Olimpio S. Bolong

Olimpio S. Bolong was born June 8, 1909 in Batac, Ilocos Norte, Philippines, the son of Jacobo Bolong and Eunomia Sarian. Olimpio was his parents’ first child; five brothers and two sisters followed over the next thirteen years; Francisco in 1910, Moises in 1912, Maria in 1914, Daniel in 1916, Samuel in 1918, Manueal in 1920, and Clemetia in 1922. Batac is a municipality in the northern province of Ilocos Norte, on the northwestern corner of Luzon. It was organized into an official “ministry” on January 5, 1586 by Augustinian friars. Today it is known as “The Home of Great Leaders,” claiming former President Ferdinand Marcos, founder of the Philippine Independent Church Gregorio Aglipay, and General Artemio Ricarte, the “Father of the Philippine Army,” as its former residents. Bolong boarded the ship, the President Jefferson, in Manila as an 18-year-old and arrived in Seattle, Washington in May 1925. He graduated from Lincoln High School in Tacoma, Washington, and enrolled in Washington State College (WSC) in 1927. 

Bolong transferred to the University of Detroit's engineering school and found work as a machine operator in an automobile plant. He lived in a boarding house run by Claude Matteson and his wife, Katherine. 

Bolong transferred back to WSC after 1930, where he obtained his Bachelor of Science degree in Mining, with honors, graduating on June 10, 1935. While at WSC, Bolong was a member of Tau Beta Pi, the oldest engineering society and the second oldest collegiate honor society in the United States, as well as Phi Kappa Phi. He also belonged to the Filipino Club of Pullman and the American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers. The Filipino Club of Pullman was founded in 1926 in order to "promote better relationships among its members as well as cooperation and understanding with the American people." Their motto was "Service and not position is the undeniable proof of true greatness." 

It appears that many young Filipino men were likely influenced by Christian evangelist movements that sought to bring students from Asia over to the United States to study. The Filipino Student Christian Movement (FSCM) was part of the YMCA’s Committee on Friendly Relations Among Foreign Students. The group was established in 1923, and grew out of a tradition of Chinese, Filipino, and Japanese Christian college students coming to the United States to study at West Coast universities with the assistance of Christian organizations. For Filipinos, the Pensionado Act of 1903 provided U.S. government-funded scholarships to the sons and daughters of elite Filipinos who often held positions in the American colonial government. However, students weren’t treated as elites in the United States and were often met with anti-Asian sentiment, discriminatory measures, and racism on and off-campus. In Pullman, townspeople threatened to pull funding from an International House run by the YMCA if it did not evict its Filipino residents. 

Despite such occurrences, the FSCM and other Christian organizations addressed racism on campus and in the communities in which they lived. They held student conferences and contributed to student publications. They also built large, panethnic networks to identify housing needs as well as promote more inclusive college curriculums. WSC's Filipino Club, founded in 1926, and newspaper records reveal that the organization fielded competitive intramural volleyball teams as well as provided a place for students to help each other navigate their studies. 

After graduation, Bolong was noted to be living in Coyote, California where he worked for the Santa Rosa Mining Company. 

No further records have been located to confirm what might have happened to Bolong. His family tree on Ancestry.com indicates he died in 1940, prior to the United States' entrance into World War II and before the Japanese invasion of the Philippines. 

Bolong is memorialized on the Washington State Univesity Veterans' Memorial.