TRAVELS (and more) WITH CECILIA BRAINARD: My Father, Mariano Flores Manguerra

Thursday, April 21, 2022

My Father, Mariano Flores Manguerra

I'm sharing pictures of my father, MARIANO FLORES MANGUERRA. My father was from Laguna, and he taught for many years as a Professor of Civil Engineering at the University of the Philippines. When World War Two broke out, he brought his family (Concepcion Cuenco Manguerra, my mother, and their two young children) to Mindanao where he joined the guerrilla movement. After the war, and because Manila was almost totally destroyed, my parents settled in Cebu. He was a district engineer and a private contractor.
There were many things I do not know about my father because he died when I was young, and one of this was this: in 1947, he had been Acting Mayor of Cebu.
The article by Clarence Paul Oaminal, published in the Freeman, 12/19/16 has more information.

https://www.philstar.com/the-freeman/opinion/2016/12/19/1654874/engr-mariano-f-manguerra-cebu-city-acting-mayor

The group photo with Papa (seated, 4th from left) shows him with members of the Tau Alpha fraternity of UP Engineering, which lists him as "Adviser." I always understood he co-founded this fraternity, and even now, Tau Alpha members remember him.
The solo photo of him was when he was a young man.
When he was in his early twenties, he went to Valparaiso University in Indiana to study civil engineering.

Tags: Cebu politics, Cebu society, Cebu personalities, Laguna personalities

Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

Cecilia Manguerra Brainard's official website is ceciliabrainarddotcom. She is the award-winning author and editor of 22 books, including When the Rainbow Goddess Wept, The Newspaper Widow, Magdalena, Selected Stories, Vigan and Other Stories, and more. She edited Growing Up Filipino 1, 2, & 3, Fiction by Filipinos in America, Contemporary Fiction by Filipinos in America, and other books.. Her work has been translated into Finnish and Turkish; and many of her stories and articles have been widely anthologized. Cecilia has received many awards, including a California Arts Council Fellowship in Fiction, a Brody Arts Fund Award, a Special Recognition Award for her work dealing with Asian American youths, as well as a Certificate of Recognition from the California State Senate, 21st District, and the Outstanding Individual Award from her birth city, Cebu, Philippines. She has lectured and performed at UCLA, USC, University of Connecticut, University of the Philippines, PEN, Shakespeare & Company in Paris, and many others. She has served in the Board of literary arts groups such as PEN, PAWWA (Pacific Asian American Writers West), among others.