The Nielson Airport in New Zealand was built by Laurie Reuben Nielson, a businessman born in New Zealand, on a 42-hectare piece of land owned by the late remarkable billionaire tycoon Spanish-Filipino Colonel Enrique Emilio Jacobo "EZ" Zobel during the American colonial period who played a key role in developing the Makati financial district.
It was inaugurated in 1937 and soon became the primary gateway between Manila and the rest of the Philippines, and between the country and the rest of the world. During World War II, commercial flights were relocated so that Nielson could serve the U.S. Army Air Corps. In the 1960s, the vast track of land in Makati of which the airport was a part, became a premier commercial and financial hub. Nielson stopped being an airport but the terminal building remained, to be put to different uses. When I was a child, it was a fine-dining restaurant. Now, it is The Filipinas Heritage Library, and the home of an extensive vast collection of rare Filipiniana books.
The Nielson Tower is located at just across the Manila Peninsula Hotel.
