Six years after the Americans arrived in Davao region, nothing very little, if any, had changed when it comes to Davao’s town proper, which was a mesh of blocks and streets.
A 1904 map of Davao sketched by Rev. Robert Franklin Black, the first Protestant minister in the region, showed only three major thoroughfares, namely: Claveria (now C.M. Recto), San Pedro, and Magallanes (then unnamed but now known as Antonio Pichon Sr.).
Except for San Pedro Street, which is named after a patron saint, all the other roads, including Legaspi and Anda, were named after Spanish personalities. Only Nueva Street (later Bolton and now Paciano Bangoy) was not; given its name, it was a newly-opened road, i.e. nueva.
Two unnamed roads are visible in the map and they correspond to today’s Rizal and Bonifacio streets, both names after the two famous national heroes. Oyanguren Street (now Magsaysay) was already in existence at the time as a trail but still without a name.
Some of the details in the Rev. Frank’s map rectify the accepted information we know today. For instance, the original City Hall (cited as city even if Davao was still a town) was built on the lot where the Sangguniang Panlungsod stands, which is just across San Pedro Cathedral.
The present Rizal Park and City Hall premises were then used as parade ground. Across it, just beside the Crooked Road where the Unitop supermarket thrives, was Rev. Black’s residence. Decades later, the first Protestant Church in the city was built in an adjacent area.
Curiously, the City Hall Drive, as we call it, was already opened as short route. Nobody knows who conceived the idea but this former trail remains to this day.
At the back of the parade grounds, across Magallanes Street, was the Post Office and beside it the new Burchfield House where Rev. Brown first resided as a lease. This area is at corer Bolton-Magallanes where a library hub and Magallanes Elementary School are situated. Capt. James L. Burchfield was a retired U.S. Army volunteer who became a plantation owner.
Rev. Black also owned a lot at corner San Pedro and Legaspi streets, in an area where the old Men Seng Hotel and Red Ribbon branch stand.
The original Davao Mission Hospital, which all along we through to have been built on the site where the Grand Men Seng now exists, was actually in the area across the old Philippine Constabulary headquarters (now Camp Domingo Leonor). It was the bigger and more improved sickbay that was actually constructed at Magallanes Street.
The areas where the Land Transportation Office (LTO) and Felcris Centrale are found were “cocoa palms.” Cocoa refers to cocoanuts, which was how coconuts were then called by the early American settlers in town.
On the other hand, the town’s slaughterhouse, now at Ma-a, was originally built at an area at the Mabini Street area, which was accessed by the sea during high tide. The street was then a marsh that was linked to a tributary that opened to the gulf.
Beyond the site of the abattoir was the designated pier, which not too far away from the delta of the Davao River; it was later moved to the upper section where Santa Ana pier now exists. The new wharf was developed into a concrete quay in 1908.
As Rev. Brown’s map suggested, there were already residences and bodegas lined up at the original anchorage that was facing Davao Gulf before the transfer was made.
Interestingly, areas on the northern side of San Pedro Street between Legaspi, Ilustre, and Quirino streets, were all rice lands, and the areas where University of Mindanao and People’s Park were entered in the map as “public lands.”
There are interesting details in the map worth citing. For instance, along Claveria Street, from the area where the Philippine National Bank now stands to the road’s end on the right, there were fourteen buildings, while on the other side there were fifteen residences.
San Pedro area, like Magallanes and Legaspi, were then sparsely populated with structures. The number of houses at Anda Street was only six. There were already small settlements at Bankerohan long before the Gov. Generoso Bridge was even planned.
The town’s Roman Catholic cemetery was situated at the end of Magallanes Street in an area peripheral to where the University of Immaculate Conception (UIC) now stands.
Beyond the school was a “hill” which fits the description of Madapo Hills at Wireless, where the flourishing Brokenshire Integrated Health Ministries, Inc. (the forerunner of Rev. Brown’s Davao Mission Hospital) buildings stand.
Now as a bustling highly-urbanized city, Davao’s geographical landscape has completely changed. The areas along the riverbanks and the coastlines, which were pristine and unpopulated, have now become informal settlement hubs.
Surely, Rev. Brown’s sketched map, which is a legacy, has afforded us a historical appreciation on how the city’s central business district look liked over a century ago.
(Sketch copy courtesy of Dr. Evelyn Tan-Requiza who got it from Houghton Library in Harvard University.)
