Top 100 Cebuano Personalities: Virginia Peralta-Vamenta

CEBU, Philippines —  Ma’am Ginnie, as she is more popularly known, is considered by many as the ultimate female broadcaster in this part of the country. She is proficient in both English and Cebuano languages, which she speaks with noticeable ease and flair.

She led the way for women broadcasters in Cebu. In 1947, she was the first female radio announcer on DYRC, the first radio station to go on air after Liberation. Popular for her cool soothing voice and her near-native command of English, having learned the language from the American family for whom her parents worked. She toured, for three months, broadcast stations in the US, as a Smith-Mundt Leader Grantee in Radio and Television of the US State Department in 1954. Broadcasters there found it unusual that she as a woman could head an all-male announcing staff back home.

Her lengthy experience in the broadcast industry has allowed Ma’am Ginnie to mentor other broadcast journalists, both formally and informally.

(Source: http://www.womenslawcentercebu.org)