Anita Magsaysay (1949) ©Artes De Las Filipina
(Anita Magsaysay-Ho’s ‘Santol Vendor’, her wedding gift to her beloved friend, Norma Pantangco Jacinto, is a highlight of Leon Gallery’s The Spectacular Mid-Year Auction 2025, which marks the 15th anniversary of the country’s leading auction house. The auction is on June 7, 2025, Saturday, at 2 p.m.)
Norma Pantangco Jacinto Carlos
The image of a vendor seated on a bent tree trunk beside a basket of fruits on Km. 144 of the Calamba-Tagaytay Road was immortalized on canvas by Anita Magsaysay-Ho as a memento of the first meeting of her friends, Juan “Jonby” Carlos and Norma Pantangco Jacinto. This was during an outing in Tagaytay with Anita as matchmaker. The painting was Anita’s gift to the couple on their wedding day in 1942. Anita was their maid of honor.
The friendship lasted a lifetime, while the painting became the impetus to Norma’s love for collecting paintings by great Filipino artists.
Dr. Nicanor S. Jacinto Residence, 613 P. Noval Street, Sampaloc, Manila. This was where family reunions were regularly held. It later became the University Residence of Institucion Teresiana. Source: A Heritage Shared
Norma Pantangco Jacinto Carlos was born in Manila on 10 March 1922 to Dr. Nicanor Santos Jacinto and Doña Maria Rosario Valeriana Fernandez Pantangco, the sister of Rufino family matriarch, Doña Mercedes Pantangco Rufino, with whom Norma was quite close to. She would accompany her to movie screenings in the Manila downtown cinemas owned by the Rufino family, Norma herself recounted in the book, Anthem for Ernesto.
Family photo portrait of Don Fernando P. Jacinto & Bernardina Reyes Pereyra Jacinto, 1962 by Bob’s Studio. Source: RJ Jacinto
Portrait of Don Fernando P. Jacinto and Bernardina Reyes Pereyra Jacinto and their eight children. Fernando C. Amorsolo, 1960. Source: RJ Jacinto
Her father, Dr. Nicanor Santos Jacinto, born in Malolos, Bulacan, in 1884, received his early education at the Ateneo de Manila, where he later obtained his A.B. degree after which he graduated from the UST College of Medicine in 1911. He passed the board the same year, and became an eminent physician and surgeon.
Apart from his medical practice, Dr. Nicanor S. Jacinto was well respected as a planter, mining executive, and businessman. He was director of the National Rice and Corn Corporation, president of the National Rice Growers Association, president of Finance and Mining Investments Corporation, and chairman of the board of the Philippine Bank of Commerce, which founded in 1938 with José Cojuangco, Sr. and the Rufino brothers, Ernesto and Vicente.
Dr. Nicanor S. Jacinto and Doña Rosario Pantangco Jacinto had five sons, Oscar, Jesus, Fernando, Wilfrido, and Nicanor, Jr., and two daughters, Elsa and Norma.
The eldest, Dr. Oscar P. Jacinto, became a renowned medical practitioner who lived in a beautiful home at 24 Ipil Road, Forbes Park, Makati, with his wife, Pacita Pestaño. They had four children: Maria Theresa “Mert,” married to former BPI CEO Xavier P. Loinaz, the renowned equestrian Nicanor, III “Nicky,” Oscar, Jr., and Melissa “Issa” J. Bjorkenstam. The family was one of the earliest residents of Forbes Park.
Minnie Osmeña in her YSL bridal gown with groom, Joselito Jacinto during their 1964 wedding which was then touted as the Wedding of the Year.
RJ and the Riots of Ramón ‘RJ’ Jacinto became a pop culture landmark of the ‘60s.
Another prominent son of Dr. Nicanor S. Jacinto was Fernando P. Jacinto, one of the richest businessmen and industrialists of post-war and pre-Martial Law Philippines. He was chairman of the board of Jacinto Steel and Iligan Integrated Steel Mills, Inc. (IISMI), the first fully-integrated steel mills in the Philippines. He was married to the beautiful Bernardina Reyes Pereyra, with whom he had eight children: Joselito (formerly married to Minnie Osmeña in a grand wedding in 1964), Fernando, Jr. “Pocholo,” Ramon “RJ,” (a businessman/ musician formerly married to Marilou Arroyo, now to Frannie Aguinaldo), Mary Rose Espeleta (host of the TV show, Santa Zita and Mary Rose), Elizabeth “Lilibeth,” Bernadette “Nanette,” Elizabeth “Lissa,” and Maria Agnes.
According to Norma’s youngest daughter, Lucille, her mother met her father, Juan de Leon Carlos, through her friend, the artist Anita Magsaysay-Ho.
Wedding photo, Juan “Jonby” de Leon Carlos and Norma Pantangco Jacinto, 1942. Source: Lucille Carlos
Anita would go on outings in Tagaytay with Norma and her cousin, Ester Pantangco Rufino, sister of Vicente, Ernesto, and Rafael Rufino, and one of two “E’s” in the company which ran EVER, Avenue, State, Capitol, Gaiety, Rizal, and other first-run movie theaters mostly in Manila and Makati. Lucille recounts stories that Anita met her father, Juan “Jonby” de Leon Carlos, in New York where her father took up his Masters in Civil Engineering and Safety Engineering at Columbia University, while Anita was studying at the Art Students’ League in New York City. Both stayed at the International House, a dormitory for international students located at 500 Riverside Drive, just a subway stop away from the Columbia University campus.
However, while Anita wrote about staying at the International House with 30 other Filipinos (among them the debonair Dr. Tony Velarde, the dancer Leonor Orosa, Alice Jose, and the sisters Gloria Cortez Toralballa and Fanny Cortez Garcia), in her book, Anita Magsaysay-Ho, An Artist’s Memoirs, a cross-check with Juan Carlos’ biographical entry in D.H. Soriano’s The Philippines’ Who’s Who (1957) reveals that it is unlikely for Juan and Anita to have stayed at the International House at the same time, as Juan completed his studies at Columbia University in 1940, while Anita attended the Art Students’ League in 1946.
Anita may have met Juan while they were still both in the Philippines, most probably at the University of the Philippines where Anita earned her Certificate in Painting, Cartooning, Illustration, and Commercial Designing from the UP School of Fine Arts in 1933, while Juan Carlos earned his B.S. in Civil Engineering from the UP College of Engineering in 1934. By 1942, Juan was already married to Norma.
Juan “Jonby” de Leon Carlos, born on 4 October 1911 in Baliuag, Bulacan, to Juan B. Carlos and Mercedes de Leon, was a prominent and successful leader in engineering. He first studied in his native Baliuag, Bulacan, after which he completed his high school studies at the Ateneo de Manila in Intramuros. He earned his B.S. Civil Engineering at the University of the Philippines in 1934 and earned his Master’s in Civil Engineering and Safety Engineering at Columbia University, New York in 1940. He was president and general manager of the Philippine Engineers’ Syndicate, Inc. which in 1956 built the P 12-M Ambuklao Hydro-Electric Power Plant in Bokod, Benguet, among the first and largest hydro-electric power plants in the Philippines. He was also president and general manager of the United Construction Co., Inc., which was well known for its construction of residential, commercial, and industrial buildings in the Philippines. Among the company’s well-known projects were the MERALCO Building in Ortigas Avenue, Pasig City designed by architect José Velez Zaragoza, and the SGV and Security Bank & Trust Co. buildings, both in Makati.
Engineer Carlos was chosen “Builder of the Year” by the Business Writers of the Philippines in 1948 and 1953 and by The Evening News for two consecutive years in 1951 and 1952 based on his leadership in his profession. He was also a member of the board of examiners for civil engineers. He was elected president of the Philippine Contractors Association, treasurer and co-founder of the Builders’ Syndicate, member of the Manila Board of Realtors. He was chairman of Filipinas Marketing Corp., Bulacan Development Co., JC Realty & Building Corp., and Security Development & Realty Corp. , vice chairman of Norton & Harrison Co., Inc. and Centro Escolar University, director, State Bonding and Insurance Co., Management Association of the Philippines, the Malolos Rural Bank, Republic Cement Corp., Grogun, Inc., and Commonwealth Food Industries, Inc.
He was also a civic leader and was president of the Manila Rotary Club. An avid golfer and clubman, he was a member of the Wack Wack Golf & Country Club, the Manila Polo Club, the Baguio Country Club, the Philippine Columbian Association, and the Casino Español de Manila.
Engineer Carlos provided for a comfortable life for Norma and their seven children: Rosario “Jeannie” (Garcia), Nancy (Tambunting), Vicente “Vince” (former DOT Secretary and Côte d’Ivoire Consul), Melanie (de Leon), Priscilla, Juan Carlos, Jr., and Ma. Lucia “Lucille” (Locsin). Norma loved to travel in style, and travel records from 1948-1962 indicate travel to San Francisco, New York, Miami, and Brazil with stays in such posh hotels as the St. Regis and Hotel Sheraton Atlantic in New York.
It was possible that Norma visited Anita in Sao Paolo, Brazil, in 1962, where Anita resided with husband, Robert, and family. Norma and Anita would maintain their friendship through the years. They would eventually become comadres. Anita was the ninang of Norma’s youngest daughter, Lucille, while Norma’s husband was ninong to Anita’s daughter, Doris.
The Carlos family lived in beautiful houses at 729 Taft Ave., Malate, Manila (in front of De La Salle College Taft), 96 Ninth Street, New Manila, Quezon City, and 1225 Acacia Road, Dasmariñas Village, Makati, their walls adorned with Juan and Norma’s extensive collection of paintings by Juvenal Sansó, Ibarra de la Rosa, and Anita Magsaysay – Ho, among others.
This precious legacy of a painting is among the last to go, hopefully to new owners who would appreciate it not only as an early example of Anita Magsaysay-Ho’s art, but as a memento of a lifetime of friendship between Anita and Norma.
Senator Sergio Osmeña, Jr. with daughter Minnie Osmeña pose with their entourage for the Osmeña-Jacinto wedding at the Osmeña Residence at Fisher Avenue, Pasay City, 1964. Source: Kasalan
The Spectacular Mid-Year Auction is happening on June 7, 2025, 2 p.m., at Eurovilla 1, Rufino corner Legazpi Streets, Legazpi Village, Makati City. Preview week is from May 31 to June 6, 2025, from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. For further inquiries, email info@leon-gallery.com or contact +632 8856-27-81. To browse the catalog, visit www.leon-gallery.com.
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