Portrait of Paulino Alcántara

Birthday profile

Paulino Alcántara

Paulino Alcántara, Spanish Filipino football player and manager (died 1964)

Born
October 7, 1896
Died
February 13, 1964
Zodiac sign
Libra
Birth year
1896

About Paulino Alcántara

Paulino Alcántara Riestrá (7 October 1896 – 13 February 1964) was a Spanish and Filipino professional footballer and manager who played as a forward. Born in the Philippines, he played for Catalonia, Philippines and Spain national teams. Alcántara made his debut for Barcelona at the age of 15, and remains the youngest player to play or score for the club. He scored 395 goals in 399 matches, a club record that stood for 87 years. He also won a total of 19 trophies including 10 Spanish Catalan League, 5 Copa del Rey, 2 Pyrenees Cup and 2 Philippine League championship titles during his 15 year career. After retiring as a player in 1927 at the age of 31, he became a doctor and served as club director of Barcelona between 1931 and 1934. He also entered politics becoming a member of a conservative fascist political group and participated in the Spanish Civil War in 1936 as a soldier in the Spanish Army. In 1951, he became a coach and managed Spain for three games, and he also became the President of the FC Barcelona Player Association in 1959. In 2007, Alcántara was officially recognized by FIFA as one of the greatest football strikers in the 20th century and in the history of football, and the best Asian male footballer of all time.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

The world when Paulino Alcántara was born

Paulino Alcántara was born in 1896. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentFirst modern Olympic Games held in Athens
  • Top headlinePlessy v. Ferguson — "separate but equal" upheld
  • Technology milestoneGuglielmo Marconi patents wireless telegraph (radio)
  • World population~1.56B

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderGrover Cleveland
  • U.S. population69.0M

1896 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Paulino Alcántara's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure18962026
Population69.0M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, Transfermarkt, National Football Teams, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.