeds of the lottery.

The fight against tuberculosis has not been very successful in the Philippines. Annual deaths are now down to 25,000 a year on of course a much higher population. This is still the third highest death rate in the world after South Africa and Lesotho. That would seem like the Quezon institute has much left to do. Instead there has been much dealing as to the facility on the stamp, which is now recognized as a national historic site. Part of the grounds were sold off in 2009 to build a Puregold branded supermarket. More recently the institute has been in negotiation with a development company named Ayala Land with an eye to converting the facility into a mixed use development. The institute would have to seek other facilities. Meanwhile the building has been a frequent backdrop for Philippine produced horror films. Wonder what that says about the level of care being offered there?

Well my drink is empty. Philippines seems to be now looking to the world heath organization to spearhead it’s fight against tuberculosis. Well I suppose you have to do something when you run out of colonial wives or Presidents that like to see their name on things. Come again tomorrow when there will be another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

Smaller countries have to import a lot of things that are expensive and it becomes a force keeping you down. Soon after independence, the Philippines’ government built a large steel mill on Mindanao to replace imports of steel. The story shows how hard that is to pull off. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

A while back I did a similar stamp from India, see https://the-philatelist.com/2019/11/21/india-1958-independant-india-will-be-great-building-on-the-success-of-people-like-j-n-tata/    . I complained about the pour printing not showing the steel mill to full effect. This stamp shows what is possible with more modern printing. You get a sense of what a massive operation the Iligan Steel Mill was.

Todays stamp is issue A214, a 10 Sentimos stamp issued by The Philippines on January 20th, 1970. It was a three stamp issue in various denominations showing off the Iligan Steel Mill. According to the Scott Catalog, the stamp is worth 80 cents unused.

The steel mill was constructed by the government in 1952 an part of their National Shipyards and Steel Corporation. It was at the time the largest steel mill in southeast Asia, which remember excludes China and Japan. Operations commenced but were not efficient and lost a great deal of money for the government. The government owned management company then applied to the USA Export/Import Bank for a 60 million dollar loan. This seems a strange thing  to do as The Philippines was no longer a colony of the USA and the Export/Import banks job is to assist with American exports. The bank was not forthcoming with a loan but suggested instead that if the steel mill was in private hands the credit markets might be more open to it.

In 1962, the steel mill was sold for a small fraction of what it cost to a new firm controlled by the crony capitalist Jacinto family. For a time this succeeded in getting the mills losses off the governments books. Meanwhile the family used the steel mill as something to borrow against, not for investment in the mill but their lifestyle needs.

In 1974, the Jacintos having extracted what they could get out of the mill defaulted and the mill passed back to the government under a new government owned company, the National Steel Corporation. Losses continued and the government sold the mill off in the 1990s, with the Chinese owned Malaysian outfit, the Westmont Group, playing the part of the Jacintos. Apparently The Philippines had run out of domestic robber barons. The financial crisis in Asia in 1998 was the end for the Westmont Group and the Philippines had to nationalize the steel mill for the third time.

Hope for getting the losses off the books springs eternal and The Philippines again sold the steel mill to Ispat Industries of India in 2004. The financial crisis of 2008 was the end for the mill, as per usual, a great deal of money had been borrowed against it. Interestingly, the Singapore liquidators refused to take possession of the now closed steel mill as they would then be responsible for it. Ispat filed suit against their old bankers for not taking it, and the liabilities involved in owning it. This as greatly complicated the schemes of the local government and current potential robber baron SteelAsia. Closing it was the end. A new investor would have to put in a great deal of money to get it operating again. The point with all the prospective investors was to have some big shiny thing they could borrow against. Nobody believes making steel there could be profitable and the national government does not seem prepared to absorb the losses for the benefit of the workers or even the original import avoidance goal.

Well my drink is empty and I am ever more impressed by the private operators of steel mills around the world who keep them going year after year. This is quite an accomplishment when competing against others for whom losses don’t matter. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

The Philippines status changed in 1936. A 10 year process toward independence from the USA was begun. It was time to show the world who the Philippine people were and show the masses at home that things will get better going it alone. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.

Looking at todays stamp, you can see the ambition or making the Philippines a great country. The majestic figures around the portrait of President Quezon do that. By showing the then current President, they are showing the simplicity with which they were facing the challenges. Reliance on an individual politician to get things done. Even in the best of times a political leader will be resented by a sizable minority. Portraits of political leaders in democratic places are better left till after their death. The partisanship is then dissipated and a legacy of good works can be honored by all. The USA puts no live figures on stamps, except actors in a role, but in 1936, the Philippines no longer had to listen to the USA.

Todays stamp is issue A69, a 6 Centavo stamp issued by the American Commonwealth of the Philippines on November 15th, 1936. It was a part of a 3 stamp issue celebrating the anniversary of the inauguration of Manuel Quezon as the second President of the Philippines. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents mint. All the variations of this issue have the same low value. Optimism can appear sad in retrospect when goals go unfulfilled.

The Philippines was granted a 10 year track toward independence by the USA in 1936. This was supported by the USA at the grass roots level because as a colony, Philippine sugar could be freely imported to the USA at a cost the American growers could not match. How many times around the world have we faced with the complications of sugar cultivation profitably without resorting to slavery. As part of the move toward independence, a long term legislator, Manuel Quezon was elected President. His parents were school teachers and he served the first Philippine President/Dictator Aquinaldo as a aide.

Quezon was interested in social justice and therefore took a half hearted stab at land reform. The Philippines had many American owned large plantations whose product was export crops. They were taken by the government and sold on into local hands. This still left the same system of absentee landlords, cash export crops, less local food production and few tenant farmer rights. This helped government revenue but did not raise the lot of the people fast enough. The Government promoted the native language Tagalog that it rebranded Filipino and tried to promote alongside English and the fading Spanish. Some feel this was a mistake as the ability to speak English is a marketable skill in the world market and of course the language emanates from Indian and Pacific Islanders who are a minority of the ethnicity of the Philippine people.

In 1941, Japan invaded and Quezon’s government fled into exile in the USA. The large American B17 bomber force stationed there had not succeeded in taking out the Japanese invasion armada as it was itself taken out in a daring Japanese air raid. The state of the Philippines was shown in that the bombers were parked together in a small area where they could be guarded from local looters not how they would be dispersed for use in wartime.

Quezon by now was old and sick with tuberculosis. His government in exile had little power and was bogged down in a power struggle with Quezon’s vice president who expected to take power. Quezon died in 1944. His political party, the Nationalists remained a important political force until Ferdinand Marcos in 1978 merged rival paries into one party, his own. Ironically in the mid 80s the party returned as a power base for the Laurel and the Aquino political dynasties. Both had got their start in the Second Philippine Republic, the Japanese puppet government of their occupation. This was after all a rival government to exiled Quezon.

Well my drink is empty and I will pour another to toast the legacy of President Quezon. He fell short but achieved much and remains a symbol of Philippine independence. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

Mabini checked all the boxes for a revolutionary leader. Up from poverty, educated locally, handicapped, so even more challenges to overcome and steadfast. The revolution in the Philippines was ultimately unsuccessful but is a vital backdrop to the independence that eventually came. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelists.

The printing on the stamp is pretty good. Showing him sitting reminds those that remember him of his handicap without making fun of him for it. It is such an important part of the story. That someone could rise from poverty in a poor colony of a far off place and be educated solely in the Philippines and rise to Prime Minister is unusual. Then this courageous man has the fortitude to resign when he feels his new country disrespected. Definitely a majestic story worth remembering.

Todays stamp is issue A170, a 30 Sentiminoes stamp issued by the Republic of the Philippines on July 23rd, 1964. The stamp was part of a three stamp issue in various denominations celebrating the century of the birth of Apolinario Mabini, the independence leader and first Prime Minister. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents used.

Apolinario Mabini was born in Tanauan in the then Spanish colony of The Philippines in 1864. His father was a peddler in the town market. Being very lucky and literate he received a scholarship to university where he  excelled in legal studies. He supported himself during his studies by teaching children. After graduation he did not practice law but instead began working on the legal ramifications of independence from Spain. He joined La Liga Filipina that was a moderate group that sought independence by peaceful means. The group gradually became more radical as members were arrested by Spanish authorities. Mabini at the time was being racked with polio to the extent that he lost the use of both his legs. He used his convalescence to write pamphlets that described a basis for in independent Philippines. The pamphlets  came to the positive attention of the Field Marshal of the independence movement Emilio Aguinaldo, later Philippines first dictator. He had Mabini brought to him which involved hundreds of men voluntarily taking turns carrying his hammock. Mabini was found impressive and later appointed Prime Minister when Aguinaldo declared himself dictator. Mabini was at one point arrested with fellow revolutionaries but was released instead of shot because of his condition. America would later not underestimate him this way.

Mabini’s job as Prime Minister was to negotiate with the Americans. America had played a big part in the end of Philippine’s Spanish colonial status and sought to then claim it as a colony for itself. Mabini tried to convince the Americans to leave or at least stop fighting Aguinaldo’s army. The Americans flatly refused this and required  Philippines to take a loyalty oath to America to end the fighting. Mabini refused and resigned his position to fight the Americans. The Americans then arrested him and sent him into exile in Guam. Aguinaldo was shortly after defeated, captured and then took the pledge to the USA. A few years later Mabini was allowed to return to the Philippines after also taking an oath but by then he was sick and was shortly to die of cholera at age 39 in 1905.

For a long period, Mabini’s reputation was besmirched in The Philippines by the rumor that his handicap was the result of syphilis. This was apparently started by rivals within the independence movement at the time of Mabini’s quick rise to power. 75 years after his death, Mabini’s remains were exhumed and it was determined that his handicap was the result of polio rather that syphilis. At the time there was a popular novel that had Mabini as a  character being sexually decadent. When the truth came out it was rewritten with Mabini being decadent and drunk with a liver ailment. Also untrue. Not one of the Philippines finer literary moments.

Well my drink is empty and so I will pour another to toast Mabini and all he achieved during his short challenging life. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.

Welcome readers to todays offering from The Philatelist. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, have your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. We have an interesting story to tell of trying to get away from a mistake without causing a new one.

The stamp today includes an overprint. Such things happen when government changes but there has not been time to properly reflect that on the stamps. It this case the status of the then American colony of the Philippine States had become a self governing commonwealth on a 10 year track to independence.

The stamp today is issue A57b a 10 centavo stamp issued in 1939. The b refers to the version with the commonwealth overprint. A version of the same stamp was issued in 1935 without the overprint. It was part of a 14 stamp issue that was the last issue before commonwealth status was granted. The stamp depicts Fort Santiago in Manila. It is worth 25 cents in it’s cancelled state according to the Scott catalog.

Fort Santiago has had an interesting history that was far from over in 1939. Fort Santiago was a stone structure built by Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, the Spanish conquistador who conquered the Philippines. It was built in 1571 on the site of a log fort that belonged to the Muslim Rajah who was the previous ruler. The Rajah was a vassal of the Sultan of Brunei so the Philippines was not independent even before the arrival of the Europeans. Santiago is the Spanish form of the Catholic Saint James, the patron Saint of Spain.

The fort was out of date militarily by the beginning of American rule in 1898. The American military did use it’s ornate facilities as a headquarters. They even drained the moat and installed a golf course on the grounds. The darkest era of the fort was ahead of it. Left over from the Spanish period was underground prison facilities. In early 1945 the American and Philippine Army were closing in on Japanese occupied Manila. The Japanese Army commander ordered Manila abandoned in order to preserve the fighting force for future fights. A Japanese Marine force refused the order and set out to defend Manila and take out revenge on the people of the Philippines for the defeat. Thousands of men were sent to detention in Fort Santiago and later executed in the underground dungeon. 400 women and girls were rounded up from the exclusive area of Manila and the 25 judged best looking were sent to a hotel where they were raped by Japanese officers and then enlisted men. Many areas of Manila were burned. This post war was deemed a war crime and the Japanese commander and his deputy were hung.

The end of colonial status did not totally arise from the people of the Philippines, although that was the official position of the local political party. Conquering the islands had proved quite bloody and expensive. The colony that then required governing still featured slavery, headhunting, and piracy that had to be ended. An increase in trade of low cost agricultural products that happened was troubling to American agricultural interest. A bill, backed by American agricultural interests, was passed over the veto of President Hoover setting Philippines on a 10 year path to independence. The Philippines was opposed to the bill but it was slightly modified and then rubber stamped. Manuel Quezon became the President of the Philippines during the commonwealth status until he went into exile when Japanese invasion was imminent during World War II. Full independence came immediately after World War II. Fort Santiago still stands.

Well, my drink is empty and so it is time to open up the conversation in the below comment section. There is an argument that the cost of the USA’s Philippine involvement sapped American lust for empire building and thus saved the country much. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.