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Article Examples
The following are examples of two American experiences in
the Phillipines. The articles are represenative of what we are looking for.
These articles are from the book American Exiles in the
Philippines, 1941 - 1996: A Collected Oral Narrative, published by New Day
Publishers.
Earl Hornbostel
From Chapter Two World War II and the end of American sovereignty,
1941-1945
Earl H. Hornbostel represents the transitional American expatriate. Born
in 1915, Hornbostel, as noted, is the son of a Harvard educated Marine Corps officer,
moved to the island of Guam at the age of six. He would spend the next seven years growing
up in a colonial environment. In 1928 his family moved to Manila, a place that Hornbostel
remembers as clean, friendly, and having polite, uncorrupted policeman. Around this time
Hornbostel began his life-long interest in radios. He built his first receiver at the age
of 13, and developed his passion by entering the University of the Philippines in 1933 as
an electrical engineering student. There he began in amateur radio with KAIUP, the radio
station of the University. In the years immediately preceding the war he worked for
Heacock’s Department Store as a radioman and for the Signal Corps of the U.S. Army
converting civilian transmitters for military use. Internee leader Frederic H. Stevens
calls Hornbostel "the best-known radio technician in the islands," and
Hornbostel was active and popular within the ham radio culture in the Manila area.9
At Bataan, Hornbostel’s father, Major H.G. Hornbostel, then in his
sixties, was captured, suffered the infamous Death March, and was imprisoned at
Cabanatuan. Young Hornbostel was interned with other foreign nationals in the University
of Santo Tomas. Because American leadership in the camp expected that each internee would
contribute their talents, Hornbostel help set up the camp’s public address system. In
doing so he earned the trust of the Japanese. Members of the American High Commissioner
staff were interned in Santo Tomas at a later date than other Americans personnel, and
some of them were able to smuggle in radio parts. Sometime after incarceration he was
approached by an officer of the High Commissioner and was asked to set up a transmitter
inside Santo Tomas. Hornbostel agreed, and using his role as one of the camp’s
electronic technician as a cloak, secretly built a radio transmitter and then tore it down
to hide the parts. As Hornbostel notes:
My plan was to assemble the set when the set when the American forces were
near Manila, or on Luzon, so that we could communicate for instructions and to pass
information to help the relief of Manila and the camp.10
The penalty for such an act was death.
In 1943 the Japanese announced they would repatriate approximately 143
internees to the United States on the S.S. Gripsholm. Seeing this, Hornbostel
approached one of the selected internees, an Otis Elevator engineer, Kermit Kraus, to
carry the news to authorities in the U.S. that he had constructed the transmitter and
stood ready to assist American forces. But getting the news back to Hornbostel in Santo
Tomas that the U.S. government would go along with the plan would be difficult. According
to Hornbostel:
To indicate that the info be passed on, was understood, and would be acted
on, I asked that a certain Walt Disney tune, popular in the camp, be played over KGEI on a
certain date and time (KGEI was the West Coast S.W. Broadcast station in the Philippines
we listened to, at the risk of our lives, for reliable news and comfort). In addition to
the arrangement of the song, which was mentioned above to indicate receipt of the
information, I had also asked Kraus to clearly indicate that I had no intention of
whatsoever of using the equipment until the very end of the occupation, that way, so as
not to jeopardize the internees.11
Kraus was debriefed by U.S. authorities, Hornbostel’s plan was passed
on, and the U.S. government did, in fact, react to it. What follows is from a declassified
Naval Intelligence document of December 1943, which describes Hornbostel and his dangerous
work:
Earl Hornbostel, a radio engineer, confined in the said camp, who had been
entrusted with the operation of a public address system by the Japanese camp authorities,
succeeded in secreting sufficient material with which to construct and operate a secret
radio transmitter of 500 miles range. Hornbostel at the same time has two short wave
receiving sets in his possession unknown to the authorities. He has no intention of
putting the transmitter into operation until such time as he receives a positive
indication from outside as to what use it may be put. By prearrangement on December 17,
1943 between 2100 and 2300 Tokyo Time, Hornbostel will be listening to the regular
broadcast from station KGEI, from San Francisco. If on that occasion he hears played the
song from the motion picture PINOCCHIO, entitled "HI DIDDLE DEE DEE" with the
special parody lyrics customarily sung at Santo Tomas, he will understand that Kraus has
communicated that fact that Hornbostel is in possession of the requisite materials for the
erection of a radio transmitter.
Description and sketch of Earl Hornbostel: 24 years old [he was actually
28], blond hair, blue eyes, about 5’ 10," 220-230 lbs., very rotund, a very
competent radio engineer. I do not know anything about his character. Apparently, he is
patriotic and willing to take any chance to put the radio set into operation. He has
definite cause to desire revenge against the Japanese inasmuch as his father was captured
at Bataan and has been ill at Camp #3 at Cabanatuan. I do not feel too certain about his
judgment, and it is for this reason that I have suggested the tie-up with Mr. Sinclair. I
believe that Mr. Sinclair or most anyone he appointed would competently handle Hornbostel
in an emergency.12
In Hornbostel’s narrative a number of themes surface which are
characteristic of the American internee experience. One is the kindness Filipinos showed
Americans, often at the risk of personal safety. Another is the ability of the American
community to rebound after the shock of incarceration, and to quickly structure their
internment in a democratic and capitalistic fashion. The theme of American and Filipino
courage runs throughout his narrative: resistance to Japanese authority, even in seemingly
inconsequential acts, demonstrates the patriotism of both communities. It should not be
forgotten while reading this narrative that the speaker was hiding the transmitter
mentioned above, and in doing so was putting his life on the line for the sake of his
country. Finally, as in nearly all accounts of internment, the paradoxical character of
the Japanese - sometimes brutal and sometimes noble - is described. Hornbostel’s
narrative begins with an account of how the relationship between the American and Filipino
communities, between the colonizer and the colonized, remained remarkably supportive,
despite the incredible predicament of World War II.13
Hornbostel: Frankly, without the help that Filipinos gave Americans in
Santo Tomas and other internment camps, the rate of death would have been many, many times
higher. Imagine this: here’s an American family in Santo Tomas. They worked for a
company in Manila. They received a monthly salary. They had one or two maids, maybe a
driver. These people [Filipinos] had no obligation to their masters; in other words, they
worked for them, that’s all. But nevertheless, so many of these people sacrificed
their own welfare by doing everything they could for their former masters in Santo Tomas.
By that I mean they would send food to them, to whatever extent the Japanese would allow.
They would get information to Spanish, Swiss, or Irish or other neutral people who were
friends of these Americans. They would get information to them so they could also help
through the Filipinos, who would bring food packages to Santo Tomas. Among the elite in
the Filipino community who had friendship ties with Americans, and virtually all of them
did, they would lend them money to be repaid after the war. This was such a common
occurrence that it was not unusual; it simply happened. There was certainly nothing like
this in Indonesia. If you read stories of the Dutch who were interned in Indonesia, the
Indonesians cooperated with the Japanese, including Sukarno. They had far more fatalities
and suffering among them.
In my particular case my contacts were far greater than the average
internee because of my camp activities in putting up this extensive audio system.14 I needed materials and I was able to get them though my Filipino
friends. In order to survive in the camp everyone was supposed to have a camp duty, except
for a few rich men who managed to get enough money to hire someone to do their camp duty.
My camp duty was the sound system. I needed money because the food the Japanese gave us
was very inadequate; so we all had to have extra food, at least for the first two years
when we could get it. When I was no longer there it was pretty well cut off and the
suffering went up because the Filipinos could not send things in to us.
Anyway, I started my part-time business there: I learned how to make candy
and fruit concentrates for fruit drinks out of kalamansi. That was possible because of
Filipinos who worked for me before the war; one whole family whose oldest son had worked
for me as my office manager when I worked at Heacocks, they went into kalamasi squeezing:
buy the kalamasi, buy the sugar. They got the flavor concentrates like oil of wintergreen,
vanilla, and all the others that were needed. So most of the day I was making candy. I had
two different people selling it in the camp.
I was not unique. Either you had to decide to borrow money from your
friends outside, which I could have done because I was able to get in all of this material
and equipment for the camp. I could have, like others, existed on that. But I did not want
to go into debt. A lot of other people who weren’t in the position to borrow and
could do something did it. Women did hairdressing or nail work. One French Jewish chemist
found a way to make lipstick. Another fellow, believe it or not, rented condoms. Rented.
One fellow, who was a military deserter, got there in the early days and was able to get a
landing on the main stairs instead of being in one of the dormitory rooms. He put sheets
around it, and he rented out the space to lovelorn couples, which was against the Japanese
rules. People built shacks for other people; got the material in from outside: bamboo,
sawali, whatever. That was an education in itself. In my room there was a ship’s
carpenter from an American President liner that was sunk here in Manila Bay at the outset
of the war. He was an avowed communist. He was trying to convert the other sixty in our
room. But after one year, no more! He was a completely changed man. He made use of his
carpenter’s ability and went into business building shacks, and communism went out
the window.
In February, 1944, Hornbostel’s stay in Santo Tomas would come to an
abrupt end. With three other internees, he would be arrested for anti-Japanese activities,
and removed from the camp. His harrowing narrative is illustrative of the humiliation
suffered by many American civilians.
Hornbostel: A friend of mine’s father, an American mestizo,
was in the camp. E.B. Harris was the father; the son was Johnny. The children of an
American and a Filipino mother were not interned. Even an American wife of a Filipino was
not interned. Johnny Harris worked in the radio station of our company. He had a good
short-wave receiver which he bolted into a wall somewhere so if the Japanese inspected the
place they wouldn’t easily find it. He was making transcripts of the KGEI broadcasts
and sending them into the camp to his father through three Americans who were the drug
purchasers for the camp. They were allowed out once or twice a week to go around Manila to
buy medicine. They were qualified because they were agents of drug companies. One was with
Sprit [?], the other Upjohn. I’ve forgotten the third. When they went out one of them
would carry a fountain pen, and you had a cavity inside with a rubber bladder, and you
would squeeze that to draw in ink. You would take out the bladder and then take these
transcripts on onion skin paper and roll it up and put it inside. They would meet Johnny
in a drug store somewhere; the Japanese did not send a guard with them. They had a
temporary pass and had to wear an armband to designate what they were. They’d
exchange fountain pens and bring them into the camp. They would read it themselves, show
it to their friends, and then it would go to his father, who was a good friend of mine, as
well. But I didn’t read his transcripts because I had a hidden radio in the camp.
The Japanese published an English language newspaper (the Manila
Tribune) here during the war. They did not allow it into the camp, but sometimes a
copy got in. One time I read this copy the same day it came out. It told there of the
American invasion of Tarawa. The interesting thing was that for the next three days KGEI
never reported that. Maybe they didn’t want to let Japanese on neighboring islands
know too much about what had happened there. Anyway, I told the old man about the Tarawa
landing and the success of the Marines.
Eventually, Johnny was caught in the Jai Alai.15 He
used to bring these transcripts and give it to some of his friends there. But he was
caught. Some of his friends were also caught. The Japanese, a few days later, came in and
arrested his father. His father was quite an old man, and he was tortured. He was asked
about these transcripts that were being sent in. The old man, when he was questioned and
tortured, for some reason told them I had shown him transcripts, which I had never done.
Because anything we heard on our radio we never wrote down. He described in part this
Tarawa incident as being part of a transcript I had shown him. Because of that I was
arrested and taken out.16
I was brought to this place in Manila, an old mansion [of Dr. Burke on
Aviles Street], built in 1834, whose first floor had originally been stables and were made
out of stone and mortar in a very heavy construction. Huge thick walls, and upstairs were
the Japanese officers. I was kept there [upstairs] for one day. Those officers just made
me stand in the corner like a guilty child. The next day they put me down in the cell with
others [of mixed nationalities], including one Japanese. I didn’t know what they had
on me; didn’t know the slightest thing. The next day took me to an interrogating
room, which was also in this basement, in this old stable.
A young Japanese, must have been 18 or 19 years old, who had lived in
Manila and spoke English, was assigned to take my life history back to my grandparents. I
spent the whole day doing that. He just wanted to know everything. He asked me all kinds
of questions: me, my family, what I’d done, where I’d lived. Everything.
The next room was separated from my room by a window, which as it came
into our room spread out. On the smaller side were bars. In the next room old man Harris
was reviewing his previous testimony by another Japanese, but a somewhat older fellow.17 Now, I had been many, many years a ham radio operator, and you learn
the ability to what we call "read traffic." In other words, hear through a lot
of noise and static. There was a lot of noise: the Japanese office was up above with these
big, wide planks of wood between us. They’re tramping around with their boots.
Hearing him through that little porthole was difficult. But while I was being interrogated
I was able to hear and make out what he had testified about me, which was being reviewed
by the other Japanese. The young Japanese with me was in the corner, and I was sitting
near where that opening was, so maybe he didn’t realize that the fellow [in the next
room] had some connection with me; that I shouldn’t be hearing that. He couldn’t
hear it as well as I could, so he wouldn’t know the import.
Anyway, I knew everything the old man had said, including what were the
colors of the paper these transcripts were supposed to be on: some were pink, some were
yellow, some were white. He gave them dates: three different dates and three different
occasions when I was supposed to have shown him transcripts, which I can tell you I never
had done. I discovered that in going over those dates in my memory, that each of them -
it’s incredible, if you saw it in a movie it wouldn’t seem possible - each of
those dates he gave coincided with dates when I repaired radios in the camp for the
Japanese guards. It’s incredible because it stretched over a year’s period.
The Japanese guards would bring in radios to the camp’s electricians,
two Americans and one Australian, who we called the Smith Brothers because each of them
had a big black beard.18 So the Smith Brothers would call me in and
I would fix the radios. I had a radio so I didn’t need to listen, but they wanted to
listen. I would always decastrate [remove the short wave components] it to receive that
KGEI station. Being electricians they could put up wires temporarily that would serve as
an antennae. I had some headphones in there that the Japanese didn’t know about; I
could listen that way safely.
When interrogated I still had something up my sleeve. The Japanese allowed
people to use AM radio. But not short-wave. However, because of the radio I had in camp, I
could, at times, receive Chunking. This was the defense of China headquarters. At times
you could receive that in Manila. They had during the war an English language news
broadcast.
The Japanese had this transcript story, and I knew it would be pretty
useless to deny it, so when they asked me, "Where did you get this news?" I
said, "Well, I listened to Chunking."
[They asked], "Where did you type it up?" The electricians had a
typewriter in their office. [He told the Japanese he used the typewriter.] I felt safe
there because they never got a hold of any of the transcripts; they wouldn’t be able
to compare the typefaces. I admitted that. That was no crime on the AM broadcasts. When
they went over the dates again, I was able to tell them the dates I’d done that
before they asked me. So my story went together every well. I wouldn’t have to worry
about getting shot.
What they did do was to go to the camp and arrest the three Smith Brothers
and hold them for one day in another room in that building. I never saw them; I heard
afterwards that it had happened. Fortunately, they confirmed the dates. So my story held
together.
All the Japanese could do was to give me a three year sentence for hearing
propaganda. Then they brought me to old Bilibid, where all of those who had been found
guilty and were being held for court martial were kept.19 I spent
over three months there.
Bilibid was different from the other place, of course. There were a number
of cells, each holding seven or eight people and one large cell of sixty. That’s the
one where they put me. Johnny Harris was in my cell also. In one cell there were seven
women; one of them was the mother of Samboy Stagg [Mary B. Stagg]. Another woman in there
was Dr. [Hawthorne] Darby, an American doctor in the charity hospital in Tondo; a
missionary doctor. There was a Mrs. [Blanche] Jurika, who was the mother-in-law of Chick
Parsons; she was arrested because of him.20 There was an American
mestiza from Negros, who was the girlfriend of Tom Myers, who was in my cell. There was,
in my cell, a priest who sat right in front of me, who later became the first Filipino
Cardinal: Cardinal [Rufino] Santos.21
His story is interesting. He was a very fine person. He was the secretary
of the Archbishop, [Michael J.] O’Doherty, who, being Irish, was not interned.
O’Doherty was old and infirm. The Archbishop’s office was just a stone’s
throw from Ft. Santiago. The Archbishop and the Catholic Women’s League and others
were helping to get medicine and badly needed things to the military prison in Bongabon,
in Nueva Ecija.22 He did most of his liaison work through his
secretary, Father Santos. There was a whole operation called the CIO. One-hundred eighty
people were arrested in January of ‘44. When they came to arrest the Archbishop,
Father Santos took the entire responsibility on himself to prevent the Archbishop from
being arrested. He wouldn’t have survived Ft. Santiago. Few people know about that.
He [Santos] was a very modest man; it didn’t get into the press here. So he went
through that whole routine: Ft. Santiago, old Bilibid, and finally Muntilupa.
He sat immediately in front of me [in Bilibid]. I became very familiar
with his back [laughs]. We could not talk among ourselves. If we were caught talking we
would be beaten by the guards. They could observe us because the building was originally
cement, with a cement floor. What the Japanese did - because we had to have a toilet there
- they made a new floor out of wood about that high [several feet off the ground] and off
in the corner was a hole in the floor with a five gallon can underneath. That was our
toilet. We had to sleep on that floor at night with nothing but our shirts and shorts. The
lights were always on.
The walls, since it had originally been a large, open building, were made
out of double wood. Yet into those [double] walls would be places where the guard could
look. It was very difficult to talk without getting caught.
You had to lay down in exactly the place where you sat for sixteen hours a
say. You couldn’t just sit in any old way, you had to squat. At night, laying down,
depending on how you laid on your side, you couldn’t be seen by the guards. So you
could do some whispering. You had some chance to talk to your immediate neighbor.
I remember there was a fellow just to the left side of Father Santos who
was beaten several times by the Japanese guards because at sunset he would say his evening
prayers. Not only move his lips but mouth the words. He got beaten up four or five times.
Finally, Father Santos whispered to him: "God knows what’s in your mind. If you
speak to God He doesn’t listen to your voice. He hears what’s here [the heart].
You need not talk. Your prayers are just as good if you think them."
The fellow stopped; he didn’t get beaten up any more.
A portion of that large compound was used for these prisoners. Nearby, but
separated by very substantial walls, were the U.S. military prisoners, who were mainly
there because they were being transferred from one work place to another. They’d stay
there a few days.
On June 30, we were taken out to Ft. McKinley [now Ft. Bonifacio] for
court martial. We were court martialed and brought back to Bilibid and kept there. Those
of us who didn’t get the death penalty - in our group there were two who did get the
death sentence - were put into a small cell and kept there until July 5th, ‘44. They
transferred us to Muntinlupa, which was the large insular prison outside of Manila where
most of the prisoners were insular prisoners; ordinary criminals. A separate portion was
for military prisoners. From July 5th until September 9th, there were no Japanese guards
in that prison. But in the last week of August a number of our fellow prisoners had
escaped, including Raul Manglapus.23 This escape triggered a change
in the prison. Previously, we had the freedom of the outside grounds within the prison
walls; now we were isolated in two buildings. The total number of military prisoners
there, the maximum number, was about 1,200. After the imposition of the Japanese guards,
conditions became very bad. Very difficult to get in supplementary food or anything from
the outside. The food was dried cassava chips. This is known to Americans as tapioca.
It’s absolutely pure starch, about the purest type of starch you can get. If you eat
that and nothing else it’s sure death. Occasionally, they’d put one or two
leaves on it; sometimes dried fish on top. Beriberi, vitamin B shortage, was highly
prevalent. By the time we got out on February 5, 1945, from 1,200 we were down to 400:
beriberi and other diseases that ordinary attention would have taken care of. It was
really difficult.
While I was there I was called out on occasion to fix radios, not only by
the Japanese guards but by three or four prison officials. My reputation had preceded me.
Among those whose radios I fixed was the Assistant Director [Adriano Valdez], who was a
Constabulary officer, a veteran of Bataan. He had spent a year as a guerrilla. I had fixed
their radio, himself and his daughter [Elizabeth Pyle Valdez]. His daughter was half white
because his wife had been American. I only had a brief time with them, one afternoon. The
Director of the prison [Elias Dioquino] was another Constabulary officer but whom everyone
disliked because he was diverting food from the prisoners to his own gain.
At the end [in 1945] we were fortunate that the Japanese lieutenant in
charge of the platoon assigned to the prison, who were our guards, had been more
compassionate than his predecessors. For example, on Christmas Eve the prison chaplain
requested that this lieutenant send in a Mass kit to the priest, who was Father Santos, so
he could hold a midnight Mass, which is very important to Catholics. This Mass was held,
and to tell you the truth, although I wasn’t a Catholic at the time, it was the most
religious experience of my whole life. After all the repression and what we had been
through, to be able to join in this offering to Christ was quite, quite an experience.
The American forces landed in Lingayen [January 6, 1945]. We’d seen
an occasional American plane; we knew what was happening. About eight in the evening on
February 3 [1945], the American forces entered the gate of Santo Tomas. The day before
that the Japanese lieutenant for our prison was called to the kempeitai headquarters at
Fort Santiago and given orders that he was to execute all those with sentences of 15 years
and more regardless of nationality and, with respect to nationality, all Americans,
regardless of sentence length. The officer did not like these orders; of course, we
didn’t know it at the time.
When he came back at noon, February 3, he had his guards call out twelve
men and told the prisoners to bring minimal clothing with them; they were being
transferred. But they were taken by these guards some distance outside the prison, to the
cemetery of the prison in a very large mango grove outside of gunshot hearing of the
prison. These twelve men were executed. Now, Filipino insular prisoners had been called
along to bury them. So when these insular prisoners got back the word quickly got to us
what was happening. Later that afternoon twelve more were called out and the same thing
happened. Next morning, Sunday, twelve more were called out and executed. Past noon time
another twelve were called out. Keep in mind that at that particular point in time the
American forces that had landed in Nasugbu and fought their way up to Manila, to Las
Pinas, were already a just a few miles from us.
So this last twelve, making a total of 48, were executed. There was one
survivor, an amazing thing: he was shot through the head and body, and when the Filipino
prisoners went there to bury them they saw this fellow was still conscious, and he
eventually survived.
The Japanese came back. It was about three or four o’clock in the
afternoon. They called out the last group, which included we five Americans. It was early
February, beginning to get close to sunset. It took time to walk out to the cemetery and
come back. Because it was getting close to sunset, the Japanese officer decided, after
letting us stand around for about an hour, to postpone it to the next morning. While we
were standing around there I found a piece of charcoal and went to the wall of the
stairway going to the second floor and wrote there: "Hornbostel was here"
[laughs].
Anyway, that night the Japanese officer was invited to have dinner with
his assistant director, Major Valdez. As a veteran of Bataan, [Valdez] had been able to
escape from Bataan with some of his men and not surrender to the Japanese, and spent a
year as a guerrilla in the mountains of the Pangasinan-Zambales boundary area. But [he]
surrendered to the Japanese because he heard that his daughter in Manila was working in a
vaudeville show. He didn’t like that. So he surrendered. The Japanese had taken all
Constabulary who were willing to be reinstated, so he was put back there and assigned to
the prison.
Getting out of Bataan he had with him there a good, battery operated
radio, a Philco, and a bottle of Black Label whisky. He kept those two things up in the
mountains. When he surrendered he was able to keep them. Of course, the radio had to be
castrated [its short-wave capability removed]. But he had them in the prison; that’s
the radio I fixed. He kept that bottle of whisky for liberation day.
He invited the Japanese [officer] over. Gave him a very nice dinner, and
then he and his daughter went to work on him not to execute anybody the next day. I guess
his daughter was more interested in me than the others [prisoners]. But after enjoying the
Black Label he agreed not to execute any more. And he kept his promise.
The next afternoon, February 5, they [the Japanese] left. That night we
were free. Of course, later on I married the young lady.24
Hornbostel would go on to marry the woman and start his own electronics
company, eventually employing several hundred in the Manila area. The rescue of
Hornbostel, a child of the American colonial military, by the Philippine officer and his
American-Filipino daughter is poignant. In this rescue one sees the transformation of the
relationship of the American and Filipino communities: where once was colonial power and
subordination, now existed a partnership, imperfect perhaps, but one built on shared
suffering and resistance. Salvation from the Japanese firing squad, while Manila was in
flames, and the marriage of Hornbostel with his savior metaphorically celebrates the
beginning of the postcolonial period.
9. Stevens 196.
10. Earl H. Hornbostel, "The Odyssey of KAIBB’S HT-1,"
unpublished manuscript, 2-3. In a December 1996 e-mail correspondence with the author,
Hornbostel elaborates on the circumstances of the radio transmitter:
When the Japanese entered Manila, most civilians, allied civilians, were
interned in Sto. Thomas but the members of the staff of the American high
commissioner’s office were interned separately in a large private residence on the
south side of Manila near the Airport, and they were kept there for several months. These
residence belong to an American businessman whose hobby was ham radio and he had a
Hallicrafters HT-1 transmitter in a cottage in his garden. When the Japanese took over the
place, they had not seem this transmitter, so the Americans interned there decided to hide
it. After a few months, they were informed that they were to be transferred to Sto. Thomas
but having something of a diplomatic status, they were allowed to bring anything they
wanted into the camp and the Japanese provided a truck for this purpose. Having enough
time before being transferred, one of them decided to bring this transmitter into the camp
but in a safe way, that is, he took it apart and hid the parts in all the different bits
of baggage and furniture that they were bringing. When they arrived in the camp, they
looked me up and gave me these parts. Fortunately, I was very familiar with this
particular transmitter since I had done repair work on it for its original owner. What I
did was to hide all those parts that could be characterized as transmitter parts in
various places in Sto. Thomas with the help of various friend in the camp but I did it on
the communist cell principle. If they were to hide them, each one hid it and only he would
know where it was hidden. On top of that, no one of these friends knew who else had hidden
parts and I, myself, would not know where they had hidden the parts. As my intention was
to put it together at an appropriate time, I would be able to gather all the parts. The
other parts of the transmitter mixed with our audio equipment because some of those parts
in any event were useful for those applications.
For more on the story of Hornbostel’s radio transmitter and other
related
Santo Tomas topics see Tom Carter’s "The Way It Was" column
in the
May, June, and July, 1998 issues of the AmCham Business Journal.
11. Hornbostel, 3.
12. Naval Intelligence document, "Guerrilla Activities (Allied) in
Philippine Islands," (New York: Third Naval District, 8 December, 1943) 1-2. The
document also contains the special parody lyrics (3-4):
Hi-diddle-dee-dee
Internment’s not for me.
The outlook isn’t a happy one
For first we borrow and then we bum,
And wind up stealing our best pal’s slum.
Hi-diddle-dee-dee.
Hi-diddle-dee-dee
The game is a wonderful spree
We found there are catches to everything
To permanent passes they tied a string
So we heckle Bert Holland [an internee leader] and mope and sing.
Hi-diddle-dee-dee.
Hi-diddle-dee-dee
We’ll be out in ‘43
But when New Year’s here in ‘54
Internees will still be fighting the war
In the showers and by the front door.
Hi-diddle-dee-dee
Hi-diddle-dee-dee
Internment’s not for me
In ‘49 we’ll begin to stall
To go over the wall or not at all
And wind up back in Villamor Hall
Hi-diddle-dee-dee.
Hi-diddle-dee-dee
A lesson this will be
When you hear that help is on the way
You’ll take the first boat from Manila Bay
To God’s country, the U.S.A.
Hi-diddle-dee-dee.
Hornbostel’s father is described by Hartendorp in his posthumously
published, "The Hartendorp Memoir’s," Bulletin of the
American
Historical Collection, 6 no. 3 (July-September 1978): 54-55.
13. A representative account of the relationship of the American and
Filipino communities also comes from Henry Sioux Johnson:
At the beginning, the Japanese permitted Filipinos to bring extra food and
so forth through the camp gate. So friendly Filipinos brought food, clothes, and other
things. It showed that many Filipinos were loyal to Americans. The internees really
appreciated the fact that a number of Filipinos had been maltreated or killed by the
Japanese for their acts of charity. The Filipinos risked quite a bit. The Japanese guards
resented the Filipinos’ display of friendship toward Americans. Onorato Henry
Sioux Johnson 18.
14. Stevens, in discussing the sound system of the camp, remarks:
The greatest aid in expending their equipment came from Earl’s
Filipino friends, whose generous load of speakers, ‘mikes’ and turntables was
invaluable. For the past five months of operation the radio boys used their own funds and
personal equipment, without financial support from the camp. So it is due to these
Filipino benefactors that the outfit grew to possess all the appurtenances of a
broadcasting station - bar the radio. 196-197.
For biographical information on Stevens see his obituary in Tom Carter,
"Frederic Harper Stevens, 1879-1982," Bulletin of the American Historical
Collection, 11 no. 1 (January 1983): 110-111.
15. The Jai Alai was a sports center turned into an internment area.
Johnny Harris was executed for passing the transcripts on July 4, 1944. See Hartendorp,
vol. II, 579.
16. The episode of Hornbostel’s arrest is treated in detail by
Hartendorp, vol. II, 578-581. The removal of the men from Santo Tomas created a good
measure of anxiety among the internees, and Stevens describes the event as follows:
On February 27, 1944, four internees - S.R. Barnett, J.H. Blair, E.T.
Ellis, and Everett B. Harris - the first three living with their wives and families in
Camp and the last an elderly man, were taken into custody and removed from Santo Tomas
Internment Camp, by the Japanese military authorities. A few days earlier these four men
had been questioned about bringing news into Camp. In the course of this questioning, Mr.
Blair had been so badly beaten that he required hospitalization. A day or two later
another internee - Earl H. Hornbostel - was also removed from Camp. Neither the Internee
Committee nor the families of these men were informed as to the reason for the arrest. ...
These men seemed to have disappeared from the face of the earth. 62-63.
See also Civilians in World War II,197.
17. E. B. Harris died of starvation in San Lazaro Hospital on May 9, 1944.
See Hartendorp (vol. II, 579) and Stevens (63). In a June 30, 1998 conversation between
the author and Hornbostel, the ex-internee asserted the following about the death of
Harris:
Self-induced starvation. A very unusual thing. He had grown up in the
southern tip of Illinois. His parents had been farmers. It is in that portion [of the
state] that [occurs] the confluence of the Mississippi and the Ohio [rivers], and that is
a pretty low and swampy area. The crop grown there is rice. His parents were not really
well-to-do farmers; they were close to being subsistence farmers. So he had an awful lot
of rice [as a child]. [As an adult] he just couldn’t eat it. When he came to the
Philippines he couldn’t eat it.
It was entirely in his mind because in Santo Tomas, at times, he was sent
in puto. Puto is a little rice cake, not necessarily sweet. It is made from rice flour. He
ate puto, but he could not eat rice, and all we got in Bilibid was rice. He just simply
died of starvation because he couldn’t eat rice. He would vomit. He would have
intense stomach upsets. And yet because I knew he could eat puto I say it was entirely in
the mind.
18. Assumedly, Hornbostel is referring to the Smith Brothers illustration
on the Smith Brothers Cough Drops. For another primary account of Hornbostel’s
interrogation seeCivilians in World War II, 203-204.
19. Bilibid prison was used mainly for military prisoners, although a
number of civilians were also interned there. For an extended and detailed description of
Bilibid see Hayes throughout.
20. American Charles A. "Chick" Parsons became a legendary
underground figure during the war. His story is accounted in Carlos Quirino’s Chick
Parsons: America’s Master Spy in the Philippines (Quezon City: New Day
Publishers, 1984). His mother-in-law, Mrs. Blanche Jurika, as well as Dr. Darby, Mrs.
Stagg, Mrs. Sylvia Carrero, and Miss Helen Wilke were all executed by the Japanese as a
result of their being a part of an alleged spy ring known as the Central Intelligence
Organization. In a March 11, 1998 letter to Tom Carter, Hornbostel provides more
information on his cellmates:
There were, I believe, about 179 arrested and brought to Fort Santiago.
After investigation, those who they considered guilty were brought to Old Bilibid and kept
for court martial. These court martials occurred, I believe, between late June and late
August 1944; and most of them were executed. A number of them were in my prison cell where
we had at any given time, between fifty-eight and sixty-three prisoners. People included
were Fr. Santos, later on became the Cardinal [see following note], Liling Roces, the
brother of Chino Roces, Tom Myers, who together with his girlfriend were doing courier
service for Chic Parsons between Mindoro and Manila but stayed most of the time in the
forested area on the Cavite, Batangas and mountain area between Tagaytay and the South
China Sea. There was also a Filipino lieutenant who had come from Australia with Chic
Parsons and had been captured in the small sailboat, together with General Vicent Lim,
other way from Chic Parsons’ headquarters. Gen. Vincente Lim, no relation of
Manila’s mayor, was an early West Point graduate and his two sons, Robert and Vincent
Jr., respectively, studied in West Point and Annapolis later. These two sons fled,
together with the third [son?] who is a Jesuit priest, and [became] very successful in
their lives and at one time [Robert?] became the head of Philippine Air Lines and the
other one, Vincente, was a high executive of [the] Del Monte operation. Unfortunately,
when Vincente Lim was captured, he was almost immediately executed but his lieutenant was
in my cell. Another officer in my cell was Lt. Gepte. He was a recent West Point graduate.
In our room, he was one of three men that was assigned to go to the kitchen three times a
day and to bring the food in kettles that was dished out in the dishes... These dishes
were half-coconut shells that had [a] very sour smell because they were not cleaned and,
of course, we had to use our fingers to eat. Occasionally, Gepte was able to communicate
with prisoners in other cells and could keep us informed about the comings and goings of
prisoners or pass messages between cells. The sad thing about him, of course, was that he
was one of those executed. ... The man who sat just to my left was dying of tuberculosis
and ironically, was the paid assassin of Alejandro Roces, head of the [Manila] Tribune
organization and had been killed late in 1943 by guerrillas who, I believed, mistakenly
thought that the elder Roces was collaborating with the Japanese because of their use of
the Tribune facilities. He did work that time with the newspaper but it was basically he
wanted to do his best to preserve the facilities owned by the family. ... Tom Myers, whom
I mentioned earlier, was the son of Forrest H. Myers, head of the Luzon Brokerage Company.
F.H. Myers was in Sto. Tomas and his son, Tom, was an outdoorsman and he used to go
hunting in different parts of the Philippines and was very used to roughing it. He had a
wife in Sto. Tomas and a daughter Terry, a teenager at that time; but, having at the time
of the outbreak of the war, a mistress, an American mestiza from Negros, Tom had elected
to get out of town with her and head for the boondocks, which is in this case were the
mountains between Cavite and Batangas, which is how he later was able to help Chic
Parsons. His girlfriend did most of the traveling but as a white man, it was very
difficult for him to visit well-populated areas.
The interesting thing about Lt. Gepte was that he was involved with Stagg
in intelligence work. His wife and Lt. Gepte, and a number of other people from the
Ellinwood Church in Malate, were doing a good job for us. Unfortunately, Mrs. Stagg and
Gepte were caught in the CIO round up and she was one of the seven women in the cell of
Old Bilibid. Of whom, six were executed and only Tom Myer’s girlfriend was not
executed and survived as a prisoner in the Women’s Correctional Institute in
Mandaluyong. Tom had found the broken tip of the pencil and with some toilet paper wrote a
will asking that his insurance be given to his girlfriend. He gave me this will before I
was brought to Muntinlupa and I hid it in the folds under the belt of my short pants that
had been issued to me in Bilibid. This will, unfortunately, I could not bring with me
because the Japanese made me change into my clothes in which I had been arrested. But
after our liberation, I went to his father and told him of the contents of the will which
I had memorized but his father refused to do it because he was pretty angry about his
situation with the girlfriend, even though he had done heroic service for our country.
See Quirno (16-17, 75) and Hartendorp (vol.II, 242).
21. Rufino Cardinal Santos was the Catholic leader during the first decade
of the Marcos government. During martial law his relationship with the Marcos family was
usually seen in contrast with that of another leader of the clergy, Cardinal Jaime Sin.
22. For a discussion of O’Doherty and his dealings with the Japanese
propaganda corps, specifically Lieutenant Colonel T. Naruzawa, see Hartendorp, vol. I,
226-230.
23. Raul Manglapus would go on to become Secretary of Foreign Affairs,
senator, anti-Marcos organizer in exile, and, during the U.S. military bases debate, the
leader of the Aquino government’s negotiating team. For an account of the escape see Civilians
in World War II, 239-252.
24. Stevens records the rescue as such:
The whereabouts of these four internees [Ellis, Barnett, Blair, and
Hornbostel] was not definitely discovered until the Arrival [sic] of the U.S. Forces of
Liberation. They were found by guerrilla troops in the insular prison at Muntinlupa, weak,
emaciated, at the point of death. Months of suffering, both physical and mental, had been
their lot. They had finally been condemned to death and the firing squad had already set
the date for the horrible orgy. Had the rescue been delayed for only a day or two longer,
they would undoubtedly been executed. 63.
Hartendorp also describes the rescue, and note the interesting role played
by the Filipino officers:
[T]he Filipino officials were delaying matters as much as possible by
claiming that some of the men listed for execution were already dead and by mixing up the
records as much as they dared. ... By this time it was considered too late in the day to
continue the bloody work, and that evening, the half-American daughter of the Assistant
Director, a girl known to the prisoners only as "Boots," pleaded with the
Japanese lieutenant not to kill the four Americans. She reminded him that the American
forces were already in Manila and at Paranaque and Las Pinas, only a few kilometers away,
and that he probably would not see his superior officer again; the lieutenant, who had not
seemed to like his task anyway, agreed that night, the 4th, not to shoot any more of the
prisoners.
About 3:30 the next afternoon - the 5th - he and his men left the prison
in great haste, apparently believing that American troops were advancing [in fact it was
Filipino guerrillas who entered the prison] ... Assistant Director Valdez ... told the
military prisoners they were free. vol. II 580.
The prisoners eventually made it to the American lines. Hartendorp reports
that Hornbostel then:
worked on army radio, sound, and moving-picture equipment at Nasugbu for
some weeks, then thumbed a ride on an army truck to Manila, arriving at Santo Tomas on
February 25 and finding his father, Major H.G. Hornbostel, there. The elder Hornbostel had
come into Camp a few days before, after almost three years imprisonment in Cabanatuan and
two months in Bilibid. ... Earl Hornbostel married "Boots" Elizabeth Pyle
Valdez, daughter of the Assistant Director of the prison, on May 31, 1945. vol. II, 581.
The help of the Filipino jailer and his daughter is also reported, albeit
very briefly, in Emily Hahn’s The Islands (New York: Coward, McCann &
Geoghegan, 1987) 224-225. See also Civilians in World War II, 223-226.
Back to the top
Eddie Woolbright
From Chapter Three Community reconstruction, Philippine
independence, and the development of new
American-Philippine relations, 1946-1964
There can be no doubt that Edward Woolbright has earned a high place in
the pantheon of expatriate personalities in the Philippines. Living first in Tacloban and
then Cebu City, Woolbright built not only a financial empire but an almost mythical
stature, and his exploits evoke the archetypal image of the American expatriate success
during the postwar years. Woolbright was born in Boswell, Oklahoma, and grew up in dust
bowl America. Like others of the time, it was Franklin Roosevelt’s Civilian
Conservation Corps that allowed him to rise above the Great Depression. Joining the Coast
Guard’s officer training program, Woolbright found himself in Florida aboard the
training vessel, Joseph Konrad. After further training in Boston, Woolbright began
his merchant marine duty by visiting Western hemisphere ports such as Buenos Aires and
Caracas. When the war broke out, Woolbright first considered becoming a pilot, but
continued in the merchant marines, taking part in harrowing convoy duty across the North
Atlantic. Another trip took him to the invasion of Sicily. In 1944 he found himself as
part of the invasion of Leyte, and it was here that his fifty-year relationship with the
Philippines began.3 Like other servicemen, he eventually found
Manila. The devastated town was ripe for the entrepreneur, and Woolbright was quick to see
the economic opportunities before him. His first venture into Philippine business was
something less than a success, but it does characterize the spirit of the times.
Woolbright: [He went from] Leyte Gulf to Tacloban [in late October,
1944], and that was the worst place I suppose I ever saw in the world. See the Army was
there... hundreds and hundreds of trucks and all kinds of vehicles... tanks... bulldozers.
All of them up and down the road. The roads were just muck. You couldn’t even walk
down the roads... [he had to go] in a jeep. Mudholes two or three feet deep in the town
and all. Dirtiest, ugliest place in the world.4
I went ashore there and met with some people. Talked to them. Met with
them in a little place. We sat down and talked. We had a USO and had some beer served, and
the Red Cross had some lemon juice [stands] all over the town. But not much to see [in
Tacloban]. A couple of little Chinese restaurants, and we would eat Chinese food. But it
was a dirty town because of so many people and so many vehicles of all types. I met a few
people there and they all spoke English very, very well. And I enjoyed Tacloban, except
that it was a dirty, dirty town because of the invasion.
We stayed there about January or February [1945], and we left for Manila.
We were loaded. We had discharged there: guns and ammunition. Leyte was the only place
that actually had been taken, really. Japs were all over everywhere except Leyte. So we
went to Manila and were anchored out in Manila Bay, and there was still fighting in
Manila. [Later] I got to know a lot of people there [in Manila]. I would go downtown,
everybody was very friendly with you. All the Filipinos were very friendly, all calling
you "Joe."
Downtown I had a lot of fun. I saw that all the bank buildings were all
wide open. You could walk in and nobody was there, money laying all over the floor. But it
was Japanese money. It was worthless, not anything of value, except for souvenirs. My
friend and I - a radio operator and I - decided to collect [the Japanese money]. So we got
sacks, and we started sacking it up. We got two or three banca loads of money, and we took
it back to the ship. From Manila we thought we would go back to the States, and we could
sell all of this money for souvenirs. Well, we locked it [the money] up. Finally, we
sailed from Manila, but not for home. The war had changed. We were there in Manila, then
the invasion of Okinawa was going on. So when the war in Okinawa was almost over we went
to Okinawa. Then from Okinawa we had something to do in Shanghai, so we had to go from
Okinawa to Shanghai. Then from Shanghai to Tokyo. Then the war was over [and the money
which they had been holding became worthless as souvenirs back in the U.S.].
Perhaps because of the protean conditions, the immediate postwar years
offered the American the opportunity to establish businesses or grow within their
corporations. The following narratives address how Americans developed professionally
within the often chaotic postwar environment. One who defines the term adventurer, Eddie
Woolbright turned war scrap into a million dollar business, and subsequently parlayed that
venture into several well-known restaurants in Tacloban and Cebu City. Below he comments
on the strong professional and personal interaction between Americans and Filipinos.
Woolbright: When the war was about over I left [Asia] and went back
to San Francisco. Then I went to the Coast Guard upgrading school to get my second
officer’s license. I came back and got on the Wreathnut which was leaving for
Tacloban. So I took the Wreathnut, I was first officer on it. They didn’t have
a second officer; I became the first officer. I got to Tacloban, and I got to know the
captain very well, and the war was over. ... [Woolbright wanted to be] discharged at
Tacloban through a sickness. I was playing sick again.8 So I pleaded
with the captain to pay me off. I was a little bit sickly, but I tried to get out through
hospital but it didn’t work out. The captain agreed to pay me off because he had a
new man to take over my position as first officer. So I was paid off in Tacloban.
When I got off originally I was going to stay for six months to break the
monotony that I had gone through during World War II. I had a long time on ships, and I
thought, "Well, I’m going to take a six month vacation." So then I got
involved in a little business here, business there, buying and selling. And every month or
two after six months I said, "Well, I’m going to get out of here, I’m going
to get out." But things were going so well, people treating me so nice, everybody
spoke English, I felt like I was at home.
When the war was over so many GIs fell in love and stayed behind. And they
tried to open up businesses. But most of them had no experience in any type of business in
their life before. They were just out of school, most of them young fellas. Very few
lasted long. Within two or three years most of these guys were gone. A few left behind in
the little, small barrios. Very few of them made out in business because they hadn’t
any experience in business. Most of those guys who stayed behind were twenty, twenty-one,
twenty-two, twenty-four, twenty-five, like me. But I had an advantage over many of them
because I had been working all my life in my home town. I was buying and selling and
working in all kinds of stores...grocery stores, hardware... meat markets... ice plants...
logging... I did everything when I was a little kid. Newspapers, I’d sell out
newspapers. So I had a lot of background from my childhood, and that’s what helped me
a helluva lot.
[Prior to coming to the Philippines] I had a lot of experience in
machineries... [Woolbright acquired some experience from] the Coast Guard... [during] my
childhood days, my father was a machinist, [who had a] blacksmith’s shop. I learned a
lot about metals. So I started buying a lot of scrap metals, machineries, and I built
myself up a little bit.
I got to like it [living and working in the Philippines]. I got to know
the whole town. I got to know many people - men and women. I was invited to lots of
houses, parties. Seems like everybody treated me like their son. I was twenty-four years
old. So I had a ball. So I kept staying... staying... staying. At that time that [the
Philippines in 1945 and 1946] was an American possession, a commonwealth of the U.S. We
didn’t need any papers. We were just at home. We could do anything the Filipinos
could do: we could buy, sell, put up a business. So it was a great life. I got to meet
lots of great people.
Back in 1946 in July they had a big event there: that was the Independence
Day of the Philippines, we thought at that time [it would later be changed to June 12].
...We gave them independence in 1946. In Tacloban they gave out ribbons and little brass
pins. So I was there in Tacloban at the time of Independence Day, which was July 4th 1946.9
But still we [Americans] had this thing called parity rights was given out
when we lost the commonwealth right over the Philippines. They had a clause in there that
gave American citizens the right to live in the Philippines, to do business, which was
called the parity rights, until the year 1973. In 1973 Americans were to lose their rights
as Filipinos, and that’s exactly what happened. But there were a few little clauses.
... There was a law came up that said anyone in business in 1953, any alien American,
could maintain his business until death. There was a few of us, maybe five-hundred people
involved. Very few people were here. So I got that right, and I could stay in business.10
Then in 1947 I had a hardware store, a spare parts store. [Next to it] I
started the Airline Hotel and Coffee Shop. What made me open up a restaurant next
to that was during my childhood days I used to work in a drug stores, but at the soda jerk
fountain, because all drug stores practically had soda fountains. This was a come-on call;
this was advertisement for your store. So I put the coffee shop in Tacloban next to my
auto supply store, and it really boomed. I had ice cream machines. I had normal
electricity. Tacloban had brown outs all the time but I had my own generators. So it [the
restaurant] became part of me. If anybody wanted to see me or buy something from me they
would go to the Airline Hotel and Coffee Shop.
I had a big hotel of twelve rooms, and they were first class. American
beds, carpets, Simmons beds, which was the best in the United States at that time.
It was great [to work with Filipinos]. At that time it was so easy,
because I didn’t speak a word of dialect, and even now I speak very little. I know
very few words. But at that time Tacloban was like me living in the States. Practically
everybody spoke English. Because Tacloban was a place where there was a lot of old time
Americans, [those who] landed there [in the Philippines] during 1898. They [the U.S.
government] sent American schoolteachers after the Spanish -American war. The American
schoolteachers were all over the islands. Every province [had] American schoolteachers.11 They brought their families over. They [Filipinos] came up with great
English, spoke well. It was like the USA. You could just walk out and everyone was right
with you. Even the songs, music, parties... They all knew the American songs. You just
felt at home. Really at home.
[Until] 1948, 1949 Tacloban was really a lively town. Because there was a
lot of machinery, Army equipment, left behind at the bases and that was being sold, and it
was a boom in Tacloban. [It wasn’t that way] before the war. After liberation time -
‘48, ‘49, ‘50 - it got slowing down. ... And I got a lot of information
from a man named Joe Price. He was the son of one of the 1898 veterans. They had a
transportation company there in Tacloban. Joe Price used to tell me, "Eddie, things
are good here now but when the Army equipment and all its surplus are gone this is a dead
town. You should look for greener grass." He was like my father. He was about
fifty-five, sixty at that time, and I was twenty-five. He taught me a lot, and I listened
to the old man, and he was really right [about the economy in Tacloban]. In 1948, ‘49
it [business] started to slack off. So I decided to start coming to Cebu once in awhile.
And I decided to move over here to Cebu.
It was very hard for me to leave Tacloban. I knew practically everybody,
every politician, every mayor, every councilor, every school teacher. I was a Rotarian in
Tacloban. We organized the Rotary Club, and I was ten years in the Rotary in Tacloban. I
knew practically the whole city, and everybody treated me just like I was a Filipino, like
I was their son. I was invited to every party and everything in town. I was made an
honorary fire chief of Tacloban city. And I was given honors from the young girl’s
association of Tacloban. They treated me so wonderful. Then one year I was made president
of Ang Mga Bayani, a yearly event in Tacloban they celebrate. So in 1947-48 I was elected
Ang Mga Bayani president. The president he has to dance, do a few things, make a speech or
so before the group... But they treated me wonderful, and until today Tacloban has been a
wonderful place for me.
And I really hated to leave Tacloban, and I had a bunch of parties when I
moved out of Tacloban.
I came to Cebu ‘49. I transferred a lot of my equipment from
Tacloban. I put up Eddie’s Auto Supply. Next door to it I put up Eddie’s
Log Cabin Coffee Shop. I brought logs from the island of Mindanao. This was a new
building. I rented it for 500 pesos a month. Brand new concrete building. I lined it with
logs and made a coffee shop, and called it Eddie’s Log Cabin Coffee Shop. And
that coffee shop is still there: the oldest restaurant and coffee shop in town.
We [at Eddie’s Log Cabin] have all types of food and the best
waiters, the best service anywhere in Cebu. And we had the first air-conditioned coffee
shop in Cebu. Before air conditioned days in Cebu I built air conditioning for that place.
Homemade. So we had everything that you need.12
There was a place called the Suerte was there before I came into
town. It finally closed up. A few years later there was a place called the Bee Hive,
it opened up. The Bee Hive and Eddie’s is still alive, [it is] about
eight years younger than mine. The Bee Hive is still existing, it is owned by a
Spanish American woman, her name is Hazel Gonzalez. It is still going strong. She is a
great woman, she treated me like [she was my] sister.
At that time in Cebu there was probably about five-hundred Americans. All
the American companies hiring from abroad and were using American personnel. But later on
in the [19]60’s they [the Philippine government] passed a law saying that...
[personnel] had to be local Filipinos. [But] at the time [the early 1950s], when the
Americans were here, we had softball games, basketball teams, baseball teams. I played on
the baseball team. We won a lot of games.
Woolbright: There was no law really in Tacloban. In the early days
of Tacloban, see everybody had guns. Everybody protecting themselves. In Leyte [I] always
had a .45 and machine guns. I had two or three machine guns. There was a lot of robbers.
You had to protect yourself.
I had a junkyard out in the town of Palo [in Leyte south of Tacloban]. In
those days it was rough. Anyone could get a gun there... [A person needed] protection. So
I had five or six guards there with machine guns. In my house I had boxes of ammunition.
... The Hukbalahaps tried to force you to pay, give them something on the side. I always
paid them off. ... Sometimes the Hukbalahaps would come in and raid us. [Usually,
however,] they would not take money, mostly take spare parts. Every afternoon we would go
out in the yard and practice shooting revolvers and guns. It was the wild west. Our guards
would have a little firing practice every night with somebody trying to come in. Sometimes
they [the raiders] would disarm the guards. I had an armor plated jeep. ... Always had a
guy sitting with me and my German Shepherd dog. I had a German Shepherd well-trained,
sitting in my armor plated jeep.
In Tacloban there was a guy named Veralez - bandit - and a guy named
Cinco. They were both finally killed in Tacloban. They were tough guys. They would come to
my [supply] yard after dark, looking for spare parts. And they would pay me for them.
Those guys, let’s say they were gentlemen. But they were wanted by the law and
finally one of them gave up and one of them got killed by the PCs - the Philippine
Constabulary. The other one named Cinco, he didn’t get killed, and a little later on
they got him to surrender. Then they [the Philippine Constabulary] double crossed him,
Cinco, I think. He wasn’t doing anything, and they killed him. So both the guys were
killed. But I knew both of them.
But those days were right after the war. It was kind of exciting. You know
you were so young you didn’t have any fear. ... Then I came over to Cebu [and
didn’t need guns anymore]. I turned in all my guns in Leyte.
Below he gives a personal insight into the world of American-Philippine
politics, noting some of the issues and friction felt at this time.
Woolbright: [Woolbright knew the Romualdez family] very, very well.
The Romualdez family [were] very good friends of mine. ... Tacloban was a small town. I
had a restaurant. It was full all of the time. Anybody who came to Tacloban I would meet
there. That’s where I met Imelda. She was just a young kid going to school down the
street from my hotel and restaurant - about 1946. ... Imelda at that time ... she was a
young kid. She was always at an American’s party ... sixteen or seventeen years old,
she could play the piano, sing. ... Imelda was not aggressive. She was very bright in her
school days. Long black hair, very friendly. She was not really a playgirl; she was very
quiet, reserved. She never dated anyone really in Tacloban. But then she joined a beauty
contest. [She] got out and went to Manila... became a beauty contestant in [the]
"Miss Manila" [pageant]. She finally won.
The next time I saw her [in the 1960s] was up in Baguio. She saw me and
said, "Hi Eddie. I’d like you to meet my boyfriend. Ferdinand Marcos, I’d
like you to meet Eddie Woolbright, from Tacloban." [Parenthetically Woolbright says]
at that time I was living in Cebu. About three or four weeks later, she’s married!19
For an extended discussion of Woolbright’s war-time experiences see
Joseph P. McCallus, "Eddie Woolbright: a Biographical Sketch Drawn from an Oral
Narrative," Bulletin of the American Historical Collection 25, no. 3
(July-September 1997): 7-20.
4. There are numerous discussions of the Leyte landing. For a solid
historical background see M. Hamlin Cannon, The War in the Pacific: Leyte - the Return
to the Philippines (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Chief of Military History, U.S.
Army, 1954)
8. Woolbright confided to the author that he had feigned sickness a number
of times to be paid off in a port that appealed to him.
9. Under the Diosdado Macapagal administration Philippine Independence day
would be moved to June 12, the anniversary of Emilio Aguinaldo’s declaration of
Philippine sovereignty from Spain in 1898.
10. The parity law Woolbright mentions is presumably the Retail Trade
Nationalization Act, Republic Act 1180, passed in 1954 to take effect ten years later,
giving foreign businesses enough time to make the necessary developments and improvements.
This was challenged by American businesses with the Laurel-Langley agreement.
11. Woolbright is referring to the "Thomasites" and the other
American teachers who formed the colonial teaching corps.
12. The reputation of Woolbright’s Cebu establishment is formidable
and long-standing. Volume 7 (1995) of the Philippine Smile, a popular tourist
publication, notes the following: "One of the best restaurants in the city is Eddie’s
Log Cabin, opened in the 1950s [sic] has been a haven for local politicians and expats
since," 140.
19. Imelda’s days in Tacloban are described in detail in Chapter VII
("The Rose of Tacloban," 83-108) of Carmen Navarro-Pedrosa’s The Untold
Story of Imelda Marcos (Rizal, 1969).
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From Chapter Five Americans under the Marcos regime, 1972-1985
The highly personalized character of Philippine politics and the baroque
mechanisms of martial law are also demonstrated by the narrative of Eddie Woolbright.
Woolbright, finished with driving Huks from his junkyard in Leyte, had set up business in
Cebu City. Among his new ventures was the development of Beverly Hills, now Cebu
City’s premier subdivision housing the area’s elite (including Woolbright), and
his new restaurant, Eddie’s Log Cabin. The restaurant offered to Woolbright
the means to meet a wide variety of people, including many politicians. In fact, the
restaurant brought Woolbright in contact with nearly all of the country’s prominent
postwar politicians.9 It was this relationship with leading
politicians, including his long friendship with Imelda Marcos, that eventually led to a
collision with the government during martial law. Woolbright begins his narrative with a
description of his popular establishment and its clientele.
Woolbright: Everybody came there. We had morning breakfasts. The
Philippine Army [in Cebu City] would call up and they would need reservations for
breakfast for all the officers that morning. During election time I had presidents come
in, candidates for president, vice president, and a lot of those people I knew, [that] I
met many times. Even Magsaysay was there one time. Jose Garcia was there. [Ninoy] Aquino
was there. I have had a great amount of diplomats come in to Eddie’s.
Macapagal has been there. And Imelda Marcos. After Imelda there was Sergio Osmena.
Osmena, who was the governor and mayor of Cebu, he made it his office
practically. He was a great friend of mine, and we would go out, nightly we would go out,
to nice clubs, and have a ball. He had an office in Manila but he was always over there
[in Eddie’s Log Cabin]. But later on he was in that bombing in Manila [the
Plaza Miranda bombing on August 21, 1971], and he got hurt very seriously. Finally, a week
before martial law he went to the States and never came back because he was afraid of
Marcos.
But for Woolbright the high profile life with politicians brought severe
repercussions during martial law. Woolbright, who built a career on being the consummate
nice guy, ironically found himself a political prisoner.
Woolbright: I was living a great life here in Cebu. Never thought I
had an enemy in the world. Didn’t have an enemy, I suppose. So one Sunday afternoon
[in November, 1972] I got a call from the Philippine Constabulary. They said, "Mr.
Woolbright, we are having a party this afternoon. Would you please come over?"
So I said, "What time?"
He said, "Two-thirty or three o’clock."
So this was a dirty trick [played] on me. I dressed up in my barong, drove
over myself in my sports car. Parked. Walked in and said, "Where’s the
party?"
The Philippine [Constabulary] sergeant said, "Mr. Woolbright, sit
down I want to ask you a few questions." He started asking me questions.
I said, "What’s all this about? Why are you asking me
questions?"
He said, "Just answer the questions, please."
[Woolbright] couldn’t find out anything. They invited me to the
party, no one willing to arrest me. They had orders from Manila or somewhere to arrest me
for some reason for which I didn’t know. And he said, "Well, Mr. Woolbright,
I’m sorry to tell you this but this is no party, you are under arrest."
"What for?"
He said, "I don’t know."
I said, "You can’t lock me up. You can’t put me in the
stockade if you don’t know [what Woolbright is being arrested for].
He said, "Yes we can. This is martial law."
So I immediately got in touch with the American consul. The American
consul, Dan Sullivan, came over. And then the general in charge [of presumably the
Philippine Constabulary] said [to presumably the arresting officers], "Why did you do
such a dirty thing as that to call him out to a party and then lock him up? Why
didn’t you [just arrest him] last night?"
[The response was], "Well, orders were out for several days but no
one wanted to arrest Woolbright. We know who he is." And they could not tell me [why
they were arresting Woolbright].
Woolbright was taken to the stockade in Cebu with other political
prisoners. It can be assumed, however, that Woolbright’s treatment was out of the
ordinary. Whether this was because of his nationality or his local reputation it is not
certain. Despite his continued incarceration with its Kafkaesque overtones, Woolbright
carried on business, enjoying life to the fullest.
Woolbright: They treated me wonderful. I had a great life in the
stockade. My lawyer came over everyday. Most of the time the consul came every day to see
[if he was OK]. Well, we would go and talk to the general, and he still couldn’t tell
me [about the charges].
I said, "General, what if I just walked out? You have no charges
against me. So what?"
He said, "No, you can’t do that, Eddie."
I said, "Well, I’m not going to stay here if there are no
charges against me. Give me a charge and I’ll stay."
So he said, "No, I’ll let you out. You can ask for permission
for leave to go outside during the day time [in effect, a day pass]. OK. But not
everyday."
I said, "All right."
So then about every other day I went out. Go out, come back at twelve
o’clock midnight. I’d bring sinigang [soup] ... [every time he would go out of
the gate] I’d give the guard 20 pesos. I said, "Well, I’ll see you at
twelve o’clock."
Everybody was scared to death [about martial law]. I had no fear, really.
... It was a helluva lot of fun in the camp. They were very nice to me in the camp. Every
night I would send my singers down from Eddie’s and the girls would come in
and sing to the prisoners. [They would] bring me food. I ate food from Eddie’s.
... We had poker games. We’d have balut games [gambling]. There was action every once
in a while. There was no problem. But anyway, they treated me wonderful in the stockade. I
can’t say anything [negative] about that. The guys in the stockade they would do all
my work for me. I was treated like a king. Couldn’t even make up my bed; all the
people would make my bed up. I would go out every other day maybe I would bring lechon
over and give the prisoners lechon [roast pork].
I was having a lot of fun. It was a good experience.
Woolbright offers some insight into why he was arrested and how he secured
his freedom.
Woolbright: [There were] plenty, plenty [of other political
prisoners]. [The arrest] was all over Osmena, I suppose, because he and I were close
friends. And Marcos couldn’t stand Osmena. They were on fighting terms.10
But everybody was telling me, "Why don’t you ask Imelda to let
you out?" I said I don’t want to ask any favors. I don’t want to beg
anybody. She must know about it. So finally I said OK. I’ll send this cable to
Imelda. I sent Imelda a cable after about forty-five, fifty days. I said, "Imelda,
I’m here in the camp, the stockade, in Cebu. I don’t know what for, but I’m
tired. I’ve tried to adjust to this but I don’t know what I’m here for.
Please look into my case immediately."
Within two hours a cable came back [saying], "Release Woolbright from
detention."
Until today I’ve never been charged. I don’t know what I was in
for. But that’s martial law. Nobody apologized.
Woolbright was not the only political prisoner in the Cebu stockade. But
he was probably one of the very few who left his confines without a sense of bitterness or
vindictiveness. Indeed, despite the incarceration, Woolbright did not lose his sense of
friendship with and respect for Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos. In trying to ascertain the
details of his arrest, he seems to exonerate both of them.
Woolbright: Imelda didn’t put me in the stockade, she took me
out of the stockade. She’s always been a good friend of mine. ... Marcos, maybe he
didn’t know about it, either. See, you never knew what happened. Marcos was a smart
fella. He never done anything mean [to me] before. And whether he did that or not...
[maybe] he couldn’t take care of everything that was happening.
9. See Philippine Smile 7 (1995):140.
10. Gleeck’s President Marcos and the Philippine Political Culture
provides interesting accounts of the Plaza Miranda bombing and the rivalry between
Marcos and Osmena. See 76-77, 98-100, and 133.
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