an article from G

Tribute to Father Juan Villaverde

in the Range of Light

Looking westward from the summit of Nozo one sunny morning, a landscape was displayed that after all my wandering still appears as the most beautiful I have ever beheld. At my feet lay the eastern valley of our dearly loved province, almost level and green, like a lake of pure sunshine. And on the foothills of eastern boundary of this vast Farmlands the raise of Caraballo Mountain, perhaps kilometers in height and some gloriously colored but mostly denuded-it seems not treated with admiration and worthy, in some of the scene like the sand dunes of the desert. And after all of my life growing up in our hometown nestled on the foot of this mountain of wondering and wandering in the heart of it, rejoicing in its glorious torrent of light, the white beams of the streaming through the Father Juan Villaverde trail, the noonday radiance on the crystal rocks of Puyao, the green flush of the Aroo tree and the shinny water on the up streams of Ambayoan-it still seems above all the others in the Range of Light.

For Father Juan Villaverde paradise (Caraballo Mountains), he gave up his life to missionary work among the hill-people (Igorots), seeking in every way to better their condition materially and morally as well. Father Juan Villaverde is not one of our national heroes though he did his obligation to the best of his ability. For thirty years Father Villaverde worked unceasingly, building roads, bridges and churches, and striving to civilized people among whom he lived; but this chief work, that by which his memory is kept green to this day, is the great trail from our province across the Caraballo Mountain range into the province of Nueva Viscaya. Father Juan Villaverde is great and exceptional among others Spanish friars. He is indeed my hero.