House of memory

Independence Day, June 12, will come and go as it does every year. Philippine flags will be raised solemnly at historic sites and town plazas from Aparri to Jolo while most people sleep in, enjoying a public holiday that does little to remind us of the long struggle for independence many take for granted today. For close to four decades now, I have been writing on June 12, 1898, and never fail to find something new. More so, that online research yields more material than we can read and digest.

A quick search on the “Times Machine,” the digital archive of the New York Times that goes all the way back to 1851 coughs out a string of stories, 2,329 hits for “Aguinaldo,” not all of them on Emilio Aguinaldo. The Times Machine has documented Aguinaldo Roberto Gallon, a Brazilian footballer; Arnel Aguinaldo, professor of kinesiology, who has published peer-reviewed articles on baseball biomechanics, gait analysis, footwear, and sports medicine; even Roger Aguinaldo from Queens who was featured in a 2023 article on the rise of utilities and fares in New York.

Articles on Emilio Aguinaldo chronicle his long life from the time he was fighting the Philippine-American War from 1899 to his capture by the enemy in 1901, then there was a political rivalry with Manuel Luis Quezon who beat him in the race for the presidency of the Commonwealth in 1935. Articles on Aguinaldo go all the way to his death in 1964. What caught my eye in all these was a long illustrated article from 1934 “Aguinaldo Sees His Dream Coming True” by Caroline Singer who visited and interviewed Aguinaldo in Kawit where:“

His house is less a home than a private museum, a fantastic and yet infinitely touching historical museum through which the general—its spirited curator—leads a guest, speaking terse footnote in the Tagalog-Spanish patois or in Tagolo (sic), the tongue which will become the official language in 1940.”

Singer wrote that Aguinaldo was a name known, vaguely, together with Admiral George Dewey and Gen. Frederick Funston by middle-aged Americans at the time, but that he remained famous in the Philippines. Unlike many Filipinos, myself included, she was given a personal tour by Aguinaldo himself of the “rambling mansion, vaguely Spanish with its interior of polished native woods, its massive carved furniture, etched mirrors produced in bygone days by Chinese craftsmen under Spanish masters, and crystal chandeliers brought from Spain.” Then as now, the Aguinaldo mansion is impressive and rambling, with many architectural details and made-to-order furniture being visual footnotes into history. Thanks to Singer’s article, my next trip to Kawit will be to see what Aguinaldo pointed out to her.

In the “spacious drawing room that has the formality of an audience hall,” the general pointed out paintings on glass that I presume depicted Biak-na-Bato. It was there, “in a hiddle of thatched huts in a mountain stronghold … the revolutionary leaders framed the first detailed plans for a Philippine republic.” Battle scars dot the mansion’s walls. “A Spanish bullet remains embedded in the wall beside the carved head of a bed in the room then occupied by the general’s mother.” When pointed out to visitors today this bullet is embedded in General and Mrs. Aguinaldo’s bedroom, not that of Trinidad Famy, the general’s mother, the very same woman of steel who watched the assassination of Gen. Antonio Luna in Cabanatuan to its bloody end and asked, “Nagalaw pa ba iyan?” There is a depiction of a train that took Aguinaldo from Biak-na-Bato to Pangasinan where he boarded a steamer to exile in Hong Kong, then there is another window with Dewey’s flagship “Olympia.”

Of course, there are references to the “Independence Balcony,” actually a later addition to the house. The Declaration of Independence was read from a window of the house facing the crowd on the street. According to Singer, “The declaration was drafted in a smoking room of the Aguinaldo mansion, its walls covered today with pictures of the men—few of them now alive—who participated in its framing.” The Independence Balcony is supported by a carabao who was described by Aguinaldo as “Humble and patient but terrible in its wrath, our native caribou (sic) typifies the Filipino masses.” I have not noticed if there are two cannons at the foot of the carabao carrying the weight of the Independence Balcony because in 1934 there were two: a Spanish cannon, dated 1856, presented to Aguinaldo by the United States Army in 1928, the other cannon presented by the US Navy.

Before the writer left, Aguinaldo pointed out two more important items: painted windows by the dining depicting Filipinas in native costume, “Our women were heroic. They prepared the food for their men under fire and died like soldiers.” At the far end of the drawing room was a bench Aguinaldo called the “Seat of Justice” that had a commanding view of the great living room and the Independence Balcony.

I was lucky to have Linda Aguinaldo, the general’s grandniece, giving me a tour on my first visit in the 1980s, and on each visit since I have learned new things. Emilio Aguinaldo’s mansion with its art, artifacts, and secret passages is a house of memory, a structure that evokes Philippine history that we should remember every day and not just on June 12, Independence Day.

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