Daly City, Los Angeles, and the Many Heartbeats of Filipino America
By David B Katague, Senior Blogger Reflecting on Community, Memory, and Belonging
In the past week, I found myself reading two articles about Filipino-American communities one about Daly City, California being the “beating heart” of Filipino America, and another calling Los Angeles the city with the highest concentration of Filipino-Americans, often dubbed the Pinoy City of America.
As someone who has lived a long life observing, writing, and remembering, these stories feel more than demographic trivia. They feel like threads in a much larger tapestry that I have watched being woven across nine decades.
Daly City: A Familiar Warmth
Daly City has always held a special place in the Filipino diaspora story. One in three residents has Filipino ancestry an astonishing statistic, but one that makes perfect sense when you drive through town. The restaurants, the bakeries, the grocery stores bursting with bagoong, longganisa, and fresh pandesal… they all echo a sense of home.
For me, Daly City feels like an epicenter of heritage, alive, fragrant, and shaped by generations who came before and after me. It is a community that grew not from wealth or glamour, but from shared struggle, resilience, and that famous Filipino instinct to create family wherever we land.
Somewhere in that mosaic, I’m reminded of my own relatives, including my distant connection to Mayor Mike Guingona, Daly City’s first Filipino-American mayor. That tiny genealogical thread always makes me smile. It reminds me that history is never abstract; it is personal. It lives in bloodlines, in stories told around the dinner table, and in the quiet pride that comes from seeing a kababayan make a mark.
Los Angeles: A Larger, Louder Pulse
While Daly City may be the symbolic heart, Los Angeles is the loud, full-bodied rhythm of Filipino America. With the largest number of Filipino-American residents of any U.S. city, L.A. earned its nickname, The Pinoy City of America, not simply through population, but through sheer visibility.
From Historic Filipinotown, HiFi, as younger Filipinos lovingly call it, to the sprawling suburbs where Filipino families planted roots over the decades, Los Angeles tells a story of migration in waves. Nurses, engineers, students, dreamers, they all found their way there.
Reading about L.A. today, I am struck by how Filipino culture has become woven into the city’s identity: food festivals, church communities, youth organizations, civic leaders, and now even Filipino-owned creative studios that tell our stories to the world. The quieter immigration narrative I grew up with has now grown into a vibrant, public symphony.
What These Cities Mean to Me
At nearly 91 years old, I find myself reflecting more often on the themes of place, legacy, and belonging. I have lived through seasons where Filipinos were scarce in national conversation barely represented in media, hardly recognized in history books.
To see cities like Daly City and Los Angeles celebrated today for their Filipino presence feels like witnessing the blooming of a tree planted generations ago.
It makes me think of my own journey from my early years, to my long FDA career, to the many decades of writing, learning, and observing human stories. And through it all, Filipino identity has been a constant compass. Even as times changed, it stayed steady, a source of grounding, pride, and perspective.
A Community That Continues to Grow
What I love most is that Filipino America is not defined by one city alone. It grows wherever Filipinos bring hospitality, hard work, food, laughter, faith, and care for one another. Daly City has heart. Los Angeles has volume. But the Filipino spirit? That lives in every place we have touched.
As I continue writing these reflections for my blog, I feel grateful to witness this chapter of Filipino-American history, one where our presence is not hidden but recognized, celebrated, and cherished.
The heartbeat of Filipino America, it seems, is not in just one city. It’s in the millions of us who carry the homeland in our stories.
A Brief Historical Reflection on Filipino Immigration to the U.S.
The story of Filipino America stretches back more than four centuries, long before the modern cities of Daly City and Los Angeles became Filipino hubs. The first recorded Filipinos arrived in California in 1587 as crew members on the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de Esperanza, marking one of the earliest Asian presences in what would become the United States.
But the true waves of Filipino immigration began much later:
Early 1900s – The First Wave:
During the American colonial period in the Philippines, Filipinos arrived as “U.S. nationals,” not aliens. Many came as farmworkers in Hawaii and California, or as students known as pensionados, sent to American universities. These Manong generation workers helped build the agricultural backbone of the West Coast, enduring discrimination, poverty, and intense labor conditions.Post–World War II – The Second Wave:
After Filipino soldiers fought under the American flag during the war, many war brides and veterans immigrated to the U.S., joining military bases, shipyards, and urban communities. Filipino nurses also began to arrive in greater numbers, planting seeds for what would become a defining legacy in U.S. healthcare.1965 Immigration and Nationality Act – The Third Wave:
This landmark law opened the doors wide. It removed restrictive quotas and allowed for family reunification and skilled worker pathways. Nurses, engineers, teachers, and entire families came to the U.S., many of whom helped transform cities like Daly City and Los Angeles into the Filipino centers we know today.The Modern Era:
Over the decades, Filipino-Americans have become one of the largest Asian American groups in the country, deeply contributing to medicine, the military, public service, arts, technology, and hospitality. The growth of communities in the Bay Area and Southern California reflects a long journey from isolated workers to thriving, multigenerational communities.
For someone like me, who has watched these shifts across nearly a century, it feels profound to witness how these early footsteps became millions of stories. Our presence in America was built through grit, sacrifice, and love of family. And today, as I read about Daly City’s heart and Los Angeles’s vibrant energy, I see not just statistics but the continuation of that historic journey.
- "Pinoy Capital" (Daly City): Daly City, just south of San Francisco, is known as "Little Manila" and has the highest concentration of Filipino residents of any city in the U.S., with over one-third of its population being Filipino American. The phrase reflects how the city became an "ideal community" and magnet for immigrants due to chain migration, affordable suburban housing after the 1968 Fair Housing Act, and proximity to jobs, creating a strong ethnic enclave with Filipino businesses like Jollibee and Seafood City.
- Los Angeles and Southern California: The greater Los Angeles area, particularly Carson and Historic Filipinotown ("HiFi"), is home to the largest total population of Filipino Americans in the U.S.. The community's history there includes early agricultural workers, post-WWII military personnel, and professionals, with ongoing efforts to gain recognition and visibility for Historic Filipinotown.
- "Many Heartbeats": This part of the phrase captures the complexity and diversity of the Filipino American experience, which is not monolithic. It includes:
- Transnationalism and Nostalgia: The "double lives" of immigrants, who maintain strong emotional and economic ties to the Philippines while establishing new lives in the U.S., often feeling homesickness despite being surrounded by Filipino culture in their new home.
- Political Engagement: Breaking stereotypes of being apolitical, Filipino Americans in both areas have developed significant political influence, electing mayors and other public officials.
- Generational Shifts: The evolving experiences of first-generation immigrants versus second and third generations, and how Filipino identity is preserved, celebrated, and adapted over time.
- Historical Context: The history is rooted in the unique colonial relationship between the U.S. and the Philippines, starting from the early 20th century migration of pensionados (students) and laborers.
