Finding Nellie E. Brown: Olongapo School's Namesake Finally Revealed
Schools in the Philippines are often named after a saint, a politician, a local hero, or their locations. We have the obvious ones: Rizal High School in Pasig, Santa Isabel College of Manila, Jose Panganiban Jr High School in Camarines Norte, and more. These schools champion the stories of the personalities they're named after—except for Nellie E. Brown Elementary School (NEBES), which namesake's history wasn't revealed until recently.
Who was Nellie E. Brown?
This was also the question of Ellie, daughter of Dr. Leo De Castro—a professor at the University of the Philippines, who studied at NEBES, a public school in Olongapo City. On November 6, 2021, he received four birthday cakes from a friend who also studied at NEBES.
"Who was Nellie E. Brown?", De Castro asked her father. As it turns out, no one knows. Not her father's brothers, who also went to NEBES, and not the other people they grew up with. Official documents about the school's early days were also missing, adding to the mystery of who Nellie E. Brown was. NEBES' official history, as documented by the Department of Education, said that Brown was a Peace Corps volunteer who helped build the school. But this information has some discrepancies, since the Peace Corps officially started in 1961, but NEBES was founded in 1953.
Ellie did what anyone would do: ask Google. Nothing turned up, which led her and her teammates (with the help of the National Geographic Society) to start a project titled "Finding Nellie."
The search lasted for more than two years with Ellie and her team of archaeologists, educators, and storytellers to check local and international archives, cross-check library records, and ask U.S. military personnel. Olongapo, after all, used to be a U.S. Naval Base. They even got in touch with politicians and messaged anyone likely related to a Nellie Brown on social media. Findings were shared on Instagram, an interactive Field Notes that one would always see done by researchers.
Finally, the official identity of Nellie E. Brown was revealed on the grounds of NEBES on April 11, 2024. In attendance were NEBES' current students and faculty, as well as community members of Olongapo City. An interactive exhibit was put up in an effort to introduce Nellie E. Brown.
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About Nellie E. Brown
Nellie E. Brown turned out to be a kindergarten teacher from Bangor, Maine. Unlike most schools' namesake, she had nothing to do with the school—not the founder and not even a teacher there. It was one of Brown's students, Roger Brown Nickerson, who established NEBES in 1953 and named it after his favorite teacher. Nickerson came from the U.S. Navy and was stationed in Subic Bay as a Commander from 1952 to 1953.
Brown was born on June 9, 1865, in Enfield, Massachusetts, graduated from Mount Holyoke College in 1888, and later from the Chicago Kindergarten College in 1896. Her career was dedicated to the education of kindergarten teachers, becoming the supervisor of kindergartens and principal of the Bangor Kindergarten Training School, where she taught for 26 years. Brown passed away on February 26, 1954.
De Castro confirmed this information after corresponding with the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.
"The story of Finding Nellie isn't just about Nellie E. Brown and Commander Nickerson. In Finding Nellie, we also got to find the people who have built and made this community in Olongapo what it is," she said during the grand reveal at NEBES, which coincided with the Olongapo Heritage Fair.
De Castro's team from the National Geographic Society included American educators Peg Keiner and Rachel Hansen, Filipino photographer Pau Villanueva, and Filipinx-American documentary producer Alexandra Lenore Ashworth (a.k.a. Dzana). De Castro is a Filipina archaeologist whose work focuses on finding avenues to connect heritage and youth.
