Ricardo Alvarado arrived in California in 1928 as a 14-year-old in the first wave of Filipino immigrants. Working as a janitor and houseboy, he enlisted in the U.S. Army First Filipino Infantry Regiment in 1942. After serving in combat in the South Pacific during World War II as a medic, he became a civilian cook at San Francisco's Letterman Army Hospital.
What sets him apart was his eye for capturing on film the special celebrations and daily rituals of the Filipino American (Pinoy) community in San Francisco after the war. More than a hobby, photography was his passion. He canvassed the Bay Area's city streets and rural back roads for subjects. His view camera gave him entree into large social functions — weddings, funerals, baptisms, parties, and dances — as well as intimate family gatherings. He recorded street scenes, beauty pageants, cock fights, agricultural workers tending crops, and entrepreneurs on the job.
For 20 years he studied the city and nearby rural areas in his free time with his view camera in hand, recording Filipino community life at dances, banquets, baptisms, funerals, and other gatherings. In 1959, Alvarado ended his work in photography and returned to the Philippines to marry Norberta Magallanes. They had two children, Janet and Joseph Alvarado, who currently live in San Francisco.
When he died in 1976, Ricardo Ocreto Alvarado left an archive of nearly 3,000 rare photographs, a vital portrait of early Filipino Americans. These beautiful and historically significant photographs remained hidden until his daughter, Janet Alvarado, found his collection of nearly 3,000 photographs and recognized their importance. She formed The Alvarado Project to ensure that her father's unique record of Pinoy life would be preserved and would receive the attention it deserves.
On November 21, 2002, an exhibit of his photographs opened at the National Museum of American History, located at 12th Street and Constitution Avenues in Washington, D.C. The exhibit will run through March 31, 2003, and features beautiful and moving photographs of the Filipino American community of California from the 1940s and 1950s. For more information, call 202-357-2700 or visit the website of the the Alvarado Project.
