Deep in the heart of the high rises of Manila’s Makati district sits the restored Nielson Tower and air control center for the first center for commercial aviation in Manila. Nielson Airfield came about from the desire of Laurie Nielson who established the airfield along with an aviation school here on land leased from the Ayala family in 1937.

LAURIE RUEBEN NIELSON

“LR” – Laurie Rueben Nielson (written as “Laurentz” and “Laurents” on some government documents) came from Christchurch, New Zealand originally, born there in 1901. His early history is not recorded in the search engines of Google. Reportedly, he and his wife Annette came to Manila in the early 1930s. Annette originated from the United States, though on passenger lists for voyages she and her husband are noted, she is listed as a British citizen. On one voyage from Southhampton to New York in August 1933, Laurie’s notes include his age – 32 – and occupation as a “broker”. On a later voyage from Shanghai to Honolulu in March 1940, Laurie is listed as a “mining executive” and again, both husband and wife are listed as British though Annette is noted as being born in the US. 

CHILDREN?

A son, Laurie, also shows up on both passenger manifests with an age of 9 in 1940. The Nielsons adopted another child, Lindsay Nielson in July 1941. Lindsay does not note in an article he wrote for the Ventura County Bar Association news magazine anything about the earlier son, writing “The Nielsons did not have children”. Theresa Kaminski notes in her book Angels of the Underground: The American Women Who Resisted the Japanese in the Philippines in World War II “After the occupation, Annette and their two sons were interned in Santo Tomas, but L.R. was taken to Hong Kong and never returned.” So, one or two children?

LR and Annette – her nickname was “Bumpy” – became thoroughly ensconced in the Manila social scene. LR played handball and the two were active in social affairs and members of the Wack Wack Country Club. While LR stayed active early on as a ‘broker”, Annette ran a local store specializing in Chinese handicrafts and antiquities called “The Caravan”. Reportedly, Douglas MacArthur and his wife included among the customers.

L. R. NIELSON & COMPANY

LR established himself in local business, setting up his own firm, L R Nielson & Co. Through his company, he made inroads in the securities and stock brokerage business, importing, and mining. Nielson also sat on the board of HSBC (Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) branch in Manila. His interests in mining took him to Baguio in north central Luzon with gold and copper among important minerals discovered. Mining also sent him to Hong Kong where he became involved with the Lin Ma Hang lead mine established on the northern border of Hong Kong. He maintained a house on Repulse Bay plus his home in Manila.

The main mines in Baguio were owned by Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company with whom LR entered a management contract in early 1937. LR managed and operated Lepanto’s mining properties for five years with an option for another five. In return, he received a monthly fee plus a percentage of net profits including dividends declared. The L R Nielson & Company also incorporated in Hong Kong – the mine produced between 150-225 tons of lead ore per day in the last two years of the 1930s.

AIRPORT PROJECT FOR MANILA

An aviation enthusiast, LR proposed a project to build both an airport and aviation school in the Manila area. The time for pursuing the project seemed perfect with a real need for an airport to support the increased economic activity in the country. With the Quezon government encouraging such infrastructure projects, Nielson convinced several other Manila-based foreign investors to join him in the project and construction of the airport. The group he gathered were able to lease 42 hectares of land from the Hacienda San Pedro de Makati from Ayala y Cia.

The property, a small part of the vast – over 1,000 hectares – Hacienda San Pedro de Makati owned by the Spanish Filipino Ayala family. The hacienda encompassed most of today’s City of Makati. When Enrique Zobel de Ayala, a senior managing partner at Ayala y Cia. and special aide to President Manuel L. Quezon, found out about the Nielson group’s proposal to the government to build an airport on a turnkey basis, he immediately offered a portion of Hacienda San Pedro as a possible site for the facility.

The site offered an ideal location for an airport with Makati then just a sparsely populated town adjacent to Manila. Located on a hard tract of land adjacent to rice fields, the area was clearly visible from the air, allowing clear approaches from all sides. Nielson’s group took up the offer with construction taking place over a six-month period. The airport became inaugurated in July 1937.

NIELSEN FIELD

The Nielson Airport became base of the American Far Eastern School of Aviation. The school developed as the first flight school organized in Asia, becoming an important producer of pilots for airlines in the region. 

More importantly, commercial air services began at the airport, making the airfield a primary gateway between Manila and the rest of the country. The Philippine Aerial Taxi Company (PATCO), the first airline company in the Philippines, and the Iloilo-Negros Air Express Company, the first Filipino-owned air service, used the Nielson Airport as an operating hub for Manila operations. When Philippine Air Lines became established, it’s very first flight took off in March 1941 from the Nielson Airport for Baguio.

PATCO

The Philippine Aerial Taxi Company got its start from Emanuel Bachrach, originally a Belarus-Jewish emigrant to the US who kept going to the west reaching the Philippines in 1901. Bacharach became involved in mining like others in the early aviation scene. The air transport company began to fly between Manila – a runway built at Grace Park in today’s City of Caloocan to the north of Manila. They began operations with a round-trip flight between Manila and Iloilo 18 March 1931. PATCO flew WACO and Stinson biplanes originally, adding two Bellanca cabin planes.

Expanding to Baguio and Paracale (both gold mining areas), the company looked to expand operations to the Visaya islands.  Enter the Iloilo-Negros Air Express Company – INEAC.

INEAC

INEAC’s founder, Don Eugenio H. Lopez, Sr, was an important business figure and politician from Iloilo. Started in 1932, INEAC flew a Stinson Tri-motor SM-6000 from Iloilo to Manila, Davao and Cagayan de Oro. After they invested in two Sikorsky S 43 twin engine amphibian planes – “Baby Clipper”, they expanded further to Bacolod, Cebu and Zamboanga. They were flying 2,000 passengers a month in 1940, but their fleet was destroyed during the war.

The trimotors carried a crew of two with a capability of 10 passengers over a 628-kilometer range. The Baby Clippers could carry 19 passengers over a range of 1,247 kilometers. Re-instituted after the war, PAL absorbed them after the government named PAL the “flag carrier” for the country.

PAL

PATCO lost of their Bellanca’s over the sea in 1937. As a result, the Commonwealth government forbade PATCO from continuing flying passengers in planes with a single engine. Unable to purchase multiengine planes, the company went bankrupt. The remains of PATCO became purchased by Andrés Soriano Sr. – an original PATCO partner – in 1940 for 500 pesos or just under $15 – about $350 today. 

A year later, Philippine Air Lines – PAL – formed. They flew their first flight – two pilots and five passengers between Nielson Field and Baguio 15 March 1941.

PAL flew two Beechcraft Model 18 planes. Both planes suffered destruction during the war. The airline returned to the sky in 1946 using five Douglas DC 3s serving to 15 domestic points out of Nielson Field. After six months, PAL flew a chartered Douglas DC 4 across the Pacific through Guam-Wake Island-Johnson Atoll-Honolulu-Oakland. In December 1946, a regular service to San Francisco started.

WORLD WAR TWO

The war proved difficult for Nielson Field. Japanese air command used Nielson Tower as air base headquarters resulting in heavy American bombing. The costs to repair the field eventually led the government to moving air operations to Nichols Air Base (today’s Villamor Air Base) which transformed into Nino Aquino International Airport.

As the airport ceased operations with PAL relocating to Nichols Field, the land was returned to Ayala and Cia. The runways eventually converted to roads.  Many of the airport structures went away as the development of Makati business and commercial district got underway in the 1960-70s. The Nielson airport passenger terminal and control tower remained preserved as the Nielson Tower. This is the only pre-World War II structures in Makati.

POSTWAR YEARS

Nielson Tower served a multitude of functions after the airport went away. The primary runway transformed into Ayala Avenue while the secondary runway became the Paseo de Roxas. It served as headquarters of a police detachment and also housed the offices of the Ayala-owned Integrated Property Management Corporation for several years. From the late 1970s up to April 1994, a group of Filipino investors leased the Nielson Tower and turned it into a semi-private, first-class club/restaurant. In 1996, after almost two years of renovation work, the Nielson Tower became the home of the Filipinas Heritage Library. 

360 view inside the Blackbird Restaurant – hold mouse down and move for 360 view.

The Library moved to the Ayala Museum. Since 2014, the Nielson Tower is home to Blackbird, a dining and leisure destination. The restaurant houses a bar and lounge in the former check in area. There is an oval grill room in the passenger terminal. Above in the former control tower is a private room. There is an outdoor bar and dining space where the tarmac used to be. Lavishly redeveloped the building maintains the integrity of its original Art Deco design.

WHAT OF THE NIELSONS?

One report notes the two boys were not biological children of the Nielsons. The older son, Laurie, was a grandson of Annette. That would have made her very young when she conceived previously or – more probably – the grandson was from a former husband. The younger son’s story is well recounted in an article he posted last year in the Ventura County Bar magazine Citations.

ADOPTED BOYS

He was from a Jewish family which fled Nazi Germany. His father, Rudi Moser, had been a well-known radiologist. His grandfather, also a physician, had been an SPD politician during the Weimar Republic. Moser emigrated to Manila with his new wife in 1938. For some reason, the Mosers gave up their first-born son to adoption with World War II unfurling around them. Moser would survive the war. He became a professor and head of the radiology department at the School of Medicine at Manila Central University. Moser moved to Brisbane, Australia in 1952 where he eventually died in 1979.

The son, Lindsay, along with his adopted mother, Annette, and adopted brother, Laurie, became interred by the Japanese after the 1942 fall of the Philippines at the Santo Tomas University. His father, LR, became interred in Hong Kong. Presumably Hong Kong because he was a British citizen. Though whether he was sent there from the Philippines or caught up in the occupation of Hong Kong while in residence remains obscure.

SURVIVORS

Mother and the two boys survived the war and went on the USS Moremacsea, to San Francisco. Lindsay went on to create a career as a lawyer in Ventura County, California.  Read his story!

LR?

LR?  Two stories. The report most often seen is the one you read from the Blackbird Restaurant. This is repeated on various other sources, interred by the Japanese in Hong Kong and never seen or heard from again.

But there are other stories. From a Hong Kong source, York Lo is researching L. R. Nielson of HK Mines ran the Lin Ma Hang mine before WWII. York noticed, LR re-visited the mines in the mid-1950s. There seems conflicting information on the Web whether he died or went missing during the War. York says he found an article relating a HK Mines board meeting in the late 1940s. The article mentioned LR did go missing for a while. He resurfaced from South America becoming reinstated as board member.”

INTERNEE CAMP IN HONG KONG

York further reported, “Nielson was active in the Stanley Camp – internee camp in Hong Kong – life, being elected to the Camp Temporary Committee in January 1942, chairman of blocks 2 to 5, a District Representative and providing support to the other internees. He got into trouble in June 1944 when buying doors to make a coffin for the recently deceased Mr. M J Flaherty. He faced a camp tribunal where it was deemed that doors would be recognized as communal property. However, he was acquitted.”

After the liberation of the Philippines from the Japanese, Nielson’s businesses and most of his properties were all gone. His home in Manila destroyed by a direct bomb hit and his mines in disarray. Following their liberation on 3 February 1945, Annette and her two sons left Manila. They returned to the USA, unaware of Mr. Nielson’s fate.

POST WAR YEARS

Post war, details of LR’s life remain somewhat obscure though he does seem to have survived. He seemed to spend his time between Hong Kong and Manila trying to resurrect his former companies. LR also remarried a lady called Elizabeth.

He spent time at Lin Ma Hang trying to restart production. In December 1953 during a visit to the mine he noted waste rock thrown down ore passes, as well as accumulating in driveways, blocking the passes and restricting access and ventilation. There was a complete lack of timbering and support for weaker areas. Nielson concluded the mining operation was hazardous and contrary to good mining practice. An eyewitness accompanied Nielson on his visit noted Nielson’s displeasure. LR was caught up “showering the men with cursing and swearing for their bad work”.

The mine closed in 1962 and today sits as a museum.

PHILIPPINE SIGHTING?

Things were not much better in Manila. Following the war, a commercial dispute arose over war damages. This resulted in a Supreme Court judgement between Nielson and the Lepanto Consolidated Mining Company. The Nielson company eventually lost the case in December 1966. The final verdict would have little affected LR as he died on 9 December 1957 in Manila. The exact cause of death was not noted in an obituary from the South China Morning Post.

Following the war, he never returned to the Unites States and his sons thought he had died in the war.”