By Danilo P. Padua, PhD
The tobacco monopoly imposed in the Philippines on May 5, 1781, more than mining or anything else, pushed Valle de Benguet into national consciousness. The decision of the then Spanish Gov. Gen. Jose Blanco to send punitive expeditions into areas illegally producing tobacco, the Valle being the main target, is a recognition of the Valle’s growing importance in local commerce. The place was not yet even under the tutelage of the Spanish colonial government that time.
The expeditions, led initially by Lt. Col. Guillermo Galvey (from 1829-1839), clearly show that Valle de Benguet (now La Trinidad) produced good quality tobacco. It’s easy to deduce that good, thriving agricultural practices were already in place, even without the supervision of the Spaniards. This was very evident by what Galvey saw when he first arrived in the area: a community of 2,000 inhabitants, 500 houses made of pine wood surrounded by wide fields of gabi, sweet potato and sugarcane that were irrigated.
Galvey immediately fell in love with the place, saw its strategic importance, and thereby strongly proposed that it will become the “Cabecera” of a district to be established. It is his high road– a dream.
In 1836, Galvey was part of a 4-man team to draw up an action plan to establish Spain’s authority in the Cordillera, to be presaged by the creation of four comandancias politico militares: Benguet, Mancayan, Abra and Cagayan. The conceived plan did not materialize due to, among others, tribal resistance, inclement weather, and disease occurrences. Col. Galvey, who was never married, died in 1839 at the age of 40.
Seven years after Galvey’s death in 1846, a military detachment called Fort San Luis Beltran, was established in Valle de Benguet. In the same year, the military Distrito de Benguet with Valle de Benguet as its capital, was created making it the first permanent Spanish settlement in the Cordillera highlands. With this development, many agricultural projects were pursued. The production of sub-tropical vegetables such as potato, beans, peas, carrot, cabbage, and turnips started during this time. What they produced were mainly transported to Manila for consumption by Europeans. Commercial vegetable gardening in Benguet is therefore of Hispanic origin debunking the claim of a departed Filipino-Chinese who told me that it was the Chinese who introduced the growing of semi-temperate crops in the country.
According to the book (The Cordillera Valley of La Trinidad…) of James N. Paw, the district was initially administered from Agoo but it became a full-pledged comandancia in 1854. When La Union became a full-pledged province in 1860, Valle de Benguet became its capital one year later, emphasizing the great importance that the Valle had assumed in the scheme of things.
The name Valle de Benguet was used from 1755 to 1874. In 1875, it was changed to La Trinidad by the then military governor of Benguet, Don Manuel Scheidnagel y Serra. It was not Galvey who bestowed the name La Trinidad, in honor purportedly of his wife. He was never married, and wasn’t known to have a girlfriend named Trinidad. Anyway, the name was given to the town, 36 long years after Galvey’s death. Scheidnagel found the name change necessary to differentiate the town from the province as both sporting the same name tags. It was to reduce confusion.
A plausible source of the name is the fact that Santissima Trinidad or Holy Trinity was an important inspiration among Spanish explorers. It is not far-fetched then for an explorer to bestow that name in a favored place of their exploration. An even more believable inspiration for giving the name is the presence of three small hills overlooking the poblacion.
Don Manuel Scheidnagel’s tenure was a great time for La Trinidad, as it was during this time that La Trinidad started to assume an urbanized and cosmopolitan character. Many Spanish nationals, other European sojourners, Ilocanos, and a few Chinese started to settle and set up shop there. Scheidnagel did wonderful things for La Trinidad. He built a government tribunal, a jail, a school, a teacher’s residence, a military barrack, an armory and a parade ground among others. He even established a botanical garden to classify rare plants and their usefulness. Systematic botanical and agricultural investigations were obviously already in progress in La Trinidad by the 1870s. He also started an earnest move to mainstream or integrate the Igorots with lowlanders, as he said the latter were not richer than the former.
Scheidnagel imported Ilocano teachers to serve as the first teachers in La Trinidad. It is not difficult to understand that early on, La Trinidad was dominated by non-Igorots. For his contribution to local agriculture, Scheidnagel is best remembered for bringing coffee not only to La Trinidad but also to the entire province of Benguet, including the present Mountain Province. The Spaniards also introduced other crops such as citrus, grapes, cacao, and tea.
Before they left the Philippines in 1898, La Trinidad was already a place of cultural diversity, populated by Spaniards, some other Europeans and a few Chinese but most of the inhabitants were Igorots and Ilocano migrants.
The Spaniards had also recognized the importance of La Trinidad as a health re-invigorating place for people. They therefore built a sanatorium where sick people (some even coming from the Visayas region), mainly those who coulc afford, from the lowlands came for healing and recovery. Soldiers and officials were also regular clients. A study was made and a plan was crafted for a bigger sanatorium but they thought it would be best to build it in present-day Baguio. This was never concretized by them because of the arrival of the Americans. Their plan, however, was used by the next nation grabbers for the same purpose thereby helping make Baguio develop into what it is today.
It is safe to say that La Trinidad, and of course Baguio, played a pivotal role in nation building in the Philippines due to its agriculture and its being a health resort for convalescing officials, soldiers, and other prominent persons.**
