The San Francisco Filipino community traces its roots back to the early 1900s when thousands of single Filipino men arrived, primarily as merchant seamen, cannery workers, and farmworkers. By the 1920s, nearly 40,000 Filipinos lived in San Francisco. This population was largely confined to an area known as Manilatown (named after Manila, the Philippine capital), the setting of Lakas and the Manilatown Fish / Si Lakas at ang Isdang Manilatown. In their early history in San Francisco, Filipinos weren't allowed to own property or live anywhere else in the city. As a result, they stayed in boardinghouses or hotels, such as the International Hotel, which became the heart of the San Francisco Filipino community. In 1977 the International Hotel was the site of a major civil rights demonstration to try to prevent elderly tenants from being evicted. Ultimately, the hotel was demolished, but in its place remains the hope that an even stronger community will arise and preserve the proud heritage of the manongs who lived there. (For more information about the history of Filipinos in San Francisco see the Resources page of this document.)

Filipino American

Neighborhoods:
immigrant communities; community members and their roles; neighborhood institutions (places for people to gather)

Family:
single-parent families; extended-family networks; relationships

Fantasy / Reality:
dreams; imagination; distinguishing fantasy from reality / fiction from fact

	Anthony D. Robles was born and raised in San Francisco, California. He has also lived in Orlando, Florida, and Waipahu, Hawaii, but says that wherever he traveled, he always “had Chinatown in [his] belly and hot sauce in [his] veins.” Robles describes himself as “just a poet a job can't hold down.” His poetry has appeared in numerous journals and magazines, including DisOrient Journalzine, Pinoy Poetics, The Asian Pacific American Journal, and the anthology of Filipino American writing Seven-Card Stud and Seven Manangs Wild (2002). Lakas and the Manilatown Fish is Robles's first book for children. The book was inspired by Robles's own son, Lakas, to whom he first told the tale as a bedtime story, and his uncle, poet Al Robles, one of the original Manilatown manongs. Anthony Robles writes that “sometimes we get lost in life looking for things, chasing things that give us nothing—that drive us further from our community. I think that the fish in the story takes us on a journey back into the past, a journey into our community . . . back to who we are.” Robles hopes that children who read the book will learn that imagination is one of the important things in their lives.
	Carl Angel is a painter and illustrator whose work is exhibited in galleries and museums throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. He was born in Bainbridge, Maryland, in 1968, and was raised in Hawaii. He attended the California College of Arts and Crafts and the Academy of Art College in San Francisco, California, and now lives in Oakland, California. As an artist, Carl Angel's focus is on storytelling and on symbolism and its relationship to the human condition, both social and spiritual. He says his first objective as an illustrator “is to serve the writer's vision and capture the spirit of the narrative.” For Lakas and the Manilatown Fish, “the story allowed for a more lyrical painting style, a more outrageous color palette, and for the compositions to have more movement.” He wants the book to be a starting point for children to learn that there once was a bustling, vibrant Manilatown, and also about the humor in Filipino culture. He hopes that after reading the book, children will want to explore their cities, and learn that stories are created through appreciation of heritage and history. Carl Angel has done numerous painting exhibitions, usually based on a theme, such as Filipino mythology, racism in America, religion and spirituality in Oakland, and the Philippine-American War. In addition to Lakas and the Manilatown Fish, Carl Angel has also illustrated and designed many other books for children and adults.
	Lucille Tenazas, head of San Francisco–based Tenazas Design, was born and raised in Manila. She was educated in graphic design and practiced as a graphic designer in the Philippines before coming to the United States in 1979 to further her education at the California College of Arts and Crafts. She received her MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan and worked for several years in New York for Harmon Kemp, Inc., before returning to the West Coast. The recipient of the National Design Award in Communication Design, she was recently the first woman and West Coast–based president of the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) and is currently the chair of the MFA program at California College of Arts and Crafts.