Beyond newsroom legacies: Remembering Eggie and Recah
There are things that textbooks, classroom lectures, and bylines can teach us about the people who helped shape the foundations of Philippine journalism today.
However, on the morning of Oct. 2, 2026, what former and current staff members of the Philippine Daily Inquirer (PDI)heard were firsthand stories about journalism icons Eugenia “Eggie” Duran-Apostol, the paper’s founder, and Recah Trinidad, one of its longtime sportswriters. These were anecdotes only colleagues and friends close to them could share.
PDI held a tribute for the two in the wake of their passing, both on Sept. 13, which also happened to be the birth anniversary of PDI’s late editor in chief Letty Jimenez Magsanoc (LJM). The striking triple coincidence was not lost on those who gathered on that day, as voiced out by PDI associate publisher Juliet Labog-Javellana. “You can almost imagine them laughing about it as they reunited in heaven,” she said.
Apostol passed away at 100, and Trinidad at 83.
Guerrilla-type operation
Hosted by former PDI chair Marixi Prieto, the tribute began with a memorial Mass held at the paper’s newest home on Mola Street in Makati City. Trinidad’s wife Fe Lacsamana Trinidad and son Paolo were also present.
After prayers were offered and the noise of excited longtime-no-see greetings died down, eulogies were delivered by a number of people who worked with Apostol and Trinidad—those who knew them up close and personal as Eggie, or Tita Eggie, and Ka Recah.
PDI pioneer Lynett Advincula-Villariba, who created the paper’s iconic masthead and nameplate and served as longtime art director, took us to “Ground Zero” of her relationship with Apostol: a building in Ortigas where the now defunct Women’s Home Companion (WHC) magazine was founded, after the closure of the Manila Chronicle, one of many publications affected by the imposition of martial law by Ferdinand Marcos Sr. Apostol was Villariba’s first boss.
“That’s how I got initiated into the guerrilla-type operation that I would henceforth come to know as vintage Eggie Apostol. Editor and artist worked with a skeleton crew of a typesetter and a pasteup artist using sequestered editorial equipment: an IBM typesetting machine here, a PMT photo copier and a waxing machine there, a stripping desk pulled out of nowhere into a secret war room,” Villariba recounted.
Exuberant woman
Villariba also did a brief walkthrough of PDI’s predecessors, from WHC to Mr. & Ms., and then the weekly Philippine Inquirer, which, in less than a year, transformed into the daily publication that became the country’s No. 1 newspaper.
“Human Face” columnist Ma. Ceres P. Doyo talked about her history with Apostol, who “loomed large” in her life as a writer, in the same way LJM did. Doyo recounted how, during martial law, she and other women writers were questioned by the military for a number of days: “I was the first to be called for Fort Bonifacio where BGC is now. Tita Eggie and Doris Nuyda of Mr. & Ms. were the last to be summoned. Having learned about our ordeal, Tita Eggie employed a different tack when she faced her interrogators. She did write about how she disarmed the roomful of military officers. So very Eggie!”
She remembers Apostol as a great dancer, who once regaled them with her moves at a party in a bar owned by National Artist for Film Ishmael Bernal: “How she danced the night away while we, the younger ones with two left feet, watched with awe.”
Chato Garcellano, opinion editor of PDI up until her retirement, and now executive editor of online magazine CoverStory.ph, confirmed Apostol’s dancing skills in her touching tribute: “The woman herself was basically exuberant—who can forget that she loved to dance?—and was hardly ever morose.”
Describing Apostol’s hopeful nature and commitment to the truth, she recalled her view on what the newspaper editorial should be: “first and foremost … sufficiently dramatic to grab the readers’ restless attention, and, down the line, be unquestionably accurate to preclude doubt, and eloquently presented to convince readers of its correctness and wisdom.”
Garcellano encouraged PDI’s new blood to let Apostol’s life and work serve as their inspiration, even as journalism and print today face unprecedented challenges, especially with the development of new technology. Stick to the fundamentals, and be the voice of those who cannot speak for themselves, she said.
Way with words
Like Apostol, Trinidad’s legacy as one of the most influential sports journalists of his time is largely intertwined with PDI’s, where he wrote his column “Bare Eye” for decades. As former PDI news editor Jun Engracia put it in his heartfelt tribute to his mentor and friend, “He had a way with words that few sportswriters possessed, a literary style unmistakably his own.”
Engracia’s tribute also highlighted how Trinidad shared his talent by being a mentor to younger writers—which PDI executive editor Volt Contreras and Chito de la Vega, former Inquirer Libre editor in chief, both confirmed in their own eulogies at the recent PDI tribute. De la Vega recalled how he would type Trinidad’s column down as his boss dictated it, word for word, over the phone. At first, De la Vega said he developed a crick in the neck from pinning the phone between his ear and neck to have full use of his hands. Later on, he just got used to the posture.
De la Vega and Trinidad also shared a community outside of work, since they were neighbors in Mandaluyong. Again, to everyone’s laughter, he fondly shared how Trinidad would walk topless, his shirt slung over his shoulder, to the city’s market to buy food to cook for the family.
Many memories with Trinidad, De la Vega added, were made over drinking sessions. He only liked San Miguel Pale Pilsen, and when that wasn’t possible anymore because of gout, he switched to gin. San Miguel, still.
Right career path
Contreras recalled how Trinidad, while holding a bottle of Pale Pilsen in the early 1990s, convinced him that he was taking the right career path as a journalist, back when he was still a journalism student at the University of Santo Tomas.
“I met him back when I was still a student correspondent of the Inquirer Sports section. I was enlisted to help cover the SEA Games in Manila. And like many life-changing first encounters, this happened during a drinking session: After the coverage, the Inquirer Sports section hosted a dinner for staff and student volunteers in Hong Kong Tea House on Mabini Street in Ermita,” Contreras said. “From where I sat at the restaurant table, I heard the banter of Ka Recah and the other editors—and I realized that this is what it means to have a calling.”
Eventually, Trinidad would become his first boss and mentor, not under Sports, but the Metro section, when he was still handling the page.
Contreras would ultimately lead Metro as well, where this writer worked as a junior reporter back in 2014. A piece of advice Contreras shared with cub reporters then has always stuck with us: When writing for print, focus on sharing details the TV cameras cannot reach. In short, give them the proper context, the deeper back story.
On Oct. 2, we learned that it was advice originally given by Trinidad to Contreras.
It is truly amazing how one’s influence and legacy lives on, when people make it a point to keep them alive by making sure the stories that matter will always be told.
