Filipino American History

In 1763 Filipino Seamen established a settlement in what is now known as Louisiana. The Spanish-American War made American "nationals" of Filipinos and from the early 1900s through 1935 both Filipino men and women were free to enter the United States as long as they had the price of a boat ticket.
Waiting to be told are the stories of the descendants of those "Spanish colonial" seamen, early workers in sugar plantations of Hawaii, men who served in the U.S. Navy since World War One, women who came in the 1920s and 1930s, ambitious and aspiring college students, eager young workers - who toiled in Alaska canneries, farms in California, Arizona, Washington and Montana, the railroads, kitchens and restaurants, as postal workers or houseboys, the American-born second generation of pre-World War Two days, war brides, and countless others who constitute the subsequent groups of immigrants from the Philippines.
Stories of Depression, riots and discrimination, vignettes of dance halls, gambling and the other "leisure time" activities, the lodges, churches and organized Filipino communities, the process of acculturation, and the value of family are some of the information FANHS has been collecting and sharing. This is just the beginning of the telling of the Filipino American Experience. There is much more to research and appreciate, especially the eras of the Third Wave of Immigration of Filipinos to the U.S. from 1945 to 1965 and the Fourth Wave starting in 1965. On-going research and new revelations, plus exciting discoveries, continue.