IT'S XIAOTIME!

Michael Charleston “Xiao” B. Chua [1]

ISLAND STUDIO classic shot of Mt. Pinatubo’s first major eruption as seen from F. Tañedo Street in Tarlac, Tarlac, 12 June 1991.

(First published at Tarlac Star Monitor, 22-28 May 2012, 5)

Street names are part of our everyday lives.  Despite that, or even because of that, we just pass them by day by day oblivious of whom or what those street names represent.  But street names reflect history.  That is why one of the best history books on the City of Manila is Luning B. Ira and Isagani Medina’s The Streets of Manila.[2]

Asking the question “Just who is F. Tañedo?” led me to writing a paper about the hero to whom the main street of the city was named.[3]  In the process of my research, Dr. Lino Dizon gave me a treasure—a copy of an old article by Tarlac micro (local) historian Vicente Catu published in The Monitor on 4 February 1973.

In “How Tarlac Streets Got Their Names,” Catu enumerated the national and provincial heroes which are honored in poblacion street names.  I will reprint his article in italics and annotate or add a thing or two to the data that he presented to update it for this write-up.

F. Tañedo Street. Photo by Xiao Chua.

F. TAÑEDO STREET (the poblacion main road) named after Gen. Francisco Tañedo, a native son of Tarlac, who died a martyr’s death at the hands of Spanish soldiers on charges of underground activities during the Philippine Revolution.  Hailing from the pioneer clan of Tarlac town, Don Kikoy was elected lieutenant for the colonial government in 1889 and served for two years.  He co-founded the first masonic lodge in Tarlac, the Logia Filipino Gran Nacional Orient, and was one of the leaders of the Katipunan in the province (Tarlac being one of the first eight provinces to revolt against Spain in 1896).  A conflict with a guardia civil led to his arrest, and when he refused to implicate fellow revolutionaries and mason, he was tortured to death.  According to letters found by Dr. Lino Dizon, his death was the reason why Makabulos continued to fight the Spaniards despite Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo’s surrender at Biak-na-Bato.

ANCHETA STREET (fronting the Alice theater) named after local hero Francisco (sic – Candido) Ancheta of Tarlac, Tarlac.

C. SANTOS STREET (fronting the Rural Bank of Tarlac) named after revolutionary leader Ciriaco Santos, the father of Don Joaquin Santos and grandfather of …Hilario Santos.

HILARIO STREET (fronting Ramos Hospital) is named after revolutionary leader Procopio Hilario Sr., and father of the late Procopio Hilario Jr., of Tarlac, Tarlac.  Procopio Hilario was the brother of Don Tiburcio Hilario, the brains of the revolution in Pampanga.  He married F. Tañedo’s sister Carmen.  Together with his brother-in-law, Francisco Macabulos, Candido Ancheta and Ciriaco Santos, they spearheaded the Philippine Revolution in Tarlac province.  For this, he was executed by the Spaniards.  His son, Procopio Hilario, Jr., became a beloved school teacher described as “very kind, simple and not greedy,”[4] and one of his grandchildren, Socorro Hilario-Timbol, became directress of the Tarlac First Baptist Church School (TFBCS).  I am proud to be his distant relative.

ESPINOSA STREET (fronting KB Sizzlers, near the Tarlac plazuela) is named after Don Porfirio Espinosa, former town president of Tarlac Town (1908-1909).

RIZAL STREET (fronting the Tarlac City Hall) is named after Dr. José Rizal, the national hero, who during his lifetime was a frequent visitor of the Tarlac masons.  On the same street once stood the house of Don Evaristo Puno (municipal president of Tarlac from 1885 to 1886) where Rizal stayed on 27 June 1892.

DEL PILAR STREET (at the back of the Old Tarlac Public Market, fronting Botica Sto. Cristo, Tarlac Ice Plant) is named after Marcelo H. del Pilar, the great reformist.

LUNA STREET (fronting the Sto. Cristo Elementary School) is named after Gen. Antonio Luna, the over-all commander of the Central Luzon Revolutionary Troops – 208,000 men.  It is now more popularly ascribed to the general’s brother Juan Luna, the Philippines’ National Painter whose masterpiece, the Spoliarium, won the gold medal in the Madrid Exposition of Fine Arts in 1884.

MABINI STREET (fronting the Tarlac Electric Plant) is named after Apolinario Mabini, the known Sublime Paralytic and Prime Minister of Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo’s Government who never collected salaries in return for his services to the country.

BURGOS STREET (fronting Kentucky Fried Chicken, near the Tarlac plazuela) is named after Father José Burgos, one of the three Filipino priests who were garroted at the Luneta on the dawn of February 17, 1892 on charges of complicity with the Cavite Mutiny.

ZAMORA STREET (fronting Kent Lumber, Iglesia ni Cristo, Tarlac Central Elementary School) named after Fr. Jacinto Zamora, also one of the three priests to have died in the garrote in connection with the Cavite Mutiny.

MACARTHUR HIGHWAY (fronting Metrotown Mall, Siesta) the national highway named after Gen. Douglas MacArthur, the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers in the Pacific Theater of World War II.

ROMULO BOULEVARD (fronting the Tarlac State University, Diwa ng Tarlak) is named after Don Gregorio Romulo, Camiling Municipal President from 1906 to 1907, Governor of the province from 1910 to 1914, and father to the Little Giant, Gen. Carlos P. Romulo, President of the United Nations General Assembly and President of the University of the Philippines, among other things.

AQUINO BOULEVARD (fronting new Tarlac Public Market, Uniwide) reclaimed from the Tarlac dike, it was named after former Tarlac governor and former senator Benigno “Ninoy” S. Aquino, Jr., who became a world icon of resistance against the Marcos dictatorship and died a martyr’s death on 21 August 1983.  Recently, the boulevard was extended from Cut-Cut I to Carangian.

HOSPITAL DRIVE (fronting the Central Luzon’s Doctor’s Hospital) the road leading to the Tarlac Provincial Hospital, the first provincial hospital in the Philippines.  The former University of the Philippines Tarlac Campus is now the site of the delapidated provincial guest house.  Facing it is another hospital, the Central Luzon Doctor’s Hospital.

MACABULOS DRIVE (fronting the Tarlac City Post Office, Development Bank of the Philippines) named after the Liberator of Tarlac Province during the Philippine Revolution, Francisco Macabulos of La Paz town, who continued the struggle despite Pres. Emilio Aguinaldo’s truce with the Spaniards in Biak-na-Bato in 1897.  Another road, the San Vicente Northern Road fronting Camp Macabulos is erroneously ascribed the same name.

The listing here is just preliminary.  Dr. Rodrigo Sicat of the Center for Tarlaqueño Studies had already written extensive papers on the toponyms or the origins of place-names in the province.  I hope other scholars and enthusiasts would expand on what we had written.  Further studies could deal with other street names or place-names or in depth research on the lives and sacrifices of many of our local heroes who just exist to us as trivial street names.