Filipino American Gems

Rita Cacas is a retired archivist who has dedicated her life to tracing the histories Filipinos and Filipino Americans in the greater D.C. area. In 2015, she helped establish the Rita M. Cacas Filipino American Community Archives at the University of Maryland, which includes materials dated as early as 1921 and spans through present day. In this chapter, Cacas discusses three “gems” from her collections that illustrate the array of Filipino American imprints on the District’s history.