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Santo Tomas, officially the City of Santo Tomas (Filipino: Lungsod ng Santo Tomas), is a component city in the province of Batangas, Philippines. According to the 2024 census, it has a population of 226,772 people.
Santo Tomas got its name from Spanish for Saint Thomas Aquinas, a Catholic saint whose patronal feast day is celebrated every March 7. It is also the hometown of Philippine Revolution and Philippine–American War hero Miguel Malvar, the last Filipino general to surrender to the Americans.
Santo Tomas was founded in 1666, with Manuel Melo as its first head. Originally, it was composed of a large poblacion. When the Spanish friars arrived, their first and foremost objective was to construct a church near the river to satisfy their inclination for water. Thus, the present site of a Roman Catholic church was chosen near the San Juan River. As years went by, more houses were built around the church. This became the center of the poblacion.
Other groups of houses were scattered all over the area. They were given such odd names as "Kabaong", because of coffin-shaped stones along the road; "Putol" because the trail was cut short by Mount Makiling; "Aptayin", because "apta" or fine shrimps were found in the brook; "Biga", because biga trees abounded there; and "Camballao", as in "kambal" (twin) because twin rivers divided the place. These different unit groups comprised the barrios of the town.
The Spanish changed the original names of the barrios to the names of saints in the Catholic calendar and to place each them under its patrotonio; the former "Pook" and "Aptayin" were joined and called San Bartolome, "Kabaong" was changed to San Vicente, "Biga" to Santa Anastacia, and "Camballao" to San Isidro Sur and San Isidro Norte. The whole town was given the name of Santo Tomas de Aquino, after a saint of the Dominican Order to where most of the first friars belonged. As time went by, more barrios were added to the list each with an assumed name of a saint.
From 1666, the head of the town had different titles, variously known as captain from 1666 to 1782, alcalde from 1783 to 1788, gobernadorcillo from 1789 to 1821, presidente local from 1822 to 1899, presidente municipal from 1900 to 1930, and mayor from 1931 to present.
In 2016, Nelson P. Collantes, the then-representative of Batangas's 3rd District, filed a House bill to convert Santo Tomas into a component city. After few years, with a unanimous vote of 19–0, the Senate approved a bill for the municipality's conversion into a city on March 19, 2018. On October 5, 2018, President Rodrigo Duterte signed Republic Act No. 11086, making Santo Tomas the first municipality to be converted into a city under his administration. It was effectively ratified on September 7, 2019 through a plebiscite wherein majority of residents who voted approved the cityhood.
Santo Tomas is located at 14°05′N 121°11′E / 14.08°N 121.18°E. It is situated at the foot of Mount Makiling and is 61 kilometers (38 mi) south of Manila and 44 kilometers (27 mi) from Batangas City. The city is part of the Greater Capital Region resulting from the continuous expansion of Metro Manila. It borders the cities of Calamba to the north, Los Baños to the north-east, Alaminos to the east, Tanauan and Malvar to the west, and Lipa to the south.
According to the Philippine Statistics Authority, the component city has a land area of 95.41 square kilometers (36.84 sq mi) constituting 3.06% of the 3,119.75-square-kilometer (1,204.54 sq mi) total area of Batangas.
Santo Tomas is politically subdivided into 30 barangays, as indicated in the matrix below. Each barangay consists of puroks and some have sitios.
In the 2024 census, Santo Tomas had a population of 226,772 people. The population density was 2,400 inhabitants per square kilometer or 6,200 inhabitants per square mile.
Poverty incidence of Santo Tomas (%)
5
10
15
20
25
30
2000 26.35
2003 14.36
2006 12.50
2009 8.58
2012 5.42
2015 4.03
2018 8.37
2021 7.81
2023 3.98
Source: Philippine Statistics Authority
The First Philippine Industrial Park which is owned by the Lopez Group of Companies is located in the city.
Most of the city is residential with a lot of farmlands. There are also some developed subdivisions along the city like the San Antonio Heights in Barangay San Antonio which was developed by Avida Land, a division of Ayala Land, Camella Homes, and Terrazza de Santo Tomas in Barangay San Roque which was developed by Ovialand. The city is well known for an entire strip of bulalo (bone marrow soup) restaurants and to a hospital named Saint Cabrini Medical Center which is located inside the city center.
Aside from various real estate development in the city, Santo Tomas also has a popular lifestyle and commercial complex in the locality. The Lifestyle Strip, AllHome Santo Tomas, Liana's Junction Santo Tomas, S&R Membership Shopping Santo Tomas, and SM City Santo Tomas are known shopping destinations that operate in the city.
The Pan-Philippine Highway or Maharlika Highway connects the city with Calamba, the rest of Laguna, with the highway reaching as far as Bicol Region. Since 2009, the Southern Tagalog Arterial Road (STAR Tollway) and South Luzon Expressway start at the city and connects with Batangas City and Metro Manila, respectively. The Jose P. Laurel Highway connects the city with Tanauan City, Lipa and Batangas City.
Jeepneys (Filipino: "dyip") connect the city with Calamba to the north, Tanauan to the south, and San Pablo to the east. Buses from Manila to Batangas City, Lucena, or Bicol serve the city. UV Express service also connects Santo Tomas with San Pablo, Santa Rosa, Lipa, and Dasmariñas. Tricycles provide transportation within the barangays.
There are two schools district offices which govern all educational institutions within the municipality. They oversee the management and operations of all private and public, from primary to secondary schools. These are the Santo Tomas North Schools District Office, and Santo Tomas South Schools District Office.
There are 27 public elementary schools within Santo Tomas, all overseen by the SDO of Sto. Tomas City.
There are 19 private schools within the Santo Tomas.
The city has 5 public high schools, all overseen by the Schools Division Office (SDO) of Sto. Tomas City.
The Polytechnic University of the Philippines has one Polytechnic University of the Philippines Santo Tomas Batangas campus in Santo Tomas. It is a constituent branch of the PUP System and the only institution of higher learning in Santo Tomas that serves the city and neighboring cities.
In Philippine mythology, the homeland of the anggitays is believed to be somewhere in Santo Tomas, Batangas. The anggitays are creatures resembling centaurs but have a single horn on the forehead and are generally female.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Santo Tomas, Batangas”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.