132. THE PETIT FAIRS OF CAMILING 1930-1933

Camiling, a premiere town of Tarlac lying next to Pangasinan, was once a part of Paniqui. It was declared an independent town in 1838, with Don Vicente Galsim serving as the first gobernadorcillo. The town, with a name derived from the ‘kamiring’ tree that once grew abundantly there, is rich in history and tradition. Camiling is the birthplace of prominent Filipino personages such as U.N. Diplomat and General Carlos P. Romulo, U.P. President Onofre Corpuz and of course, Dr. Jose Rizal’s young love, Leonor Rivera.


In the 1930s, amidst a time of peace and plenty, Camiling held its own ‘petit carnivals’ in conjunction with the town fiesta that was held annually from May 6, 7, and 8. The first recorded provincial fair of Tarlac was held in 1927, same year as the town fair of Concepcion. Camiling followed suit in 1930, with a mini-fair that adapted certain successful elements of the grand national carnival in Manila.


Two pictures from that event show the lavishness of the petit fair, aping successfully the costumed pageantry of the Manila Carnival. Reigning queen over the festicities was Queen Pura I, a namesake of the very first Carnival royale of Manila (Pura Villanueva).

In 1933, the chosen Queen was a pedigreed beauty named Remedios Romulo Kipping. If her name sounds familiar, it is because the lovely Camiling Queen is a direct descendant of Leonor Rivera-Kipping. Leonor was a second cousin of Dr. Jose Rizal; they had met while he was but in her early teens. Unfortunately, their love did not prosper owing to Rizal’s departure for abroad to escape arrest and Leonor’s mother’s objection over her controversial suitor. Leonor was the inspiration of the character “Maria Clara” in Rizal’s “Noli” and “Fili” novels.


Leonor, instead, married the British engineer Charles Henry Kipping, whom she had met while staying in Dagupan. A lone child of their union, Carlos Jr., married Lourdes Romulo, sister of Carlos P. Romulo. They had four children namely, Carlos III, Linda, Araceli and Remedios, the future Queen of the Camiling Fair. Remedios was a student of Sta. Catalina de Manila, a school run by Dominican sisters, when she was elected to reign as the monarch of the fiesta. At her coronation, she was dressed as a Russian Empress.


The Camiling petit carnival that year had a grandiose mixed European-theme as these pictures show, reflecting the rise of this premiere commercial town, which, in prominence and affluence, ranked second only after the Tarlac capital.

Remedios later married Cesar Jimenez, with whom she had 6 children: Miguel, Meddie, Anna, Rita, Jimmy and Josefina.

131. Carnival Beauties: ROSARIO L. MANUEL, 1927 Miss Pampanga

ROSARIO MANUEL, Miss Pampanga 1927. A beauty of renown from Bacolor, made it to the national finals of the 1927 edition of the Manila Carnival.

True to its title as the “Athens of Pampanga”, Bacolor was not just a cradle of culture, it was also the seat of beauty, echoing the fabled reputation of Greece as the land of beautiful goddesses--Hera, Aphrodite and Athena—who figured in perhaps, the 1st documented beauty pageant of ancient times, as judged by Paris.

Bacolor belles like Luz Sarmiento, Paz Sanchez, Consuelo Santos and Elisa Gutierrez were regarded as the town muses in the mid 1920s-1930s. A more notable titled beauty however was Rosario Manuel, crowned Miss Pampanga 1927. She was the daughter of Generoso Manuel and Gliceria Lacsamana of Cabambangan, now the town’s poblacion.

With her victory, Rosario (Chayong) gained the right to represent the province in the 2nd National Beauty Contest sponsored by The Philippine Free Press. Doe-eyed Rosario went to Manila for the competition to make her bid for the Miss Philippines crown. It was a tall order for Rosario, as among the previous year’s winners was a kabalen—Socorro Henson of Angeles, who reigned as Manila’s Carnival Queen of 1926.

In the 1927 edition held from February 12 to 27, 28 beauties from around the country participated. Two of the contenders that year were Amelia Romualdez, Miss Leyte, who bore a striking resemblance to her first cousin, Imelda Romualdez and fellow Kapampangan, Luz Besa of Tarlac. The judges were reminded that “in the selection of the most beautiful ladies, (you) shall consider, besides physical beauty, the personal charms and the general refinement and composure of candidates”.

In the end, Luisa Marasigan, Miss Manila, won as Miss Philippines. Her court included Miss Luzon, Iluminada Laurel (Batangas), Miss Visayas, Lourdes Rodriguez (Cebu) and Miss Mindanao, Nora Maulana (Sulu). Even then, Rosario Manuel’s beauty was immortalized in a special commemorative booklet issued by Free Press magazine. Rosario Manuel settled back in Bacolor, remaining unmarried and adopting young relatives to serve as companions for the rest of her life.

130. Carnival Mementos: COMMEMORATIVE PROGRAMS

Collectors of commemorative items from world fairs and national expositions avidly seek out souvenir programs as these contain valuable information about the conduct of the event, schedule of activities, officers and members of the fair association and listings of major sponsors. Some programs were also profusely illustrated, and came with interesting advertisements as well as old photographs that give readers a glimpse of our past social history.

The Manila Carnivals had such programs, beginning with the 1908 national carnival. The slim volume, entitled “Programa Oficial del Carnaval de Filipinas en Manila, Islas Filipinas” has a listing of the schedules of the activities from 27 Feb. -3 Mar. 1908, including the land parades and the sporting competitions. The program is handsomely illustrated with the fabulous carrozas and floats of the different private companies and government bureaus participating in the first ever carnival of Manila. A lay-out of Wallace Field in Luneta is also featured as a convenient guide to the different booths, playing fields and the Hippodrome.

Subsequent programs were printed in color, such as the 1920 Victory Carnival and Exposition, held from 31 Jan.- 8 Feb., 1920. The souvenir program contained photos of newly-built infrastuctures—schools, bridges, municipal halls—as testaments to the march of progress in the Islands.

Programs also carried advertisements of corporate sponsors (Manila Hotel, Sanitary Steam Laundry, Firestone, Smith Bell & Co., San Miguel Brewery) and now-defunct business establishments like “Estrella del Norte”, “Gonzalo & Sons”, "Bazar Siglo XX" and “La Puerta del Sol”.


The Carnival was also a time to breastbeat, and so, important officials and members of the Manila Carnival Association—mostly government personalities—were featured in full page photos. The major characters of the Carnival—Governor Generals Leonard Wood, Francis Burton Harrison, perennial president Manuel L. Quezon, Sergio Osmeña, Director Arsenio Luz—had regular appearances on commemorative programs.


Later programs were printed on cheaper paper stock. The 1935 program with its signature art deco design was of newsprint, with photographic reprints of the past Carnival Queens, making it a valuable documentary reference of past Carnivals.

Manila Carnival programs are very hard to come by, but a few have survived—recovered from old bauls and musty aparadors, they can either be found for bidding in online auction sites or sold as historical ephemera by antique dealers, great pictorial souvenirs of the most spectacular event ever held in our fair Islands.

129. 1938 DAVAO CARNIVAL AND EXPOSITION

One of the last big provincial fairs in the flickering days of the national Carnival was held in the city of Davao starting on 25 June 1938. The Davao Carnival and Exposition lasted for two weeks and and the provincial capital pulled no stops in ensuring the carnival’s success. Just like the Manila Carnival, the Davao event also featured a brightly-lit carnival auditorium that was the central venue of many carnival activities.


Elsewhere, around the city, military, school and government bureau parades were held on the street, featuring officials in horses, marching bands and Boy Scouts.

When evening fell, the auditorium grounds came alive with masked balls, folk dances and other cultural presentations. Most awaited was the selection of the Queen of the Davao Carnival, won by local beauty, Angela Bangoy. One of her princesses was a Miss V. Cortez.


At her coronation, Queen Angela I donned the costume of a Muslim princess. Throughout the Carnival Days, the beautiful queen received prominent visitors who paid her homage, including Dna. Graciana vds. De Lugod and Mr. Jaime Gavina.

128. THE 1927 CONCEPCION PETIT FAIR, Tarlac

Concepcion, one of the largest municipalities of Tarlac province is also known as the birthplace of Sen. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr. The historic town celebrates its town fiesta (pyestang balen) every 25th of April, which surprisingly is the feast day of San Marco. It can be surmised that the April 25 date originated from the petit carnivals that were popular during during the first decade of American Rule in the Philippines.

Concepcion, like many other towns copied the happenings of the annual national Manila Carnival of the Philippines, integrating the crowning of a Miss Petit Carnival in its program if activities. In his write-up about his town fiesta, historian Dr. Lino L. Dizon notes: “Both adults and children eagerly awaited not only the beauty queens of the Karnabal – as the dominant Kapampangans of the municipality pronounced such an event – but also the piyalben quing patiu (sights in the town square).

The early 1900s would have been dominated by the musicus (brass bands) parading around the town and the arcos (arcs) built in the heart of the plaza festooned with banderitas, where zarzuelas and crissotans were held. Later years would have seen the karnabal become more mechanical, with the arrival of the arueda (ferris wheel, from the Spanish rueda), the merry-go-round and other rides, collectively called chubibu (literally, ‘pacifier’ in Spanish). And each taga-Concepcion, irrespective of social class, would be eagerly inviting fiesta-goers to their dining table or even their lowly dulang, sharing genuine hospitality and their taung fiesta, like the lechun, the bringhi, the achara, and the putu lansung.”


The 1927 Petit Carnival of Concepcion was attended with similar fanfare. That year, Queen Paz I was elected as the carnival royal. Nineteen year old Paz Feliciano (b/ 13 Nov. 1918/ d./ 18 Feb. 2008) was born to a prominent family of hacienderos who were one of the original settlers of Concepcion., together with the Aquinos, Pinedas, Yumuls, Castros, Bermudezes and Cortezes. Paz had a sister, Consolacion (later married to an Ibarra)

She later married Atty. Patricio Y. Pineda Sr., a prominent lawyer and one of the incorporators of the Rural Bank Association of the Philippines. Their children included Corazon, Cecilia, Patricio Jr., Bernadette, and Maria Paz.


One of the princesses of Queen Paz I was an equally well-known town beauty, 17 year old Aurora Aquino. She would go on to be the second wife of Assemblyman and Sen. Benigno Aquino Sr., (after Maria Urquico) who was, in fact, a third cousin. They were married on 6 December 1930, and their union resulted in the following children—Maria Aurora (Maur), Benigno Simeon, Jr. (Ninoy), Maria Gerarda (Ditas), Maria Guadalupe (Lupita), Agapito (Butz), Paul, and Maria Teresa (Tessie)

Doña Aurora Aquino, mother of the late Sen. Benigno ''Ninoy'' Aquino Jr., mother-in-law of the late Pres. Corazon C. Aquino, and grandmother of current president Benigno ‘Noynoy’ Aquino III, died at 9:05 a.m. on 24 December 1998 at the Makati Medical Center. She was 88.

(THANK YOU to Prof. Lino Dizon for the use of the photo of Paz I and her consort, taken from his article: Fiestang Balen: Biography of a Town Fiesta.http://www.apwn.net/index.php/archives/more/fiestang_balen_biography_of_a_town_fiesta_by_lino_l_dizon/)

127. Carnival Beauties: ENCARNACION I. JOHNSON, 1927 Miss Rizal

ENCHANTING ENCARNITA. Miss Rizal of 1927 charmed the King Escort of the 1927 Miss Philippines, and became Mrs. Guillermo Jose and the mother of two tennis champions.

In 1926, the province of Rizal fielded its very first Miss Rizal to the 1st National Beauty Contest in the person of Remedios Santos, a dreamy-eyed mestiza beauty who went to Manila for the pageant and whose room mate was the eventual winner, Anita Noble of Batangas. The next year, Rizal chose another mestiza bet, the slender Filipina-American Encarnacion Ibañez Johnson.

While Encarnita did not place in the finals, she caught the eye of the King Consort of Luisa Marasigan, the 1927 Miss Philippines winner. Guillermo Jose, a family friend of the Marasigans (her sisters were schoolmates of Luisa at Centro Escolar), had been requested to provide escorting duties to the new Queen by the school directress, Carmen de Luna, who also happened to be his godmother. In their moments together, Guillermo would often ask Luisa about “Miss Rizal”. Luisa, sensing his attraction to Encarnita, urged her escort to pursue and court her.

Guillermo took the Queen’s advice and successfully wooed Encarnita. She became Mrs. Guillermo Jose and settled in Manila. Guillermo became very much active in the tennis sports scene ( he became the president of the Philippine Tennis Association in the 1950s) and the couple even had two sons who became national tennis champions: Johnny and Danny Jose. Johnny became a member of the victorious 1955 Philippine Davis Cup team along with Raymond Dero and Felicisimo Ampon. In 1962, Johnny won a Gold Medal in the Asian Games held in Jakarta. Today, the Guillermo Jose Memorial Tennis Tournament is held annually and this has become a venue where budding young tennis players are discovered.

126. THE 1933 PAMPANGA CARNIVAL

ARO KATIMYAS DA DENING DALAGA!. The official candidates for the Miss Pampanga title in the 1933 Pampanga Carnival Fair and Exposition, San Fernando, Pampanga.

In 1933, Kapampangans held their grandest event ever, to celebrate the progressive stride made by Pampanga in the two previous decades. From 22 April to 6 May 1933, the Pampanga Carnival Fair and Exposition—“the greatest concourse of people on the island of Luzon”--was held at the Capitol grounds in San Fernando.

The much-awaited selection of Miss Pampanga 1933 provided the climax of the fair. Pampanga’s leading muses, most from socially prominent families. First, each town had to select its own “Miss Municipality” to compete in the provincial pageant. Socio-civic and youth groups like Mountainside, Circulo Escenico, Kayanikan ning Kuliat and Aficionados Baculud helped in drawing up a beauty list from which the loveliest was chosen. Not unlike contemporary pageants marked by sourgraping and backstage dramas, the Miss Pampanga search had its share of controversies.

First, the selection criteria was put in question. Following the Manila Carnival style of selection, Miss Pampanga was to be chosen based on newspaper ballots cast in her favor. A leading Kapampangan newspaper, “Ing Cabbling”, put out an editorial that cautioned using “social influence”, rather than physical beauty , as basis for judging. It even went as far as recommending an ideal mix of judges to make the selection truly impartial and objective, a panel to include a painter or sculptor, a poet, a high society lady, a professional and a respected elder from the province.

Then there was the case of a town muse who, in the voting, was boycotted by her own town mates because of her perceived snobbishness and haughty demeanor. In one tabulation, she gathered zero votes. Despite these minor issues, the contestants had a great time as they were feted and paraded about in motorcades. In the end, it was the slim and svelte Miss San Fernando, Corazon Hizon who romped off with the title.

The titled town beauties included the following:

MISS ANGELES, Maria Agustina Pilar Nepomuceno. (b. 13 October 1911-d. 5 June 1995) Daughter of Gonzalo Mariano Nepomuceno and Gertrudes Ayson y Cunanan. Not much is remembered about her reign or the circumstances of her victory. Later married noted doctor, Conrado Manankil y Tison. They have 4 children, one of whom—Marieta Manankil (now Mercado)—continued the tradition of beauty in her family by becoming Miss Angeles 1955.

MISS APALIT. Lina Espiritu

MISS BACOLOR. Luz Sarmiento. (b. 23 July 1914-d. Aug. 1988) to Laureano Sarmiento and Ines Lugue. Studied at the local St. Mary’s Academy, then attended Assumption Academy in neighboring San Fernando for her higher education. Became Pampanga’s entry to the 1934 Manila Carnival. After the contest, settled down as wife to Jose Gregorio Panlilio y Santos-Joven, in April 1934. An only child, Jesus Nazareno a year later. The couple made their home in their beloved Bacolor, where Luz propagated a lifelong devotion to Nuestra Sñra. del Rosario.

MISS CANDABA. Marina Reyes

MISS GUAGUA. Quintina Lapira

MISS LUBAO. Cornelia Flores

MISS MABALACAT, Pacita Sese. (b. 1916-d. 21 Aug. 2004) Daughter of the town treasurer, Andres Sese and Justina de Guzman. Graduate of Instituto de Mujeres. Married Mauro Feliciano of San Fernando.

MISS MACABEBE. Paciencia Gomez

MISS MAGALANG. Belen Gueco. Daughter of Lorenzo C. Gueco, a successful doctor, sugar planter, business man and PASUDECO stockholder and Elena Aquino. Her elder sister Paz was also a noted town beauty. Schooled at St. Paul’s Institute, Manila. She was an active and popular member of Rho Alpha and Nucleo Solteril. Her candidacy was supported by the Mountainside Club, headed by Jose Luciano, but pulled out of the provincial contest after some controversy. Nevertheless, she was feted house-to-house by her proud kabalens, who were rumored to have withdrawn their support for her. Later married Jose Tinsay.

MISS MASANTOL. Maria Guinto. Later married Artemio Manansala with whom she had 7 children, mostly U.S. based. Died 1969 of cancer.

MISS MEXICO. Candida Nuqui. A student of Sta. Rosa College in Manila when elected as town beauty.

MISS MINALIN. Benita Mercado

MISS SAN FERNANDO. Corazon Hizon (WINNER). Daughter Corazon Hizon of San Fernando, the daughter of Maria Paras and Jose Hizon. After her reign, the lovely Corazon, the toast of the Pampanga Carnival, married Marcelino Dizon also of San Fernando. They settled in the town they loved best and raised 9 children, all daughters—Monica, Maria Teresa, Maria Corazon, Lidia, Encarnacion, Concepcion, Maria Asuncion and Josefina. Monica’s daughter with Marcelino Enriquez, Maria Lourdes, continued the beauty tradition in the family by becoming Bb. Pilipinas- International 1987.

MISS STA. RITA. Juana Amio

MISS SEXMOAN. Marta Pinlac