FORMER, FORMER AND FORMER. Former President Joseph
Estrada in a press conference called by former Iloilo Rep. Alberto
Lopez (extreme right) and his common-law wife, former Guimaras
Gov. and Rep. Emily Relucio (center) when Erap was invited as
Commencement Speaker during the graduation cemenonies of
the Lopez-owned University of Iloilo (The News Today)

LT. COL. CARLOS P. Romulo – the last man off Bataan, was at the Manduriao airport of Iloilo City when Bataan fell to the Japanese on April 19, 1942.
He left Cabcaben Airport in Bataan under heavy Japanese shelling around 1 a.m. of April 9, 1942 and landed in Mindanao at dawn.
After taking his breakfast at the […]

THE FIRST branch of the Hongkong-Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) outside Manila was opened in Iloilo City on 2 April 1883 to serve the growing sugar industry. HSBC is the oldest foreign bank in the Philippines, opening its doors in Binondo in November 1875.

ON 1 APRIL 1889, Graciano Lopez Jaena of Jaro, Iloilo founded the freemason Lodge Revolucion in Barcelona, Spain which counts among its members Jose Rizal, Mariano Ponce, Marcelo H. Del Pilar, Jose Alejandrino, Antonio and Juan Luna and Pedro Serrano Laktaw. Later renamed Lodge Solidaridad, it is composed of intellectuals who petitioned the Spanish Parliament […]

Alberto Lopez blowing his birthday cake as common-law-wife Emily looks on.

Related posts:
◙ OF CALLOUSNESS AND INDIFFERENCE

◙ IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU
◙ OF LIBEL AND HONOR

◙ AN ANARCHY OF FAMILIES
◙ THE GUCCI GANG

THE BROUHAHA brought about by the Gucci Gang controversy that involves lifestyle columnist Celine Lopez resurrects past reports about her parents, […]

GABRIEL M. REYES, the first Filipino archbishop of Manila, was born in Kalibo, Aklan on 24 March 1892. He died on 10 October 1952 in the US.

THE 19 MARTYRS of Aklan were executed on 23 March 1897 in Kalibo. They were all Katipunan members who joined the forces of Francisco Castillo in attacking the Spanish garrison on 17 March 1897.

EDUCATION PIONEER and Ramon Magsaysay awardee for Government Service in 1959, Jose Vasquez Aguilar was born on 23 March 1900 in barrio Caduhaan, Cadiz, Negros Occidental. Upon completing his secondary education in 1920, he left for the United States, where he worked his way through college. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy […]

ON 19 MARCH 1835, Doña Francisca Cabañas was born in Cabatuan, Iloilo. She was a philanthropist and heroine of the revolution against Spain, and of the Philippine-American War. She was tortured by the Americans to reveal the whereabouts of General Martin Delgado and other information about the revolutionaries. But no amount of torture can force […]

MARCH 18 of every year is a non-working special holiday in the islands of Panay and Romblon, including the cities of Iloilo and Roxas, to commemorate the said islands’ liberation from Japanese forces.
The patriotism and gallantry of Filipino soldiers who teamed up with the Allied Forces during World War II liberated Panay and Romblon islands from the Japanese Imperial Army on March […]