78th Death Anniversary of Pres. Manuel L. Quezon

The National Library of the Philippines (NLP) joins the whole nation in commemorating the 78th death anniversary of former President Manuel L. Quezon today, August 1. He served as the 2nd President of the Philippines from 1935 until he died of tuberculosis while in exile in 1944.

In remembrance of his life and works, NLP features its rich online collection of various written works of Pres. Quezon, including his monographs, papers, and speeches. The collection is freely available to the public through its Tekno-Aklatan: https://nlpdl.nlp.gov.ph/mq01/home.htm.

Included in the NLP’s President Manuel L. Quezon Digital Collection is a book entitled “Manuel L. Quezon, His Life and Career: A Philippine President Biography.” In the chapter “Quezon, Architect of Our Freedom,” former Senator Claro M. Recto wrote this paragraph as part of his eulogy for Quezon (p. 297):

“Manuel Luis Quezon left shreds of his life along that uncertain and glorious road, until he gave up life itself far from the fatherland, without seeing the end of the fight which sent him to distant shores and without receiving the greatest reward which he had longed for and richly deserved – to witness, with heart overflowing with emotion, the hoisting of the national flag in all its majestic glory, there to be caressed by the air of freedom and sovereignty, its sun and three stars even more luminous than those of the firmament itself, treasuring in its folds and deathless determination of a people expressed in those immortal verses of the national anthem: “Ne’er shall invaders trample thy sacred shores . . .”