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Asian Migration and Global Cities

Anne Cong-Huyen, Jonathan Young Banfill, Katherine Herrera, Samantha Ching, Natalie Yip, Thania Lucero, Randy Mai, Candice Lau, Authors
Migration and Moving Forward, page 2 of 2
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Eliseo Felipe



Eliseo Mateo Felipe didn't actually stop at Angel Island upon arriving in America from the Philippines. Deemed an American "national" according to dictates following the U.S. 1989 victory in Spanish-American War, he was able to travel freely to and within the United States. Often coming through Hawaii, many Filipinos, particularly men, took advantage of the 1903 Pensionado Act, which sponsored their education, to study in the mainland. Mr. Felipe represents one among approximately 18,000 Filipino repatriates who traveled to the mainland in search of work in agricultural fields or fisheries.1


Though coming at the height of anti-Filipino sentiment stemming from European-American workers' Great Depression-fueled prejudice, Mr. Felipe was able to pass through to San Francisco in 1933 without anyone stopping him. Mr. Felipe exclaims, "When I landed in San Francisco, I just get off the boat! I was the only Filipino on Market Street seen wandering around down there" as photographs of the San Francisco ferry building and Market Street appear on screen. 



Highly motivated at nineteen-years-old, Mr. Felipe asked his father's permission to go to the States in order to help his family, who were living in destitution doing back-breaking labor in the Philippines. With his father's blessing, Mr. Felipe migrated, found work as a farmhand, and began sending small amounts of money to his family.



After vacationing to the Philippines in part to share his success in the Land of Opportunity, he found himself detained at the immigration station at Angel Island. Under the new 1934 Tydings-McDuffie Act, his status went from "national" to "alien." Nevertheless, his records of work in the U.S. afforded him release soon after. 



In 1941 came World War II and with it, the drafting of "every swinging Filipino in the whole U.S. to Canada" -- though many immigrants enlisted to gain U.S. citizenship or, in the case of native-born ethnic and racial minorities, to prove that they were as American as anyone. Mr. Felipe came to serve in the federal armed forces for over thirty-five years, eventually settling in Salinas, California, with his wife and their four children.



Similarly to Tyrus Wong's profile, the video closes by wishing Mr. Felipe a happy (100th!) birthday. He is still gardening. 



By Samantha Ching

1 “Immigration from the Philippines.” Pacific Link. KQED. 2014. Web. 21 Mar 2014

Media Credit: The Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation (AIISF) via YouTube

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