Old San Francisco Chinatown, I found a map!!
#AsianStudies #ChineseAmericanHistory #CaliforniaHistory #SanFranciscoHistory #TongWars #WarriorTelevisionShow #HistoryOfOrganizedCrime #AmericanWest #ScatteredThoughts
Greetings! Another publication of Scattered Thoughts and Focused Investigations. Consider this a scattered thought, a shorter piece. As stated below, one of my areas of current research are the Chinese in the Old American West and the Tong Wars that were part of that. This is one such publication, sharing one small part of my on-going research. If things go well, many more on the subject will follow, mixed in irregularly with pieces on other subjects, and over time a great deal of knowledge will be shared.
Oooh!! Look what I found!! Sometime ago, I became annoyed over the lack of historical accuracy in the TV show "Warrior." It was a fictional serial about Chinese Tong War intrigues in 1880s Old West San Francisco that aired for three 10 episode seasons on HBO and Cinemax. It was good if you wanted to watch an ultra-violent, R-rated, over the topic gangster series with a largely but not entirely racially Asian cast. However, as it's about as historically accurate as episodes of Bonanza or similiar traditional Westerns, in other words not very, it often drove me up the wall. (The American Western genre is often a forum for discussions about concerns of the present, not concerns of the late 19th Century, and the series Warrior was no exception to this.)
Now being the author of a book entitled "Tongs, Gangs, and Triads - Chinese Crime Groups in North America," copyright 1995, I started pulling books off the shelf and doing research into the tong wars and after a while decided that any serious research would definitely require a good map of San Francisco Chinatown of the pre-earthquake era. Turns out there are several.
This seems to be a very good one, searchable and with zoom features.
Of course this map, like anything submitted as historical evidence, must be put in historical context. As my old academic advisor, Sherman Cochrane (great man), used to say (and probably still does ) “What motivated these people?” As the notes on the Cornell Image of the map clearly state ( see Cornell citation ) the map was explicitly created to strengthen the anti-Chinese feelings of many residents of San Francisco of the time, and then to convert these feelings into anti-Chinese political and legislative action. And why was there a great deal of anti-Chinese feeling among many of the Whites of the time?
The reasons are multi-faceted and clearly documented. Of course, racism and xenophobia played a part. And one manifestation of the fears was an unrealistic fear of Chinatown as a source of exotic diseases ( Venit Shelton). While exaggerated, it stands to reason that as the majority of 1880s San Francisco Chinatown’s population was largely male, largely sojourner, often young, and largely impoverished living in low rent quarters and sharing beds, they may not have been inclined to maintain the highest standards of cleanliness or hygiene. One wonders how their standards of cleanliness compared to the often low standards seen in many college dorms in the USA today. Men without women can be truly filthy creatures at times.
There were also documented problems with crime and tong killings (Huston, Dillon), opium smoking (In a Chinatown Opium Den), not just wide-spread prostitution but the fact that it routinely involved the public soliciting and sale of sexual services of enslaved human-trafficking victims (Tong, Yung, Huston) Therefore, there were valid reasons to support strong legislation intended to end vice in Chinatown, even though it must be admitted that these valid concerns were often intermixed with not just racism and xenophobia, but the very real fact that the Chinese laborers often were willing to work and work hard for rates of pay far below that of the local Whites. This in itself would undoubtedly produce intense friction when jobs were tight.
And, hey kids, remember, for more detailed pieces on the real history of the Chinese in the “Old West” and the real Tong Wars, subscribe to S.T.A.F.I., and tell your friends and share on social media please.
THIS MAP MAY BE FOUND AT THE TWO LINKS BELOW
https://digital.library.cornell.edu/catalog/ss:3293857
https://www.davidrumsey.com/luna/servlet/detail/RUMSEY~8~1~215016~5501920:Official-Map-of-Chinatown-in-San-Fr#
PARTIAL BIBLIOGRAPHY
In a Chinatown Opium Den. Lee, Anthony W. California Historical Society. March 9, 2022. Video. 1:15:26. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xP0vLO5Y2k
Dillon, Richard H. The Hatchet Men. New York: Coward-McCann Inc, 1962.
Huston, Peter. Tongs, Gangs, and Triads: Chinese Crime Groups in North America. Boulder, CO: Paladin Press. 1995.
Tong, Benson. Unsubmissive Women, Chinese Prostitutes in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco. Norman OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1994.
Venit Shelton, Tamara. Herbs and Roots, History of Chinese Doctors in the American Medical Marketplace. New Haven & London: Yale University Press. 2019.
Yung, Judy. Unbound Feet, A Social History of Chinese Women in San Francisco. Berkeley and Los Angeles, California: University of California Press, 1995.
“Official Map of Chinatown in San Francisco : prepared under the supervision of the special committee of the Board of Supervisors. July 1885.” Cornell University Library Digital Collections. Accessed on March 25, 2024. https://digital.library.cornell.edu/catalog/ss:3293857