Filipino American History Month: programming for ERGs services for ERGs.

Filipino American History Month was established in 1992 by the Filipino American National Historical Society (FANHS) and federally recognized by Congress in 2009. The October date marks the first documented Filipino landing in what is now the United States — October 18, 1587 in Morro Bay, California — nearly 35 years before the Mayflower.

AAPI Heritage Month covers a wide range of communities; October is the month built specifically for Filipino American history and contributions — the colonial relationship with the United States (the 1898 Treaty of Paris, the Philippine-American War, the 1946 Treaty of Manila), the labor organizing of Larry Itliong and the Manong generation, and the 1965 Delano Grape Strike that Filipino farmworkers started before Cesar Chavez joined.

That labor history matters because it's the most consistently erased part of the US labor movement story. FANHS, the Welga Project at UC Davis, and the Pinoy Teach curriculum all publish materials designed for workplace use. Programming that includes the colonial story, the Manong generation, and contemporary Filipino American leaders — in tech, healthcare, arts, and policy — lands better than a lumpia-and-tinikling celebration alone.