175. CHILDREN'S PETIT CARNIVALS

Perhaps to make a point and remind every one that the Manila Carnivals is for the old and young alike, the beauty pageant—always the highlight of the national festivities—became the inspiration of some provincial groups to hold their own petit carnivals with children reigning as royalties.


The Charity Fairs (Feria de Caridad), organized by the government to raise funds for its charitable advocacies, actually popularized the concept of having children reign as “queens” during these much publicized 1920s events. Schools even held their own themed charity fairs, featuring little misses addressed as “Infantil Princesas y Reinas” and decked in court costumes and pompadour wigs. Then the Anti-TB Society launched its own “Queen of Mercy” quest where only children were eligible to join.


These children’s beauty pageants were immensely popular and became springboards for beautiful young misses to join the Manila Carnival Queen search later on. For instance, Alicia de Santos was chosen as Queen of Mercy in 1929; two years later, she competed in the 5th National Beauty Contest and emerged as Miss Luzon. Similarly, little Blanquita Opinion, Queen of Charity in the 1925 fund-raising program of Centro Escolar alumnas, joined the Miss Philippines search eight years later and won the title of Miss Visayas 1933.


The idea caught on in the different provinces, and soon, petit carnivals were being organized with literally, their own petit royalties. This example shows a provincial carnival held in Aparri in 1939, with an adorable Queen Teresita and her satin-caped escort, ruling over the fair’s festivities. The tradition continues today, instigated by TV shows which holds annual talent-cum-beauty pageants like “Little Miss Philippines”.

174. Carnival Memento: 1909 MANILA CARNIVAL TICKET

TICKET TO RIDE, AND MORE! A rare example of a 1909 Manila Carnival general entrance ticket issued by the 'taquillera' at the gate. 1909.

So well-received was the first Manila Carnival of 1908 that a second Carnival just had to be organized the first year. Director General G. A. Reilly noted, “The Carnival of 1909, in presenting itself to the Orient, needs no more substantial guarantee of success than the truly wonderful record left behind by the Carnival of 1908”.

To give the second Carnival a fresh sense of visual identity, an illustrator was commissioned to create a logo for the Manila Carnival of 1909, which was cascaded to all sorts of printed materials and collaterals. The logo shows three Carnival symbols of revelry—a court jester and two masked female revelers, one in a Gibson Girl hat, the other in a native baro, to symbolize the unity of East and West. Below the smiling jester is the great seal of Manila. A ribbon carried the text “The Philippine Carnival”, festooned on top with coconut and anahaw leaves. The date of the event is on a crest between the 2 female figures: February 1909, Manila.


The artist has discreetly inscribed the illustration with the letters “HX” inscribed in an ovoid, below the Filipina masked figure. He may have been Howard Hedden, an American who illustrated for national publications like The Philippine Magazine in the first decade of the 20th century.

The small 2 x 3 in. paper ticket featured here, printed with green and red colors, repeats the design elements of the logo although they have been compressed and rearranged to fit the vertical portrait format. This paper ephemera, now over a hundred years old, is a rare memento of our country’s finest hours, when the world converged in Manila to see the a grand spectacle never before seen in the Orient.

173. 1936 Queen of the Ilocos Norte Carnival, FLORENTINA I

ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE. Queen Florentina I. Ilocos Norte Carnival Queen of 1936.

The province of Ilocos Norte was quick to take a cue from neighbor Ilocos Sur in holding its own petit carnivals. Ilocos Sur seemed to have taken the Carnival spirit more to heart, holding provincial fairs with more frequency and at every given opportunity. But it is to be remembered that Ilocos Norte gave the country its second Manila Carnival Queen, in the person of Julia Guerrero Agcaoili of Piddig, who reigned in 1909. Her sister, Pilar, also was the Queen-elect of the 1929 Ilocos Norte petit fair.

Ilocos Norte fielded two beauties in the 1926 and 1927 editions of the national Manila Carnival. In the dying years of the Carnival, the only documented provincial fair was held in 1936, in which this beauty, "Her Majesty, Queen Florentina I", reigned over the festivities. Nothing more is known of this Ilocana beauty. The last Ilocos Norte Carnival was held in the postwar year of 1946.

172. THE MINDORO CARNIVALS

HER MAJESTY, QUEEN PEPITA I. With her court. Mindoro Carnival 1926.

The seventh largest island in the country, Mindoro was known to Spaniards as a “gold mine”—Mina de Oro, hence its name. Pre-colonial history tells us that Mindoro, known as Ma-i in those days, was an active trading partner of China. Local traders swapped and sold cotton, beeswax, pearls and gold with their Chinese counterparts.

When the American came, they made Mindoro a sub-province of Marinduque on 23 June 1902, but later in November, Mindoro was separated from its mother province and its own provincial government was organized with Puerto Galera as the seat. Mindoro was finally declared a regular province in 1921. Thereafter followed, the fast development and cultivation of the island's interior. The structure of society and culture were likewise altered, becoming more influenced as American influenced crept in.

The Manila Carnival offered the opportunity for Mindoreños to show how far they have advanced in terms of economic, commercial, social, cultural and human development. In 1926, the people of Mindoro held their own showcase of progress, a provincial carnival that was highlighted by the coronation of Queen Pepita I.

The next year, when the Manila Carnival called for candidates to the 2nd National Beauty Contest, the province sent their very first beauty delegate to Manila to compete in the 2nd Miss Philippines- a Pinamalayan-born belle and a St. Scholastica interna named Caridad Morente, Miss Mindoro 1927.

HER MAJESTY, Queen Loreto I and Court, Mindoro Carnival 1935-36.

There are no records of other Mindoreñas having succeeded Caring (who lived to be more than a hundred), but the provincial carnivals of the big island province continued. During the Commonwealth years, another petit carnival was held, of which we have above a lone pictorial evidence. Her Majesty Queen Loreto I reigned supreme in the provincial fair, assisted by two fair princesses and their consorts. Not much else is known about Loreto and the details of this carnival.

After the Second World War, the island was divided into its two present-day provinces, Occidental Mindoro and Oriental Mindoro, on June 13, 1950, by virtue of the Republic Act No. 505.

171. Carnival Memento: 1920 MANILA CARNIVAL POSTER

CARNIVAL POSTERITY. Posters issued by the Philippine Carnival Association are sought after by collectors of Filipiniana and fair & exposition memorabilia.

The 1920 Manila Carnival was truly a special edition of the national fair. For two consecutive years before that, the Carnival had been scrapped as the United States was engaged in a long-winded war with the Central powers. But as the war came to an end with an American victory, the Carnival Association revived the event in 1920, dubbing it as the Victory Carnival and Exposition.

This full-color original poster was just one of the promotional materials printed for the 1920 Carnival by the Philippine Carnival Association. The main visual depicts a pair of revelers, with the man dressed as the Red Devil, the Carnival mascot and his woman companion as a masked Perriot. The Angel of Peace descends upon the Carnival gate, holding an olive wreath. The same illustration appeared in other collateral materials, like the 1920 souvenir program, which also featured the couple on the cover.

This incredibly rare, large poster comes in 3 sections and measures an impressive 25 x 48 inches. It must have been printed by the Bureau of Printing in Manila. Posters such as these were seen all over the city—from train stations, municipal halls and government bureaus.

Used with permission. My thanks to: Mark J. Weinbaum Fine Vintage Posters and Decorative Prints 2211 Broadway, Suite #4E New York, NY 10024 By Appointment www.MJWFinePosters.com

170. THE PETIT CARNIVALS OF ZAMBOANGA, part 2

ZAMBOANGUENA HERMOSA. Her Royal Highness Margarita Macrohon, queen of the 1934 Petit Carnival of Zamboanga.

The election of the Queen of the 1934 Petit Carnival of Zamboanga started in the second quarter of 1933, and by September 1933, the first canvassing of votes for the candidates was already undertaken. The five leading candidates were Remedios Caballero (510 votes), Marietta Hamoy (450 votes), Margarita Macrohon (310 votes), J. Torres (280 votes) and J. Marin (120 votes).

On October 28, the 9th counting showed a change in leadership with Margarita Macrohon on top with a whopping 8000 votes, followed by newcomer Susie Galle, Marietta Hamoy, Adela Johnston, Ella Varian and Remedios Caballero at the tail-end.

More concrete plans were also drawned up by the Carnival committee and exposed to the public by November. Local residents, however, raised eyebrows at the idea of a cabaret-style pavilion as one of the attractions of the petit carnival. Inter-school dance and costume contests were also planned, using the Manila program as the model.

The final tabulation to determine the 1934 Zamboanga Carnival Queen was done six days before Christmas. Margarita Macrohon was the runaway winner with 47, 470 votes. Her elected princesses were Remedios Caballero (2nd, with 23,810 votes) and Susie Galle (a close 3rd, with 21,810 votes).

Margarita Macrohon was already a popular young woman of Zamboanga society when she became queen. She had participated in the 1929 fiesta of the city’s patron Virgen del Pilar, crowning the “Princesa Floral” of the fiesta. She also joined the the Declamation Contest, a talent that ran in her family (brother Jun was a champion orator of Ateneo de Zamboanga).

In the Fancy Ball dance contests, Tetuan Elementary School placed first with their “Clown Dance” (under Maria Rodriguez), while the City School came in second with “Fairies Dance” (under Mary Hampton). In 3rd place was the contingent from Sta. Maria Elementary School with their “Russian Dance”.

When the fabulous Carnival of 1934 ended, the organizers realized a net profit of PhP 3.77 for their business venture—not exactly a great profit, but Zamboanga certainly had fun. And that was all that mattered.

169. THE PETIT CARNIVALS OF ZAMBOANGA, part 1

Ever since local mestiza girl Carmen Fargas put Zamboanga province in the national beauty map by winning “Miss Pearl of the Orient Seas” at the first ever Miss Philippines quest of 1926, the city was never the same again. Zamboangueños became determined to duplicate the festive mood of Manila by staging their own petit carnivals.


Zamboangueños were already celebrating Rizal Day, Garden Day and the city fiestas with spectacular results since the 1920s, and the petit carnivals were another welcome additions to their fondness for social revelry. Two petit carnivals—one in 1930 and the last in 1934-- stood out for the lavishness of the staging and the competitiveness of the candidates in the beauty search.

Antonio C. Orendain, author of “Zamboanga Hermosa”, had vivid recollections about these most-awaited events of the city:

“The Carnivals were exciting. The Red Rovers sponsored most of them… The (beauty) contest was the Carnival fund raiser in those days and sympathizers sold ballots for their candidates. Family prestige and personal popularity counted for victory more than beauty—physical, intellectual, moral. When the candidates were on an even keel in their attributes, the contest was feverishly exciting.

IN THE DAYS OF MILK & HONEY, Zamboanga residents celebrated their fiestas lavishly and indulged even more luxuriously in fairs and carnivals with beauty queen to boot. In the petit carnival of 1930, the beauteous Rosie Shinn reigned as the queen with the debonair Pab Sebastian as her consort. Completing her court was the lovely Luisa Fernandez and Josefina Fermin.
In one such contest did Conchita Albrecht of Maluso lose to Rosie Shinn of Zamboanga City. Both mestizas were ravishing beauties and the contest was talked about for years later. The coronation pageants were fanciful, ranging from Egyptian, Arabic or Moorish spectacles to metaphoric fantasies. From the time Carmen Fargas won the title of ‘Pearl of the Southern Seas’ in a national beauty contest in Manila, the metaphor was popularly adopted."


Carnival organizers engaged the services of the best decorators in the province. Ramon Ramirez, for instance, a town artist who embroidered garments for santos, decorated chapels for fiestas and taught folk dances for veladas, was commissioned to direct most of the pageantry of the petit carnivals. In Tetuan, Badong Azacarraga, had the final say in the artistic directions for the district festivities, while a certain Pinky did all the work in the Visayan center of San Jose.

In that romantic era, the winning queens were exalted and extolled, often depicted as pearls and, as such, had thrones designed like cockleshells. Symbolic representations were the fad and there was even a year when dancers danced out of a giant pot to pay tribute to the Carnival sovereign.