Claro Candelario (born 1905) was a Filipino

labor leader A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...

of the early 1940s to the mid-1960s.

Biography

Claro Candelario was born in 1905 in

San Fernando, La Union San Fernando, officially the City of San Fernando (; ), is a component city and the capital of the province of La Union, Philippines. It serves as the regional and administrative center of the Ilocos Region. The city also functions as a hub ...

, to a poor family. A good student, he excelled in school and, after two years of high school, worked for the superintendent of schools. He later to

Manila Manila, officially the City of Manila, is the Capital of the Philippines, capital and second-most populous city of the Philippines after Quezon City, with a population of 1,846,513 people in 2020. Located on the eastern shore of Manila Bay on ...

for work, where he attended the

Philippine Normal School The Philippine Normal University (PNU; ) is a public coeducational teacher education and research university in the Philippines. It was established in 1901 through Act No. 74 of the Philippine Commission ''"for the education of natives of the ...

. Candelario moved back to his home province and became the assistant principal of its public school. Candelario married his childhood sweetheart, teacher Ines Nufable. They had a daughter, Angelina, and a son born May 30, 1930. That same day in 1930, Candelario boarded the ''

Empress of Russia The emperor and autocrat of all Russia (, ), also translated as emperor and autocrat of all the Russias, was the official title of the Russian monarch from 1721 to 1917. The title originated in connection with Russia's victory in the Great Nor ...

'' and traveled to

Victoria, Canada Victoria is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of British Columbia, on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada's Pacific Ocean, Pacific coast. The city has a population of 91,867, and the Gre ...

wishing to improve his education and pay; his wife and children remained in San Fernando. In 1939, Candelario moved to

Stockton, California Stockton is a city in and the county seat of San Joaquin County, California, San Joaquin County in the Central Valley (California), Central Valley of the U.S. state of California. It is the most populous city in the county, the List of municipal ...

with activist

Carlos Bulosan Carlos Sampayan Bulosan (November 24, 1913 – September 11, 1956) was a Filipino-American novelist and poet who immigrated to the United States on July 1, 1930. He never returned to the Philippines and he spent most of his life in the United S ...

. They founded the Committee for the Protection of Filipino Rights, which advocated for naturalization rights for Filipino immigrants. With Bulosan and other activists including Rudy Delvo, Chris Mensalvas and Larry Itliong, he helped organize cannery workers' and

asparagus Asparagus (''Asparagus officinalis'') is a perennial flowering plant species in the genus ''Asparagus (genus), Asparagus'' native to Eurasia. Widely cultivated as a vegetable crop, its young shoots are used as a spring vegetable. Description ...

pickers' strikes in Stockton. Two of these asparagus strikes, in 1948–49 with Local 7, led to small pay increases for workers. In 1949, Candelario was elected president of the Filipino Community of Stockton, Inc. Candelario also ran a restaurant called the Luzon Café. He wrote several poems about his time in America, although he claimed to have burned them. Candelario was the inspiration for a character, also named Claro, in Bulosan's book ''

America Is in the Heart ''America Is in the Heart'', sometimes subtitled ''A Personal History'', is a 1946 Autobiography, semi-autobiographical novel written by Filipino American immigrant poet, fiction writer, short story teller, and activist, Carlos Bulosan.

''. In the book, Claro is a

restaurant A restaurant is an establishment that prepares and serves food and drinks to customers. Meals are generally served and eaten on the premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and Delivery (commerce), food delivery services. Restaurants ...

owner that educates the main character in the ways of

politics Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...

References

Filipino trade union leaders 1905 births Year of death missing {{Trade-unionist-bio-stub