The idea of a summer capital was not new. European colonizers had built a series of hill stations, most famously Shimla in India, where Rudyard Kipling summered and from which the British ruled during the hot months. U.S. officials, fearing the effect of the Philippine climate on their constitutions, sought a hill station of their own. They chose Baguio, 150 miles north of Manila and five thousand feet above sea level. In 1903 the government declared Baguio the summer capital of the Philippines, and in 1904 Forbes charged Burnham with planning the still-unbuilt town.
