The Chinese in America

by Iris Chang

  220 about 75,000 at the start of the 1930s: 1930 U.S. Census (74,954 Chinese). Also Diane Mark and Ginger Chih, A Place Called Chinese America, p. 179.

  220 $300 for every Chinese in the country: Him Mark Lai, ”Roles Played by Chinese in America During China’s Resistance to Japanese Aggression and During World War II,” p. 94.

  220 some gave almost every cent: Renqiu Yu, p. 100.

  220 Montgomery Hom: Author interview with Montgomery Horn in Los Angeles.

  221 percentage of U.S.-born Chinese Americans surpassed: L. Ling-chi Wang, ”Politics of Assimilation and Repression: History of the Chinese in the United States, 1940 to 1970,” unpublished manuscript, Asian American Studies Collection, Ethnic Studies Library, University of California at Berkeley, p. 288.

  223 ”hardworking, honest, brave”: Sucheng Chan, Asian Americans: An Interpretative History (Boston: Twayne, 1991), p. 121.

  223 ”Virtually all Japanese are short”: Time, December 22, 1941, p. 33.

  224 used jujitsu: Interview with Rodney Chow, interview #149, Southern California Chinese American Oral History Project.

  224 carried identification cards: Judy Yung, Unbound Feet, p. 250; Jules Archer, The Chinese and the Americans (New York: Hawthorne Books, 1976), p. 106. It appears that the Chinese embassy also issued identification cards for people of Chinese ethnicity in the United States. One such card can be found in File #5608-505, Box 2168, Accession #58734, Stack Area 17W3, Row 13, Compartment 15, Shelf 1, Record Group 85, National Archives, Washington, D.C. The card reads: ”Chinese Embassy Washington, D.C. Chinese Identification Card. The bearer of this CHINESE Identification card, whose photograph appears heron, is a member of the CHINESE race.”

  225 Yu-shan Han: Interview with Yu-shan Han, interview #152, p. 19, Southern California Chinese American Oral History Project.

  225 ”You damn Jap”: Judy Yung, Unbound Feet, p. 256.

  225 Citizens Committee to Repeal Chinese Exclusion: Diane Mark and Ginger Chih, p. 98; Harry H. L. Kitano and Roger Daniels, Asian Americans: Emerging Minorities (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1988), p. 38.

  225 ”enemies of the American people”: H. Brett Melendy, p. 28.

  226 first Chinese woman and second woman ever invited to address a joint session of Congress: Mur Wolf, ”Madame Chiang Kai-shek; Week of August 14, 2000; Mayling Soong, who became Madame Chiang Kai-Shek, is the Wellesley Person of the Week.” Wellesley College 125th Anniversary Person of the Week. Office for Public Information, Wellesley College.

  226 ”Goddamnit, I never saw anything like it”: Time, March 1, 1943, p. 23.

  227 ”To men of our generation”: Charlie Leong quote, in Victor and Brett de Bary Nee, Longtime Californ‘, pp. 154-55. For a description of Leong’s life, see Sandy Lydon, p. 483. A journalism graduate of San Jose State College and Stanford University, Leong was the first Chinese American editor of a college newspaper and the first Asian American to join the San Francisco Press Club.

  227 Colonel Won-Loy Chan: Author interview with Montgomery Hom, documentary filmmaker of They Served with Pride.

  228 15,000 to 20,000 Chinese served in the military: Thomas Chinn, ed., Bridging the Pacific, p. 147; Him Mark Lai, ”Roles Played by Chinese in America During China’s Resistance to Japanese Aggression and During World War II,” p. 99; Judy Yung, Unbound Feet, p. 252. (About 13,499, or 22 percent, of adult Chinese men enlisted in the army. Source: Ronald Takaki, p. 374; Gloria Chun, p. 44.)

  228 20 percent of the Chinese population: Him Mark Lai, ”Roles Played by Chinese in America During China’s Resistance to Japanese Aggression and During World War II,” p. 99.

  228 8.6 percent: Ibid., p. 99.

  228 40 percent: Yen Le Espiritu, Asian American Women and Men: Labor, Laws and Love, p. 50.

  228 ”New York’s Chinatown cheered itself hoarse”: Rose Hum Lee, ”Chinese in the United States Today: The War Has Changed Their Lives,” Survey Graphic, October 1942, p. 4444.

  228 ”I remember Sunday, December 7th, vividly”: Richard V. Lee, M.D., ”A Brief Lee Family History,” paper presented at the conference on Yung Wing and the Chinese Educational Mission, 1872-1881, at Yale University, September 28-29, 2001.

  229 ”I had never felt so happy and proud”: Gloria He-Yung Chun interview with David Gan, former soldier with the U.S. Army. Gloria He-Yung Chung, Of Orphans and Warriors, p. 85.

  229 asked if they were part of the Chinese army: Christina M. Lim and Sheldon H. Lim, ”In the Shadow of the Tiger: The 407th Air Service Squadron, Fourteenth Air Force, CB1, World War II,” Chinese America: History and Perspectives 1993, p. 27.

  229 ”goddamn Chink”: Peter Phan, ”Familiar Strangers: The Fourteenth Air Service Group; Case Study of Chinese American Identity During World War II,” Chinese America: History and Perspectives 1993, p. 85.

  229 all his possessions thrown out the window: Ibid.

  229 ”I was told that ‘no Chinaman will ever fly in my outfit’ ”: Oral history interview with William Der Bing in 1979, in Diane Mei Lin Mark and Ginger Chih, A Place Called Chinese America, p. 96.

  230 ”I was so damn surprised”: Peter Phan, ”Familiar Strangers,” Chinese America: History and Perspectives 1993, p. 87.

  230 Gordon P. Chung-Hoon: ”Navy Names Destroyer to Honor Rear Adm. Chung-Hoon,” Department of Defense press release, October 10, 2000; ”Navy Ship Named for Isle World War II Hero,” Associated Press, October 12, 2000.

  231 ”China is your home”: Peter Phan, ”Familiar Strangers,” Chinese America: History and Perspectives 1993, p. 78.

  231 Nationalist soldiers marching in straw sandals: Ibid., p. 91.

  231 John Chuck: Ibid., p. 90.

  231 ”behind time”: Ibid., p. 93.

  232 ”Except for the uniforms”: Christina M. Lim and Sheldon H. Lim, ”In the Shadow of the Tiger,” Chinese America: History and Perspectives 1993, p. 62.

  233 Information on Air WACs: Author interview with Judith Bellafaire, Ph.D., curator of the Women in Military Service for America Memorial, Inc., January 27, 2003; Judith Bellafaire, ”Asian-American Servicewomen in Defense of the Nation,” 1999 article available online from http://www.womensmemoriaI.org/APA.html and included in the Women in Military Service for American Memorial exhibit, Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia; Rudi Williams, ”Asian Pacific American Women Served in World War II, Too,” American Forces Press Service, May 1999.

  233 Helen Pon Onyett: Judith Bellafaire, ”Asian-American Servicewomen in Defense of the Nation”; Huping Ling, Surviving on the Gold Mountain, p. 120.

  234 as long as the marriage had occurred before May 26, 1924: Roger Daniels, Asian America, pp. 96-97.

  234 only about sixty Chinese women a year: Origins & Destinations: 41 Essays on Chinese America, p. 89; Roger Daniels, Asian America, p. 97.

  234 male-female ratio was three to one: Yen Le Espiritu, Asian American Women and Men, p. 55.

  234 almost six thousand Chinese American soldiers: Ibid.

  234 One soldier on leave flew to China: Rose Hum Lee, ”The Recent Immigration Chinese Families of the San Francisco-Oakland Area,” Marriage and Family Living 18 (1956), pp. 14-24. As cited in Huping Ling, p. 114.

  234 80 percent of all new Chinese arrivals: Peter Kwong, The New Chinatown, p. 20.

  234 an average of two births a day: L. Ling-chi Wang, ”Politics of Assimilation and Repression,” p. 284.

  234 many had to sleep in the hallways: Author interview with Him Mark Lai, March 16, 1999, San Francisco.

  234 soared from 77,000 to 117,000: Yen Le Espiritu, p. 55.

  Chapter Fourteen. ”A Mass Inquisition”: The Cold War, the Chinese Civil War, and McCarthyism

  237 fewer than one in four survived: J. A. G. Roberts, A Concise History of China (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1999), p. 239.

  238 ”its readiness to conclude”: A Decade of American Foreign Policy: Basic Documents, 1941-49, prepared at the request of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations by the Staff of the Com
mittee and the Department of State. Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1950, produced online by the Avalon Project at Yale Law School: http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/wwii/yalta.htm

  240 ”When a Chinese with some influence”: Murray A. Rubinstein, ed., Taiwan: A New History (Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1999), p. 284.

  240 10,000 billion Chinese dollars: Tiejun Zhang, Chu Ran Meng Jue Lu, vol. 2 (Taipei, Taiwan: Xue Yuan Publishers, 1974), p. 211.

  240 factor of 85,000: Leslie Chang, Beyond the Narrow Gate: The Journey of Four Chinese Women from the Middle Kingdom to Middle America (New York: Dutton, 1999), pp. 18-19.

  240 63 million yuan: Leslie Chang, p. 19.

  240 ”eight hundred cases of notes”: Stella Dong, Shanghai, 1842-1949 (New York: William Morrow, 2000), p. 282.

  241 Houston businessman: L. Ling-chi Wang, ”Politics of Assimilation and Repression,” p. 306.

  241 scarcely enough to buy a postage stamp: Ibid., p. 307. During this era, my maternal grandfather had received an advance from the Nationalist government to write a book for the political department of the Chinese air force. By the time he finished writing the book and withdrew the money from the bank, the advance was worth less than the price of a shirt. (Tiejun Zhang, p. 212.)

  241 1.5 million troops: J. A. G. Roberts, A Concise History of China, p. 250.

  243 five thousand foreign Chinese intellectuals marooned: Peter Kwong, The New Chinatown, p. 59; Ronald Takaki, Strangers from a Different Shore, p. 417; Kitano and Daniels, Asian Americans, p. 42; Ting Ni, ”Cultural Journey: Experience of Chinese Students of the 1930s and the 1940s,” Ph.D. dissertation in history, Indiana University, April 1996, p. 142.

  243 4,675: Ting Ni, p. 81.

  243 ”We joked about getting gold-plated”: Author interview with Linda Tsao Yang.

  244 ”We came to a fork in our lives”: Ibid.

  244 more than 2,500 Chinese students lacked basic funds: Time, February 28, 1949.

  245 more than $8 million: The Committee on Educational Interchange Policy, Chinese Students in the United States, 1948-1955 (New York, 1956), as cited in Ting Ni, pp. 24, 94.

  245 ”Guomingdang-hired goon squad”: L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 394.

  246 ”Communist bandits”: Ibid.

  246 ”understanding” between the races: Gloria Heyung Chun, p. 84.

  248 bugged the headquarters of the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance: Renqiu Yu, p. 191.

  249 white mob tore apart a Chinatown restaurant: L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 333.

  249-50 subpoenaed several staff members of the China Daily News: Renqiu Yu, To Save China, to Save Ourselves, p. 187.

  250 Information on Eugene Moy: Renqiu Yu, p. 188; Andrew Hsiao, ”100 Years of Hell-Raising,” Village Voice, June 23, 1998; L. Ling-chi Wang, pp. 439, 443; Him Mark Lai, ”China and the Chinese Community: The Political Dimension,” Chinese America: History and Perspectives 1999, p. 11.

  250 interrogated Tan Yumin: Renqiu Yu, p. 191.

  250 ”The FBI guy shouted back”: Ibid., p. 187.

  250 ”fantastic system”: Kitano and Daniels, Asian Americans, p. 43.

  251 ”destroy that system”: L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 425.

  251 J. Edgar Hoover: L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 406; Roger Daniels, Asian America, p. 305.

  251 ”Only once before in modern times”: L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 423.

  251 ” ‘criminal conspiracy’ ”: Report from Drumwright on visa fraud. File 122.4732/12-955, Location 250/1/05/05, Box 720, Record Group 59, National Archives, Washington, D.C; L. Ling-chi Wang, pp. 422, 423. Wang provides an excellent summary of Drumwright’s charges.

  251 ”Chinatown was hit like an A-bomb fell”: Ibid., p. 418.

  252 ”mass inquisition”: Ibid., p. 422. It should be noted that during the Korean War, the Chinese American community lived under the threat of mass incarceration. In 1952, the federal government allocated $775,000 to establish six internment camps, in the states of California, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, and Florida. (L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 368.)

  252 ten thousand Chinese confessed: Ronald Takaki, p. 416.

  253 some 120 Chinese intellectuals were detained: Yelong Han, ”An Untold Story: American Policy Towards Chinese Students in the United States,” The Journal of American-East Asian Relations, Spring 1993. As cited in Ting Ni, p. 25.

  253 Biographical details on Tsien Hsue-shen: Iris Chang, Thread of the Silkworm (New York: Basic Books, 1995).

  256 ”That this government permitted this genius”: ”Made in the U.S.A.?,” 60 Minutes, October 27, 1970, CBS Archives.

  256 Information on Cameron House in the 1950s: Author interview with Harry Chuck at Cameron House, March 17, 1999.

  257 ”many of my peers strove to be all-American”: Judy Yung, Unbound Feet, p. 287.

  257 passed an anti-gambling law: Ben Fong-Torres, The Rice Room: Growing Up Chinese-American: From Number Two Son to Rock’n‘Roll (New York: Plume, 1995), p. 53.

  257 New York State Housing Survey: L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 515.

  257 Information on William Chew: Author interview with Bill Chew; Chew’s unpublished manuscript in his private collection.

  258 the ”Chinese Rockefeller of Hawaii”: Burt A. Folkart, ”Known as ‘Chinese Rockefeller’ of the Islands; Hawaii Multimillionaire Chinn Ho Dies,” Los Angeles Times, May 14, 1987.

  258 Information on Delbert Wong: Interview with Delbert Wong, interview #59, Southern California Chinese American Oral History Project; Sam Chu Lin, ”Historical Society Commemorates WWII 50th Anniversary,” Asian Week, November 11, 1994; K. Connie Kang, ”From China to California, a Six-Generation Saga: One Family’s Milestones and Challenges Tell the Story of a Changing World,” Los Angeles Times, June 29, 1997; Lillian Lim, ”Chinese American Trailblazers in the Law.”

  258 Median family income of $6,207: Betty Lee Sung, p. 128.

  259 $5,660: Ibid., p. 128.

  259 ruled unconstitutional the real estate convenants: Ben Fong-Torres, p. 52. Yet many of the social barriers would remain. When future Nobel laureate C. N. Yang tried to purchase a house in Princeton, New Jersey, in 1954, the seller abruptly returned his down payment, telling Yang that the transaction would hurt his business. (Zhenning Yang, Forty Years of Learning and Teaching [Hong Kong: Sanlian Publishing House, 1985], pp. 11-12.)

  259 moved in furtively: Rodney Chow interview, interview #149, Southern California Chinese American Oral History Project.

  259 ”The first night, they broke my windows”: Interview with Lancing F. Lee, Southern California Chinese American Oral History Project.

  260 ”the only Asian family”: Interview with Alice Young, Nightline, ABC News, June 28, 1999.

  260 nationwide study recorded twenty-eight American cities with Chinatowns: Betty Lee Sung, The Story of the Chinese in America, p. 144.

  260 fallen to sixteen: Ibid., p. 144.

  Chapter Fifteen. New Arrivals, New Lives: The Chaotic 1960s

  263 seventy thousand people: Nicholas D. Kristof, ”Hong Kong, Wary of China, Sees Its Middle Class Fleeing,” New York Times, November 9,1987.

  264 only a token 105 Chinese: H. Brett Melendy, Chinese and Japanese Americans, p. 66.

  264 Thanks to special legislation: For details of the Refugee Relief Act of 1953 and legislation for immigrants with special skills, see L. Ling-chi Wang, ”Politics of Assimilation and Repression: History of the Chinese in the United States, 1940-1970,” unpublished manuscript, Asian American Studies Collection, Ethnic Studies Library, University of California at Berkeley.

  264 threw up barbed wire: Betty Lee Sung, pp. 92-93.

  264 presidential directive: Victor G. and Brett de Bary Nee, Longtime Californ‘, p. 254.

  264 some fifteen thousand Chinese refugees: Betty Lee Sung, p. 93.

  265 ”no basis in either logic or reason”: John F. Kennedy, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1964), pp. 594-97.

  265 Statistics and political quotes regarding the Hart-Ce
ller Act, or 1965 Immigration Act: ”Three Decades of Mass Immigration: The Legacy of the 1965 Immigration Act,” Immigration Review, No. 3-95, September 1995.

  266 Lillian Sing: Testimony of Lillian Sing, ”Chinese in San Francisco—1970.” Employment Problems of the Community as Presented in Testimony Before the California Fair Employment Practice Commission, December 1970, p. 15. As cited in Stanford Lyman, Chinese Americans, p. 143.

  266 1969 San Francisco Human Rights Commission: Victor G. and Brett de Bary Nee, pp. 302-3; Cheng-Tsu Wu, ed., ”Chink!,” p. 241.

  267 ”It’s really amazing how the Chinese exploit themselves”: Ronald Takaki, Strangers from a Different Shore, p. 428. ”Here we are like the disabled,” one Chinese woman said of immigrant vulnerability. ”We’re deaf because we cannot understand the language. We’re dumb because we cannot speak it. We’re blind because we cannot read it. And we’re lame because we cannot find our way around.” (Ruthanne Lum McCunn, Chinese American Portraits, p. 151.)

  267 ”Your father has to work a long time”: M. Elaine Mar, Paper Daughter (New York: HarperCollins, 1999), p. 98.

  267 ”We each slept on a small piece of plywood”: Grace Pung Guthrie, A School Divided, p. 71.

  268 greatest tuberculosis rate in the country: Victor G. and Brett de Bary Nee, p. xxv; L. Ling-chi Wang, p. 509.

  268 highest suicide rate: Victor G. and Brett de Bary Nee, pp. xxv, 260.

  268 labor in sweatshops for at least eight to ten hours a day: Victor Low, The Unimpressible Race, p. 143.

  268 ”They work half the night”: Ibid., p. 144.

  268 ”It began with the newcomers getting hassled”: Bill Lee, Chinese Playground: A Memoir (San Francisco: Rhapsody Press, p. 1999), pp. 64-65.

  269 ”It was payback time”: Ibid., p. 5.

  269 Dressed in black from head to toe: Stanford Lyman, Chinese Americans, p. 163; Bill Lee, Chinese Playground, p. 128.

  269 ”delinquency was too clinical a word”: Ben Fong-Torres, The Rice Room, p. 193. The worst outbreak of gang violence occurred on September 4, 1977, when three masked men armed with shotguns and automatic weapons burst into the Golden Dragon restaurant in San Francisco Chinatown and fired randomly on customers, killing five people and wounding eleven.