Restoring Chinese Heritage in Boston's History Wing-Kai to Bridgewater State College, [email protected]
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Bridgewater Review Volume 27 | Issue 2 Article 5 Dec-2008 Restoring Chinese Heritage in Boston's History Wing-kai To Bridgewater State College, [email protected] Recommended Citation To, Wing-kai (2008). Restoring Chinese Heritage in Boston's History. Bridgewater Review, 27(2), 3-6. Available at: http://vc.bridgew.edu/br_rev/vol27/iss2/5 This item is available as part of Virtual Commons, the open-access institutional repository of Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, Massachusetts. Restoring Chinese Heritage in Boston’s History Wing-kai To “Are Boston Chinamen Becoming Americanized?” This There were Chinese sailors who arrived with the New was the question raised by an essay in Boston Globe England merchant ships including one named “Chow” printed on October 31, 1899. This quote exemplified the who was buried in the Boston Common Burial Ground attitudes toward the Chinese at the turn of the 20th in 1799, but a fuller picture of the lives of any sailors century when Chinese settlers were perceived as both who landed in Boston remains a speculation. In an essay exotic and foreign on the entitled “First Chinaman one hand and capable of in Boston” published in being assimilated on the Boston Globe on August other. The essay discussed 17th, 1902, the legendary the division between the merchant Ar-Showe was merchants who were more considered to be the first and more becoming Chinese who lived in Americanized and the Boston. He arrived on a laundrymen who had been merchant ship in 1848 in the country only for a serving Captain Ryan as a short time and remained servant and while in totally Chinese in outlook. Boston was taken by the A decade later, on April 3, Halliburton family to 1910, another essay advertise the tea trade. entitled “Sunny Side of Later he married a German Boston’s Chinatown” was employee Louisa Hentz, published on Boston Globe cut off his queue, became that included a picture and the first naturalized story about Mrs. Lee Kim, Chinese in the US, and had a merchant’s wife, and her four children. Ar-Showe six children, four of whom established a tea store on attended American schools. 25 Union Street by the The essay was written by 1850s and later lived in the famous writer with the Malden until about 1878 pen name Sui Sin Far when he went to San (1865–1914), whose real Francisco and China to name was Edith Eaton. A continue his business. biracial woman, the child of an English father and Ar-Showe’s life thus marked both the end of the era of Chinese mother. she was born in England but grew up prosperous Chinese tea trade in Boston and the in Montreal. Sui Sin Far published a series of fictions beginning of Chinese presence in the city. about North American Chinatowns and has been Another origin of the Chinese in Boston came from referred to as the first Chinese-American writer because western Massachusetts after the construction of the of her sensibilities to the complex stories of Chinese- transcontinental railroad in 1869. It is unclear how American men, women, and children instead of the many of the seventy-five Chinese workers employed by orientalist gaze of the Yellow Peril atmosphere. These the Calvin T Sampson shoe factory in North Adams to depictions of Chinese merchants and families contrast break the labor strike in 1870 arrived in Boston after more sharply with the downtrodden image of the 1875. Yet the earliest laundries of Chinatown can be anti-Chinese movement, represented in immigration found on 110 Harrison Avenue as well as a couple others raids, opium dens, gambling and crime, and tong wars. on Kneeland and Washington Streets in the 1875 Boston City Directory. By the 1885 directory Chinese laundries BRIDGEWATER REVIEW DECEMBER 2008 3 were listed all over the city of Boston and several groceries and restaurants can also be found. A Chinese reading public was able to support a Chinese newspaper named Chinese Monthly News. The newspaper office was located at 36 Harrison Avenue, managed by P.Y. Moy and the paper sold for 5 cents. The paper provided news of China and sold advertise- ments to an assortment of stores selling liquor, TO jewels, firearms, hats, and paper items. kai 1920s Chinese businesses expanded across Tyler Street - Another period of development occurred in the first and Beach Street. The famous restaurants included Hon th ING decade of the 20 century. The elevated train started to Hong Low and Joy Hong Low in the 1920s and later W go through Chinatown and more restaurants and shops Ruby Foo’s Den and the Good Earth in the 1940s. Part of had been established including the Sen Lock Low the appeal of the restaurants was to cater to non-Chi- restaurant on the corner of Beach Street and Harrison nese customers who started to park their cars along Avenue. A photographer and a journalist completed a Tyler Street for both restaurants and night clubs. STORY I featured article entitled “China in New England”, A sense of solidarity was found in the family associa- H published in New England Magazine in 1905. The images tions newly established in the 1920s. The family ’s presented Chinese merchants socializing in the Bun associations such as those developed by Goon, Moy, Yee, N Fong Low restaurant on Chin, and Lee as well 32 Harrison Avenue and as its umbrella provided a glimpse of the organizations—the OSTO small number of Chinese- B Chinese Consolidated American families in the Benevolent IN still bachelor-dominated Association of New E Chinatown. The article G England and the local featured a Chinese Nationalist Party TA I merchant, his wife and branch—were centers their young daughter of activities for the Mabel. According to the Chinese elders who author, this merchant’s dominated commer- ESE HER wife was one of only cial activities in IN fifteen Chinese women Chinatown. The in Boston. In addition to Goon Family CH the discussion of this Association on Tyler family, the essay also Street, the Moy ING noted that “there are the Family Association humble clerks and labors and laundrymen that come on Beach Street, and the Nationalist branch on Hudson from all parts of the city and surrounding city.” By the Street were important architectural examples. The Lee Family Association opened a new building in 1960 and RESTOR the Gee How Oak Tin Family Association comprised mainly of the Chin family opened a new building in The role of Chinese 1964. These are all spectacular structures. Chinese children changed with children who grew up in the 1920s and 1930s in Boston the Repeal of the were increasingly living under the multiple influences of Chinese Exclusion Act American public schools, Chinese language schools, as in 1943 and the end well as missionary activities. The Chinese American of the Second World Citizens’ League at 36 Harrison Avenue sponsored War in 1945. After Troop 34 of the Boy Scouts at least since the 1920s. In the War more an article “Chinatown proud of it’s boy scouts” Chinese were published in Boston Globe on July 23, 1922, it mentioned represented in the that the troop paraded across the State in Springfield local public school. and also in nearby Lowell and Lawrence. According to Initially the the article, the children in the Troop lived near Tyler and Quincy School, Oxford Streets. They normally met at the YMCA at founded in 1847, 73 Tyler Street once a week and conducted camping on 90 Tyler activities mostly in Dedham. It further stated that these Street was a boys went to the Kwong Kow Chinese language school magnet for all every evening on 2 Tyler Street. After the Kwong Kow immigrant school moved to 20 Oxford Street in 1931, the school children. organized a Junior High School band and was active After the war throughout the 1930s and early 1940s. Children in the as Italian, 1930s often participated in parades in support of the Jewish, and American troops in the Second World War and the Syrian children Chinese War of Resistance against Japan. moved away, more Chinese children were represented at the school. They What is quite remarkable was the increasing role played learned about China on the one hand and also became by women in activism in the 1930s. Rose Lok was the citizens as seen in their pledge of allegiance rituals at first woman who joined the Chinese Patriotic Flying the school. Corps in the early 1930s to assist China in its defense against Japanese aggression. The Denison Settlement However, the traditional Chinatown community House at 93 Tyler Street was founded in 1892 to serve changed its character during the 1960s due to urban immigrant women and a Chinese girl’s basketball team relocation of residents on Hudson Street and Albany was formed by Street, an area today known the early 1930s. as Parcel 24. The immigration Some young reforms and the Vietnam War women joined brought in new immigrants the lion dance from Hong Kong, Taiwan, troupe and Vietnam, and Cambodia. The paraded on the development of New England streets of Boston Medical Center and Tufts to raise funds in University, along with support of China formation of new civic against Japan associations and new before Pearl property development has Harbor. The transformed Chinatown Chinese Women through gentrification and Association was the influx of non-Chinese founded in 1940 residents. in Boston with In a photo history book published earlier this year I have participation of all ages and continued to march in presented traditional Chinatown as an enduring support of American troops against Japan community in Boston.