Dawn Bohulano Mabalon (August 17, 1972 – August 10, 2018) was an American academic who worked on documenting the history of Filipino Americans. Mabalon was born in Stockton, and earned her doctoral degree from Stanford University; she later taught at San Francisco State University.[1] Mabalon was the co-founder of The Little Manila Foundation, which worked to preserve Little Manila in Stockton, California.[2] During her life, her work elevated the topic of the history of Filipino Americans, in Central California in particular.[3]
Mabalon was born on August 17, 1972, in Stockton, California, to Filipinos who had immigrated to the United States from the Philippines;[2] her father was a guerrilla during the Japanese occupation of the Philippines.[4] Mabalon's grandfather, Pablo "Ambo" Mabalon, ran the Lafayette Lunch Counter,[5] an important hub in the community and one of the longest surviving Filipino American businesses in Little Manila.[6] Many Filipinos frequented the restaurant, including Carlos Bulosan.[7][8] It remained in business until 1983, and the building it had occupied was torn down in 1999.[6][8][9][10] Mabalon's maternal grandmother, Concepcion Moreno Bohulano, was the first school teacher of Filipina descent in the United States.[9][11] Mabalon was also the niece of Fred and Dorothy Cordova;[12] who were involved in the founding of the Filipino American National Historical Society.[13]
During her time at UCLA, Mabalon was active in the Filipino community on campus. She endorsed the effort to keep Tagalog as an available language taught at the university.[17]
In 2010, photographs taken by Mabalon were published on SFGate about a Filipino American band Skyflakes.[20] In 2015, Mabalon was interviewed about the November 2015 Paris attacksbyVoice of America, as she and her husband were visiting the area at the time.[21] In 2017, Mabalon, along with Gayle Romasanta, wrote a children's book about Larry Itliong called Journey for Justice: The Life of Larry Itliong; the book was published a year later.[22] In 2018, Mabalon visited the Delano campus of Bakersfield College, which is in the area where the Delano grape strike began, for an event about archiving; at the event she spoke to encourage Filipino Americans to preserve their family histories, with the goal of expanding historical narratives.[23]
In 2013, the Filipino Women's Network listed her among their "100 Most Influential Filipinas in the World".[11] In 2014, she received an honorable mention for the Frederick Jackson Turner Award for her book Little Manila Is in the Heart;[9] that same year Mabalon was profiled in the book Remarkable Women of Stockton.[24]
In August 2018, Mabalon died while snorkeling off of Kauai.[4] She had been vacationing with her family prior to her death.[25] Mabalon had an asthma attack when she was out with her sister, and her inhaler did not alleviate her symptoms.[26] She was brought out of the water and 9-1-1 was called.[26] Paramedics attempted CPR and then transported her to an emergency room.[26] She died at the hospital.[27] Mabalon was buried at San Joaquin Catholic Cemetery.[28] Mabalon was survived by her husband of ten years, Jesus Perez Gonzalez.[1] In early October, Mabalon was memorialized at San Francisco State University.[3][29]
Mabalon's work of documenting the history of Filipino Americans continued at the Little Manila Center that she had co-founded even after her death .[30] Mabalon authored three books and was working on a fourth.[3] Her works elevated the status of Little Manila in Stockton and helped lead to Little Manila being listed as one of America's Most Endangered Places.[3][31] The San Francisco Chronicle described Mabalon as "a major figure to California's Filipino Americans".[3] Larry the Musical, the 2024 musical about Larry Itliong, pays tribute to Mabalon’s work and research on the Filipino farmworkers.
^Perez, Frank Ramos; Perez, Leatrice (Winter 1994). "Filipinos in San Joaquin County"(PDF). The San Joaquin Historian. VIII (4): 3–18. Archived from the original(PDF) on September 24, 2015. Retrieved October 7, 2018.