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CEBU CUSTOM HOUSE. The government has reportedly approved the conversion of the Malacañang sa Sugbo or the Cebu Custom House into a national museum. In this archival photo, the Custom House is shown after a strong storm hit Cebu in 1912. The structure was built in 1910.

The building served as Aduana or Custom House until it was converted into Malacañang sa Sugbo during her term. (This photo is from the Cebuano Studies Center of the University of San Carlos)

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Skip the line by ordering from Bo’s ahead through its Facebook Messenger chatbot.

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Try the cashless and digital convenience of paying for your purchase using PayMaya.

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Add this to your bucket list: go camping on the beach in Basdako or Basdaku, Saavedra, Moalboal. Badako offers one of the best white sand beaches in the whole of Cebu.

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OLD CEBU ARCHBISHOP PALACE. This photo taken in 1915 by Galileo Medalle shows the old Cebu Archbishop Palace fronting the Cebu Cathedral before it was transferred to its present site on D. Jakosalem St. The site you see above is now occupied by "Patria de Cebu." (Photo used with permission from the Cebuano Studies Center of the University of San Carlos)

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Best Trafficman of the Year 1930. This photo shows a policeman on a traffic stand on Colon Street in 1930. At left is Vision Theater. Beside that building are cars of the now defunct Checkered Cab while next to the theatre was the house of the late Don Sergio Osmeña, now occupied by the Eden Theatre. Further down the road to the right was the Oriente Theatre. Fronting the Vision Theater was the Cebu Lunch which was one of the most popular eateries in those years. The trafficman in this photo is Pio Alo, who was named Best Trafficman of the Year in 1930. (PHOTO USED WITH PERMISSION BY THE CEBUANO STUDIES CENTER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF SAN CARLOS) 

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Bolocboloc, Barili 1927

This photo taken on December 17, 1927 shows a swimming pool in Bolocboloc, Barili. The photo is part of the Jose Ma. Cuenco Collection and is used in this site with permission from the Cebuano Studies Center.

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Pari-an fire station, 1920 and now

This photo taken in 1920 shows the headquarters of the Cebu Fire Department “located at the Plaza Parian near the spot where the old Parian Church used to stand,” according to the Cebuano Studies Center. The photo below shows the current Pari-an fire sub-station (which is no longer the original building) on the same spot. A marker on the station indicates it was built in 1954. In the Pari-an area are markers with QR or quick response codes that you can scan with your phone to download information (and old photographs) about the heritage structures. The project is a collaboration among Smart Communications, Inc., Department of Tourism, Cebu City Government and InnoPub Media. The photo above, which is part of the Medalle Collection, is used in this site with permission.

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Compañia Maritima: then and now

Fernandez Building, more known by its locators Shamrock Hotel and Compañia Maritima, was built on reclaimed land at waters' edge. It was built in 1910 and was owned by Fernandez Hermanos Inc. 

Although at times spelled Compania or Compaña Maritima, archaeologist and conservationist Jobers Bersales and sources at the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc. said the actual spelling is Compañia Maritima.

The structure was printed in postcards published as advertisements by the Shamrock Hotel. The photo on top is part of the Lucy Urgello-Miller collection.

Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama said he will put up glass mosaics of historic sites in Cebu on windows in the structure by December.

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Opon Church, 1910

This photo from the Cebuano Studies Center shows the old Opon Church in 1910.

Oponganons revere the Virgen de Regla or our Lady Of the Rule. 

Lucy Urgello Miller, in “Glimpses of Old Cebu: Images of the Colonial Era,” wrote that this church’s first parish priest way back in 1735 brought with him an original painting of the Nuestra Señora Virgen de Regla from Africa.

The priest – Augustinian friar Francis Avalle – used this painting to teach people about her and as basis for the religious icon of the Patroness of the Rule that he commissioned also in 1735.

The Virgen was housed in the church in Opon (present day Lapu-Lapu City) that was, according to Miller, built between 1735 and 1744. It had  a pathway of coral blocks that led to the sea during the early days. The structure is near Muelle Osmeña, a Spanish structure that now serves as docking area for passenger ferries plying the cities of Lapu-Lapu and Cebu.

Originally built from coral blocks, Miller said, this church was damaged but not badly during World War II and repairs brought it back to its original condition. It would have been among the oldest churches in the country if Dutch priests assigned there in 1960 had not decided to tear it down and build a new one in its place. They spared the nearby convent built in 1885 that is connected to the church to an arched gateway. (Photo used with permission from the Cebuano Studies Center)

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Cebuano women, 1910

This photo from the Cuenco Collection shows a group of Cebuano women in 1910. (Cebuano Studies Center photo, used with permission)

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This1936 photo of Carbon Market is part of the Lucy Urgello Miller collection. It's on display in Museo Sugbo.

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Lapu-Lapu Statue in Opon: then and now

At left is a 1939 photo of the statue of Lapu-Lapu that showed him holding a bow and arrow aiming at the Opon Municipal Hall a few meters away. Opon is the old name of Lapu-Lapu City. Locals blamed the statue for the untimely deaths of many of Opon's town mayors. A mayor ordered the replacement of the bow and arrow with what historian Jobers Bersales described as "a fictitious caveman's club (or a pestle as some would also erroneously call it---as if he had a mortar and was about to pound rice, eh?)."

Bersales, host of the Kabilin show over Sugbo TV, said Lapulapu's weapon of choice at the time was "a "Kampilan" or what we Bisayans call a "Talibong" and a bamboo lance or even an iron-tipped spear, when he and his men went to battle with the overconfident Ferdinand Magellan."

For more photos like this, you can follow Kabilin's Facebook page here.

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Virgen dela Regla pilgrim

Billy Morales, 50, has been coming to the the Virgen dela Regla parish for 20 years now. The blind person from Leyte plays a makeshift single-string instrument cobbled together from bits of wood. He uses an empty bottle of liniment as guitar slide.

Billy says he comes to Lapu-Lapu every fiesta as "panaad" or religious vow to the Lady of the Rule. He prays for "grasya nga mabuhi." On a slow day, he gets P100 in alsm. During the fiesta, he can get up to P1,000 from generous churchgoers.  

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Japanese War Propaganda

Copies of Visayan Shinbun on display in the World War II gallery of Museo Sugbo. For details, you can check the museum's Facebook page.

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Vicente Sotto: Father of Cebuano Letters

Vicente Sotto published Ang Suga, the first paper in Cebuano, in 1901 to 1911. According to the book "Cebu more than an island," he also published the first Cebuano short story, Maming, in Ang Suga.

"He preached and practiced the writing of narratives attuned to the times instead of exotic and idealized romance stories of the corrido that his audience had a surfeit of," according to the book.

A photo of Sotto and a copy of Ang Suga is on exhibit in Museo Sugbo, a museum housed in the old Carcel de Cebu or the Cebu Provincial Jail.

Sotto is the main author of the Press Freedom Law or the Sotto Law, which also protects journalists from being compelled to name their news sources. Sotto is the grandfather of the controversial Senator Vicente Sotto III.

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Vision Theater, 1945

This photo shows Vision Theater on Colon Street amid the ruins of World War II. The photo, which is part of the Medalle Collection, was taken in 1945. Writer Erlina Alburo said in the book "Cebu more than an island" that after the war, movies were a favorite pastime of Cebuanos. The boom in movie production, however, ended at the close of the 1950s. Today, the movies you'll find in Vision Theater are in pirated DVDs. (Photo used with permission of the Cebuano Studies Center)