Liloan - The Light of the North

BRIEF SUMMARY

Located just 19 kilometers away from Cebu’s capital city, Liloan is a first class municipality that is aiming to join the list of Philippine cities.

Both residents and visitors alike are enjoying Liloan’s peaceful and quiet atmosphere.

Liloan was a destination where visitors would flock to its beaches, come to see the scenery, and enjoy the clean air. Now thousands of people from other towns are drawn to Liloan because of its active livelihood, and various jobs fair.

It has a rapidly growing population being served by rural banks, two telecommunications offices, a college and 60 other educational facilities, as well as small and medium businesses, like hardware and grocery stores.

Employment in private and government offices is the major source of income for families. Others are into livestock, marginal fishing and farming.

Liloan is home to pottery makers as well as makers of different kinds of furniture. It also has the Titay’s Rosquillos which was founded more than 100 years ago.

Its church, with San Fernando Rey as its patron, dates back to 1847. Liloan also has two other parishes, one in Cotcot and the other in Yati.

A famous landmark for Liloan is the lighthouse built in 1904, during the American period.

Well-known Liloan-born personalities are Pilar Pilapil, a beauty queen-turned movie actress and Democrito Mendoza, president of the Associated Labor Union-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines.

Aside from its efforts to become a city, Liloan now envisions being the first town in Cebu, or perhaps in the country, to have access to internet from all its barangays, even in the mountains.

Liloan is even more accessible from the airport and seaports because of the construction of the North Coastal Road, a major road artery which cuts travel time to the north.

ROSQUILLOS FESTIVAL

For many decades now, people have always associated rosquillos with the northern Cebu town of Liloan.

Thus it only follows that in answering to Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia’s call for each town to have its own festival to celebrate local product or culture, Rosquillos Festival it should be.

The making of these little ringlet cookies date back to April 3, 1907, when the then 21-year-old Margarita “Titay” Frasco was tinkering in her kitchen with her baking ingredients and made her new culinary creation.

Kneading the dough manually and using a wooden eggbeater, some baking tins and a clay oven, little did the 21-year-old know that she was starting a product that would put her little town in the national and international map of gastronomic delight.

The market for her unnamed cookie started with her neighbors and passersby who were offered the snack as a freebie for every purchase of a bottle of soda. It was then Cebu governor Sergio Osmeña, who later became Philippine president, who gave it the name rosquillos after the Spanish word rosca.

As years passed, people going to northern Cebu have made it a habit to drop by her store to buy the rosquillos. It is also a known fact that those who couldn’t visit Cebu would ask friends who are in Cebu to buy some for them.

Rosquillos have become a household name, a product that is aptly celebrated in a festival that Liloan could call its very own.

SAN FERNABDO REY PARISH CHURCH

One of the oldest standing heritage structures in Liloan is the Church of Saint Ferdinand, King of Spain, the fiesta of which is celebrated every May 29 and 30.

The church, although a religious structure, has also been a source of local folklore. Told from generation to generation of Liloan families is the story of how a giant sea creature guards a treasure of gold in a cave under the altar.

Supposedly proof of the cave existing underneath the church, according to the elderly, is the hollow sound one will get upon tapping the altar. Depending on whose version or who’s telling the story, the giant sea creature could either be a huge red-eyed octopus, a giant fish, or a large half-fish half-human. Also, there are claims that a local fisherman was brave enough to go to the cave, the opening of which is supposedly a few meters from the seashore.

There are also old stories of St. Elmo’s fire seen roaming the back of the church.

The parish was established in Aug 23, 1844 through a government decree and was completely separated from the Saint Joseph Parish of Mandaue on Jan. 27, 1845.

Data from the parish’s book of accounts reveal that Mandaue then gave P100 as support for the newly erected parish. Materials for the church came from as far as Hindang, Leyte and Camotes islands and were brought to Liloan through rafts. Window shutters made of glass were purchased from Barcelona, Spain. Seven recollect priests supervised the entire construction on different lengths of time.

Fr. Vicente de los Dolores, an Agustinian Recollect priest started officiating baptism on Feb. 22, 1845. The first native to be baptized was a certain Maria Catalina, daughter of spouses Rufino Bernabe and Maria Roventa.

The San Fernando Rey Parish Church is the only Catholic Church in the entire Cebu island which is facing the west.

HISTORY

There are no documents available at the Liloan Municipal Hall or any public library that mentions a specific date on its establishment as a town. It was written that Liloan was once a part of Mandaue. But because of the absence of documents, conflicting claims exist on the specific date of separation.

An earlier article on the municipal profile mentioned 1840 as the date of the town’s founding, with a population of around 5,000. A Capitan Pedro was mentioned as the first appointed capitan municipal, followed by Capitan Juan Delgado, Capitan Antonio Villamor, Capitan Doroteo Pilapil, Capitan Simeon Pilapil, Capitan Santiago Noval, Mamerto Cabatingan, and Custodio Mendoza.

But the historical data paper on Liloan cited 1845 as the year Liloan separated from Mandaue. The Bantilan, Pepito, Cabahug, Canete, and Delgado families were supposedly the ones who initiated Liloan’s independence from Mandaue. A list of municipal mayors showed a Basilio Bantilan heading the town from 1845 to 1846, followed by Hipolito Pepito (1846-1847), Francisco Cabahug (1847-1848), Esteban Canete (1848-1849, 1850-1851, 1852-1853) and Juan Delgado (1849-1850).

During the second World War or in 1941, Liloan had three mayors: Catalino Noval (who served until 1946), Pascual Delgado (appointed by the Japanese) and Jose Canete (appointed by the guerilla forces). The mayor who served the most number of years was Lazaro Ramas (1928-1937; 1937-1938; 1938-1941; 1963-1965).

Books on the early history of Cebu state August 23, 1844 as the organization of Liloan as a parish separate from Mandaue through a Superior Decree, with San Fernando Rey de Espana as its patron saint. In Jan. 27, 1845, a decree from the Bishop of Cebu confirmed Liloan’s status as a parish.