Little biographies of men of the crowd

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Part of The American Chamber of Commerce Journal

Title: Little biographies of men of the crowd
Language: English
Source: The American Chamber of Commerce Journal Volume 9 (No. 12) December 1929
Year: 1929
Rights
Fulltext: December, 1929 THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL 15 Little Biographies of Men of the Crowd Speaker Roxas, commendably leading his people to reflect upon the econo mics of their present situation, said something to the effect that the masses in the Philippines now are no better off than they were when the American period began, and the half-truth of this constitutes a challenge. The whole philos ophic truth is that the masses everywhere and at all times have only a livelihood for their toil, but that the American plan permits a great many individuals to lift themselves out of the masses and better their economic lot. To illustrate the way in which Filipinos of today, who never become widely known, arc throwing off the bonds of oldtime feudal aristocracy and succeeding in bettering their material condition, the Journal begins a series of true narratives under the heading, Little Biographies of Men of the Crowd. It will pay for authenticated data when the stories written from the data arc printed, and it would appreciate such cooperation.—Ed. I: The Barber Who Buys A Farm Valerio Bulanan, a barber in the new shop next door to the Savoy theater, is just one of the crowd; barbers who are very much of a success financially are not numerous in any country, and conditions that enable a barber here and there among the crowd to lift himself into the proper tied class are surely not below par. So let us learn a little of the life history of Valerio. He is, of course, a first rate barber. He is 33 years old; he attended the public schools of San Isidro, Nueva Ecija, his native town, until, when in his third year of high school, in 1914, he began teaching country school at Pl8 a month. He taught school five years, reached a salary of P28 a month, and came to Manila in 1919 to try to better his fortune. His father, a worthy peasant, is poor, having six children living and only three hectares of land; Valerio has had to make his own way, and it was his father's inability to help him that caused him to quit studying and commence earning money. Arrived in Manila 10 years ago, he found a low-pay job at the customshouse. He worked at this job during the short government hours; he made his home with a relative in Tondo, who is a barber and has a little shop, and this relative taught him barbering. Valerio soon quit his job as a workmen and took up his trade as a barber. He was determined to get ahead; his oldtime classmates were going on, some in one profession, some in another, and natural pride impelled him to ambition. He left the shop in Tondo and came downtown to one on calle Carricdo owned at that time by Eugenio Sevilla, another San Isidro man. Custom here was more lucrative, many sailors and soldiers patronized the shop, and Valerio, pleasing them and being rewarded with liberal tips for good service, made as much as P300 a month. He married and began rearing a family. He was also a little gay of evenings; he squandered a good deal of his money—as he looks back ruefully now—but he also saved a good deal of it. One thing he did was to hire a law yer and go into court in a vain effort to establish his mother’s rights in a rich rice farm of 50 hec tares. The title had got into the hands of a cousin, and the land had been finally registered in the cousin’s name, the deal beginning at the time of the insurrect ion. Valerio failed of establishing his mother’s rights, so she never received the inheritance to which she believed herself entitled. The experience was expensive all round, but the law suit contributed to Valerio’s wisdom; he knows what registered title means! The money he saved he, of course, put into rice lands in San Isidro; he bought three hec tares for about Pl,000, another four hectares for about 1’1,500; so he is now the owner of seven hectares, and a low price for his holdings would be 1’600 a hectare. What the three hectares brought him helped to buy the four. Immigration into Nueva Ecija has been such from the Ilokano provinces that good rice lands have materially increased in value during the past five years, for they are scarce. Valerio can raise corn, yams and tobacco on some of his land, as well as rice. He raises all he can, and finds ready transportation for it to market. It is truck service over the new roads; for a few pesetas a peasant rides anywhere he may wish to go; formerly, carromatas charged P3 for taking one from the railway station in San Isidro to Cabanatuan, and now a truck will pick you up at your door in San Isidro and drop you anywhere in Cabanatuan for 1’0.40, while the railway fare has been lowered to P0.65, or about 30%. The new transportation has much to do with the increasing value of the land. While he has done comparatively well, Va lerio is still ambitious. He has his own shop in Paco, employing eight barbers, and himself when he is not busy downtown; he has also formed a partnership with a master tailor re cently and opened a tailor shop which is paying a satisfactory profit. He has the idea of saving more money, selling his San Isidro land and buying farther up the valley where prices are lower; he has a chance to participate in the ownership of a 200-hectare tract in Tarlak, or a 120-hectare tract in northern Nueva Ecija. In a word, he is following the route of the ex tending transportation lines and buying land for a rise of values that will make him well-to-do. There are special reasons, with which he has familiarized himself, why lands are cheaper at some other points than they are in San Isidro; and yet the cheaper lands will produce just as good crops. One reason, it seems, is that the Ilocano settler is often willing to abandon his land quite (Please turn to page 17) IN RESPONDING TO ADVERTISEMENTS PLEASE MENTION THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL lHE, A1V1EIC1CAN ^HAMHEK UH T^UlVlJVlKKLiE JUUKNAL £7 surancc trust is created, the money (principal and income) may be made payable by the person executing the trust to any person or persons desired and the “laws of succession’’ would have no application. We are also advised that life insurance trusts are not subject to inheritance tax. Little Biographies of Men of the Crowd (Continued from page 15) as casually as he homesteaded it; the land not having come to him in the customary way, he does not look upon his patent from the govern ment as a genuine title, and for a modest re muneration for his labor in getting the land under cultivation he will pass title and move off. He likes to be among his people, and an infiltration of Tagalogs from the south—a process which never ceases—disgusts him and inclines him to move away. Valerio is a Tagalog. What of his brothers and sisters? There are four boys living, and two girls. One of the girls is still in school, the other is married to a man of her own class, a tenant farmer. But this tenant has saved money and bought himself a farm of four hectares; a new crop is coming on, too, and if Valerio sells his land his brother-in-law will buy it. Valerio’s three brothers are tenant farmers of San Isidro; one of them works Valerio’s land, and another helps their father, now too old for all the work of a three-hectare farm. The married sister has six children, with good prospects of being able to put all of them through school. As for the old father, the boon of rapid transportation into Manila benefits such old men as he, and the young as well. It has become a very' profitable and easy avocation to grow mangoes; twenty years ago this fruit brought almost nothing in San Isidro, but last year Valerio’s sister sold the crop from one tree for 1 * 150 without the trouble of leaving her house to do so. The crop of a single tree has sold for 1 * 200; the buyers motor up from Manila, and bid for the crop, which they gather themselves, when the fruit is well set; and the new immigrants from Baliuag have taught the San Isidro growers how to smoke the trees to stimulate early' bearing, while a method of fertilization sometimes induces two crops a year. Valerio's wife has borne him two children. In reality, however, he has three; for one of his brothers has, according to ancient customary' law, given him a boy' now thirteen years old and in grade VI, Valerio’s own boy being under nine and in grade III. The elder boy, as much Zamboanga Building Villa Tourist Place A committee designated by’ the provincial governor has been busy during the past week studying the proposition to build a hotel or inn at Pasonanca and develop the park as a pleasure resort in cooperation with the Philippine Tourist Association and the Manila Hotel Company. A prospectus has been prepared and will be submitted at a meeting of the officials and busi nessmen of Zamboanga to be held in the Zam boanga Club next Wednesday' afternoon at 5 o'clock, and all interested in the progress and welfare of their city are urged to be present. As outlined in the Herald last week, the Manila Hotel . Company proposes to supply half the capital necessary for the erection and operation of the inn and the Dollar Steamship Lines propose to bring the tourists to Zamboanga. Realizing, however, that such an enterprise could hardly' pay dividends for some time to come if entirely dependent upon the tourist trade, it is intended to make Pasonanca park and inn so attractive that local patronage will pay all running expenses and leave a safe margin of profit. The tourist business will be "velvet”. The bungalow arrangement, with numerous small cottages adjoining or in the immediate vicinity of the main building, will appeal espe Valerio’s as if born to him, was a dreamy herdboy’ when his father and uncle discovered that he hacl a mind good enough to deserve schooling; so he was given to his uncle and put to school in Manila. He sketches with skill, Valerio hopes he may become a painter: he will be given a chance in the fine-arts school. “1 live in Manila in order to have the ad vantage of the best schools,” says Valerio. “It is hard to find money here, but I am doing my best. We don't own our own home now; we did have a house on leased land, rent 1 * 8 a month, but we sold it when we could make P250 clear. Now we wish we hadn't; the new owners get 1 * 40 a month from rooms rented to students, and live there besides. We may buy' in one of the additions, but not until after I do something about the new land; we are saving everything for that and the tailor shop because they' will make us money. We have cut our expenses 50%.” Remember, Valerio is a barber. The Ikugan (Continued from page l/f) utary of the Agusan. Everyone rejoiced as the flotilla sailed out of the harbor. “The king’s marriage to the lovely maiden was celebrated for several days amid great feast ing, after which the king, his bride and the Ikugans passed on over the mountain and were never seen again. The old woman remained in the upper Agusan teaching the new tribes the art of dyeing and weaving. “Some say that the lovely maiden was 7'agabayo, the Goddess of Love, who assumed a human form to aid her brother, Busao, in over coming the war-gods of the Ikugans, who were greatly weakened after her marriage to the Ikugan king. “However that may be, thus it was that all the tribes in the upper and lower Agusan, after being nearly exterminated, once again populated this fertile valley.” The voice of the dancer died away and the slow, explosive boom of the agong commenced once again, gradually growing faster and faster. In like manner, the dancer at first moved solemn ly and with slow deliberation to the rythm of the music; then as it accelerated, he stiffened his body and whirled and leapt with ever-quicken ing movements until at last he fell exhausted. Softly the tribe crept from the dying fire to their tree houses. Sleepy-eyed boys stumbled along beside their parents. Another day would find these youths fighting the battles of the Manobos. cially to the local people, many' of whom will make their homes there; and the golf course, tennis courts, auditorium, swimming pools and other attractions will make the park the recrea tion center of the community, all to the financial benefit of the company' operating the inn. The prospectus prepared by' the committee provides for the organization of a corporation to be called “The Zamboanga Inn and Resort Co.” (or any other name that may’ be chosen). The corporation to have an authorized capital stock of 1 * 200,000, divided into 4,000 shares of 1 * 50 each. At the present time it is proposed to sell not more than 1 * 50,000 of this stock to local people. The Manila Hotel Company will take 1 * 50,000. This will give the company 1 * 100,000 with which to construct and furnish the inn, with an ample surplus for operation and new development. As a cold business proposition the plan should look good to investors, and in providing an ideal place for the local people to live, healthful recreation and entertainment, it cannot be sur passed anywhere in the Orient. The support and cooperation of all elements in Zamboanga is assured.—.Mindanao Herald. It Kills— Malaria Germs MALARIA APPETON is a combination curative and tonic, easily digested, and quickly effective. MALARIA APPETON is composed of quinine, or ganic iron, and arsenical acids, the result of many years of medical research. If your druggist can not supply you, write us. Quinine................... 20 % Fer. Citr. Ammon. 10 % Acid Arsenic.......... 0.5% Cacao and Mass.. 69.5% Distributors BEHN, MEYER & CO., H. Mij. 227 David, Manila, P. I. IN RESPONDING TO ADVERTISEMENTS PLEASE MENTION THE AMERICAN CHAMBER^OF COMMERCE JOURNAL