Snugly situated right at the entrance of Sorsogon Bay obliquely opposite the coast of Castilla to the west, this town sprawls over a total land area of 15, 111 hectares and weaves an irregular spread of productive lands characterized of rolling hills, mountains and plains planted mostly with coconut, various trees, shrubs, food crops and vegetables. There are also rice fields devoted to rice production, tracts of thickets, and thin frills of forest covering an ample area north of the Municipality of Bulan and west of Municipality of Juban. It is erratically straddling between 12 and 13 degrees north latitude and between 123 and 124 degrees east longtitude. A tandem of mountains took its eastern side, while ribbons of ridges rim to the south. In the southwestern part is the Ticao Pass while in the eastern side is the Sorsogon Bay.
Including the eight Poblacion barangays, the municipality is composed of thirty-four (34) barangays and one hundred seven (107) sitios. Two of these barangays and nine sitios are in Bagatao Island, a 543-hectare isle just a little more than a stone’s throw to the west and cut off from the mainland by a narrow channel, a natural harbor alongside of which the pier is located. Tinacos, about several hundred meters north of Bagatao is a separate island shaped like a sunken ship, to this day it is uninhabited.
The town is 47 kilometers away from the provincial capital and is linked to the Daang Maharlika at a junction in Juban, 24 kilometers to the east by a long and winding two-lane concrete road. It is essentially a farming and fishing town. A large number of population takes to the sea for a living. An equally large part of the total number of inhabitants devote their time to their landholding engaged in different agricultural activities, some are agricultural workers, while some are tenants looking out for the land entrusted to their care by the owners, some are also engaged in other occupation such as drivers, fishpond operators, laborers, government employees, businessmen, OFW and the likes.
Most of the inhabitants of Magallanes are descendants of the conscripted craftsmen from Albay, who evacuated after the successive eruptions of Mayon Volcano in the early era, others came also from the town of Casiguran and segments from the Visayas, notably Panay, Bohol and Samar, some years later. The present population of more or less forty thousand has gone a long way from the 1,400 individuals who started the settlement in 1864.
The predominant dialect of this town is Bicol-Albay particularly the people in the Poblacion and barangays where the evacuees and settlers from Albay had been heavily concentrated. People who came from places in the Visayas mostly retained their own language or dialect and in time just learned to adapt to the language of Magallanes. They can easily be identified because they speak the language a little bit differently from its natural pronunciation.
The people of Magallanes are predominantly Catholic. Less than one-fifth of the total population belongs to other denominations such as the Iglesia Ni Cristo, Born Again Christian, Muslim, Seventh Day Adventist, Baptist and others. Despite of the difference in religion and belief, the people and the community are relatively peaceful, and tolerant of each other.
The official government address is Barangay Binisitahan Sur, Magallanes, Sorsogon. It is located in an enclosed compound wherein the Rizal park is located within together with the municipal building housing the majority of LGU offices except for the MHO and the MAO, PNP Station, basketball court, ABC building, Fire Station, a motor pool, municipal library and the Gabaldon building. It has an official website which was recently launched by the Local Chief Executive. You can easily access vital news and information regarding the municipality at www.magayagayangmagallanes.ph which carries the banner Magayagayang Magallanes.
The executive department is headed by the Municipal Mayor Augusto Manuel M. Ragragio and the legislative department is headed the Municipal Vice-Mayor Allen A. Arambulo as the Presiding Officer.
