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Coming Home to Manilatown: I-Hotel Opens (3 of 3)
Hailed as the “Filipino Bill Gates,” Diosdado Banatao and his wife Maria initiated fundraising for Manilatown Heritage Foundation (MHF), encouraging other FilAms to donate. They donated $500,000 in February and vowed to match the remainder of donations dollar-for-dollar. Diosdado said he wanted the public to understand what the FilAm community has contributed to American culture.
Wife Maria recalls her conversation with MHF President and former I-Hotel tenant Emil DeGuzman about the I-Hotel struggle as a “touching moment.” This newly minted lola said the Dado and Maria Banatao Education Center would “provide a good database of information available to anyone who wants to learn about Filipino culture and activities.”
The grand opening signified the renewal of I-Hotel as a historic landmark that enshrines the contributions of the FilAm community to California culture.
DeGuzman said the I-Hotel has become a national symbol, gaining notice by those on the East Coast.
“(The possibilities) of what we can do--is boundless. The I-Hotel is a memorial monument for all Manilatown landmarks that were destroyed,” he said.
Former mayor of San Francisco, Willie Brown, described the I-Hotel struggle as a “people's movement,” and its restoration a “historic symbol” of a cultural effort that reverberated across the nation.
