it was asked in the 1918 census, in which it was reported that from a total population of 10,314,310, the number of Filipinos capable of speaking Spanish was 757,463 (or 7.34% of the total population), with 511,721 belonging to the male population and 245,742 belonging to the female population. In contrast, the number of English-speaking Filipinos was 896,258 (or 8.69% of the total population). Greater percentage of Spanish-speaking males compared to their English-speaking counterparts were found in Zamboanga, Manila, Isabela, Cotabato, Marinduque, Cagayan, Iloilo, Cavite, Albay, Leyte, Batangas, and Sorsogon. The province with the greater percentage of Spanish-speaking females compared to their English-speaking counterparts were found in Zamboanga, Cotabato, Manila, Davao, Ambos Camarines, Iloilo, and Sorsogon. The rest of the provinces had greater percentages of English-speaking people, with the provinces of Ifugao, Bontoc, Benguet, and Kalinga registering the greatest percentage of English-speaking males. The census also affirmed that those who learned to speak Spanish or English also possessed the ability to read and write in those languages. While the 1918 census confirmed the great boost in the position of the English language in the Philippines since the arrival of the first Thomasites, Spanish still retained its privileged position in society, as was made clear by Henry Jones Ford, a professor from Princeton who was sent to the Philippines by the then American President Woodrow Wilson for a "fact-finding mission". In his 1916 report, Ford wrote that the "Filipino gentry speak Spanish and the masses speak native dialects which are not low languages, but are refined and capable instruments of thought", adding later on the following observations: He also made note of the increasing usage of the native vernacular languages through which the literature of Filipino politics reached the masses, with the native newspapers and magazines in the Philippines tending to be bilingual and with the regular form being a Spanish section and a section written in the local vernacular language, while none of them was published in English. Additionally, the most widely circulated American newspaper has a Spanish section. Antonio Checa Godoy assessed that between the Philippine–American War and the Japanese occupation of the Philippines, more than 220 periodical publications were written in Spanish or, in case of bilingual and even trilingual publications, Spanish was one of the languages used. They are published and disseminated not only in Manila but also in different parts of the country, with more than