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Taguig History, Philippines

A City on the Fore

A city with a 2020 vision is the thrust of the residents of Taguig and this is apparent everywhere you go in the city, especially in the area of Fort Bonifacio. But it wasn’t always this way, like all cities, there are humble beginnings and the city of Taguig is no exception to this fact. This is the story of how this up and coming city grew into a highly urbanized area of Metro Manila.

The Kingdom of Tondo

The early residents of Taguig were rice threshers and back then the city belonged to the Kingdom of Tondo. Archaeological findings have also put Chinese settlers as one of the city’s early inhabitants as evidence by artifacts like glasses, teacups and other porcelain materials with Chinese characters in recent diggings around the area.

Encomienda del Tondo

The Spaniards reached the city in 1571 and had officially ordered Taguig to be part of the Encomienda del Tondo from 1582 to 1583 which was led by Alcalde Mayor, Captain Vergara. The citizens of Taguig were the first to be baptized into Christianity by the Augustinian friars during this time. It was four years later that this city was considered a separate town apart from Manila and was led by Captain Juan Basi for a year.

During the Spanish rule, the city was known to produce rice and its residents made a living by fishing and weaving cotton cloth and “sawali” from bamboo strips.

Fort McKinley

When the Americans took over the country from the Spaniards, the city was declared an independent municipality in the year 1900. A year later Taguig was incorporated into the province of Rizal. But it was in 1918 that the city eventually became an independent municipality.

During the time of the Americans, a portion of the land of Taguig was acquired by the U.S. Government for military use and named this area as Fort McKinley in memory of the 25th president of the United States, William McKinley.

Forward Taguig

At the end of the American regime, Fort McKinley was turned over back to the Philippines and to the city of Taguig and it became the permanent headquarters of the Philippine Army in 1957. It changed its name to Fort Bonifacio after Andres Bonifacio, considered to be the father of Philippine revolution, whose father happens to be a native of Taguig.

In the year 1975, the city of Taguig became part of the National Capital Region, which meant this city became one of the seventeen municipalities that form Metro Manila.

Thirteen years later a bill was passed in Congress to make Taguig into a city but the results of a vote by its residents show that they were against this act. In 2004, a move was made to recount these votes. It was then discovered that the citizens were actually for, and not against, the cityhood of their municipality and Taguig finally became a city officially on December 8, 2004.