Governor's Heritage Award - Fred Cordova

Fred Cordova of Seattle, Washington is the leading expert on Filipino-American history in the United States. Born in California’s Central Valley, he came to Seattle in 1948. In 1957 he founded Filipino Youth Activities, a social service agency for Filipino-American youth. In 1959 he founded the FYA Khordobah, a drill team that has performed in parades all over the United States for over forty years. For many years, while manager of the University of Washington’s News Services, Cordova found time to write Filipinos: Forgotten Asian Americans, a published collection of photographs and essays about the Filipino experience in North America, which his wife Dorothy edited. In 1982 Cordova became first president of the Filipino-American National Historical Society, which Ms. Cordova founded, and which has twenty chapters around the United States. The Cordovas hold honorary doctorates in humanities from Seattle University.