Chapter 1 New Life Pedro Flores was a passionate inventor and salesman He brought new life to a toy that had been around since ancient times He started the modern yo-yo craze Pedro Edralin Flores was born on April 26 1899 in the Philippines He grew up in Vintar a town in the Ilocos Norte province Little is known about Pedro’s family or early life The early 1900s were a difficult time in Pedro’s homeland The United States had just won the Spanish-American War Before the war Spain had ruled the Philippines As part of the treaty it gave the Philippines to the United States But many Filipinos were tired of being ruled by another country So in 1899 a war began between the Philippines and the United States The Philippine-American War lasted three years The United States won in 1902 and kept control of the Philippines This brought changes to Pedro’s hometown It was annexed by the city of Bacarra for 4
Pedro Flores’s hometown of Vintar is located on the Philippines Luzon Island several years only to break ties in 1908 Young Pedro’s life continued to change In 1915 he moved to the United States at the age of 16 5
Chapter 2 A Busy Student Flores was one of many US immigrants from the Philippines Because their nation was under US control Filipinos could travel to the United States easily The United States also ran a Filipino education program The program sent Filipino students to US schools Some historians believe Flores may have been part of this program By 1919 Flores was living in California He continued his education there into the 1920s He attended San Francisco’s High School of Commerce Then he enrolled in the University of California’s law school He later studied law at San Francisco State University Flores spent several years studying law But he did not become a lawyer Instead he began working at a California hotel Flores helped fun fact California is across the Pacific Ocean from Flores’s homeland of the Philippines It takes almost 20 hours to fly from one location to the other 6
Today the University of California has ten campuses across California Flores attended the university’s Berkeley location guests check in and out of the hotel He carried their bags to and from their rooms It was at this hotel that Flores would make toy history 7
