Unbound Feet: A Social History of Chinese Women in San Francisco

by Judy Yung

  6. Florence Chinn Kwan, interview with author, October i z, 1988. Chinese Christian families were the first in Chinatown to dress in Western clothing. Clara Lee, whose father, Chan Hon Fun, was also a minister, recalls feeling conspicuous when she first wore a Western dress in Chinatown: "When I walked down from Stockton Street to go to the store, I was all dressed up and so proud. Then some Chinese man said, `Yun ng yun, gwai ng gwai, do ng gee jo muk yeh?' [It doesn't appear to be human or devil; what is it?). And of course I cried" (Clara Lee, interview with author, October z, 1986).

  7. Florence Chinn Kwan, "Some Rambling Thoughts on Why I Am a Christian" (unpublished paper, November 1966).

  8. Florence Chinn Kwan, interview with author, October 7, 1988.

  g. Ibid.

  i o. To compare how Mexican American and Japanese American women experienced acculturation and responded to cultural conflicts, see Sanchez, Becoming Mexican American; Vicki L. Ruiz, "`Star Struck': Acculturation, Adolescence, and Mexican American Women, 1910-1950," in Small Worlds: Children and Adolescents in America, 1850-1950, ed. Elliott West and Paul Petrik (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 199z), pp. 61-8o; Mei Nakano, Japanese American Women: Three Generations, 1890-1990 (Berkeley, Calif.: Mina Press, 1990); and Valerie Matsumoto, "Desperately Seeking `Deirdre': Gender Roles, Multicultural Relations, and Nisei Women Writers of the 193os," Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 1 z, no. 1 (1991): 19-32.

  i 1. Ching Chao Wu, "Chinatowns"; Kit King Louis, "A Study of American-born and American-reared Chinese in Los Angeles" (Master's thesis, University of Southern California, 1931); and Marjorie Lee, "Hu Jee: The Forgotten Second Generation of Chinese America, 1930-1950" (Master's thesis, University of California, Los Angeles, 1984).

  1 z. I am indebted to Colleen Fong and Marjorie Lee for calling my attention to Karl Mannheim's "The Problem of Generations," in Essays on the Sociology of Knowledge by Karl Mannheim, ed. Paul Keeskemeti (London: Routledge & Kegan, 1959), pp. 276-32o. According to Mannheim, there are three aspects to the sociology of generations: generational status, that is, being born within the same historical and cultural context; actual generation, that is, participating in the common destiny of the historical and social unit; and generational unit, that is, sharing the same response to sociohistorical forces. By studying generational units we acknowledge the importance of historical location rather than birth order in understanding the diversity of political perspectives within an actual generation. Mannheim's contention is that one unit's perspective generally comes to dominate, speaking for and influencing the entire generation. Jade Snow Wong's perspective of cultural fusion, also found in the autobiographical writings of her peers, can be said to be that dominant view for her generation.

  13. The following works were also useful in my analysis of Jade Snow Wong's life story: Lowell Chun-Hoon, "Jade Snow Wong and the Fate of ChineseAmerican Identity," Amerasia Journal 1 (1971): 5z-63; Elaine H. Kim, Asian American Literature: An Introduction to the Writings and Their Social Context (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1982), pp. 58-90; and Marjorie Lee, "Hu-Jee," pp. 64-79.

  14. J. Wong, Fifth Chinese Daughter, p. z.

  15. Ibid., p. vii. Jade Snow Wong does not follow this practice in her second autobiography, No Chinese Stranger (New York: Harper & Row, 11975). That book begins in the third person singular, but she switches to first person midway through, after the death of her father-as a sign of her readiness to be the head of her own family.

  16. J. Wong, Fifth Chinese Daughter, pp. 2-3.

  17. Ibid., pp. 14-15.

  18. Ibid., p. 3 5.

  19. Ibid., p. 69.

  20. Ibid., pp. 113-14.

  z,. Ibid., pp. 109-10.

  zz. Ibid., p. 12.8.

  Z3. Ibid., p. 246.

  24. "Story of a Chinese College Girl (The Conflict Between the Old and the Young)," Survey of Race Relations Collection, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace, Stanford University.

  25. Ibid., p. 3.

  z6. According to another interview in the Survey of Race Relations Collection, "Miss Wong says there are two kinds of girls in Chinatown, the oldfashioned Chinese girl and the modern Chinese girl. A man who wants a real Chinese wife marries the old-fashioned girl, who can keep house, will be willing to stay at home and who will not spend too much on paint and clothes" ("Esther Wong, Native-born Chinese, San Francisco, July i, 19z4," P. I).

  27. "Story of a Chinese College Girl," p. 8.

  z8. Ibid., p. 3.

  29. See Paula Fass, The Damned and the Beautiful: American Youth in the 192os (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977); and John D'Emilio and Estelle Freedman, Intimate Matters: A History of Sexuality in America (New York: Harper & Row, 1988).

  30. Judy Chu, "Anna May Wong," in Counterpoint: Perspectives on Asian America, ed. Emma Gee (Los Angeles: Asian American Studies Center, University of California, 1976), pp. z84-88; and San Francisco Chronicle, June 3, i9z8, p. 13.

  31. San Francisco Examiner, May I, 19zz, p. 8.

  3 z. "Interview with Flora Belle Jan, Daughter of Proprietor of the `Yet Far Low,' Chop Suey Restaurant, Tulare St. and China Alley, Fresno," Survey of Race Relations Collection, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace, Stanford University.

  33. "Chinatown Sheiks" appeared in the San Francisco Examiner, March 27, 1924, P. 9. "Old Mother Grundy" was mentioned by Flora Belle Jan in the Survey of Race Relations interview, but I have been unable to locate a copy of it.

  34. I am indebted to Flora Belle Jan's daughters, whose names have been withheld by request, for sharing some of the letters written by their mother to her friend, Ludmelia Holstein.

  3 5. Flora Belle Jan, letter to Ludmelia Holstein, July 17, 19z' -

  36. Ibid., September 3, 1918; August 17, 1911; June z8, 1920.

  37. Ibid., August zo, 19zo.

  38. Ibid., July 17, 1921.

  39. For a history of discrimination against Chinese students in the San Francisco public schools, see Low, Unimpressible Race.

  40. Liu Pei Chi, A History of the Chinese in the United States of America, vol. z (in Chinese) (Taipei: Liming Wenhua Shiye Gongsi, 1981), P. 363.

  41. CSYP, February 17, 1903.

  4z. CSYP, February 17, 1913,

  43. F. Chinn, "Religious Education," p. 40. In 19o6, the San Francisco school board changed the name of the school from Chinese Primary School to Oriental Public School to accommodate Japanese and Korean students. Under pressure from the Chinese American Citizens Alliance, which found "Oriental" derogatory, the name was subsequently changed to Commodore Stockton School in 1924. See Low, Unimpressible Race, pp. IS2-15.

  44. Mary Bo-Tze Lee, "Problems of the Segregated School for Asiatics in San Francisco" (Master's thesis, University of California, Berkeley, 1911).

  45 . Low, Unimpressible Race, pp. 115-23.

  46. Liu Pei Chi, History, p. 364.

  47. Shih Hsien-ju, "The Social and Vocational Adjustment of the Second Generation Chinese High School Students in San Francisco" (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Berkeley, 1937), PP. 36-54.

  48. Eva Lowe, interview with Genny Lim, July 15, 1982, Chinese Women of America Research Project, Chinese Culture Foundation of San Francisco.

  49. J. Wong, Fifth Chinese Daughter, pp. 68-69.

  5o. Thomas W. Chinn, Bridging the Pacific: San Francisco's Chinatown and Its People (San Francisco: Chinese Historical Society of America, 1989), P. 248.

  51. "Story of a Chinese College Girl," p. 4.

  52. Shih, "Social and Vocational Adjustment," pp. 56-64.

  53. Janie Chu, "The Oriental Girl in the Occident," Women and Mission 3, no. 5 (August 1926): 175.

  54• See Kwoh, "Occupational Status."

  55. "The cream" is taken from Grace W. Wang's "A Speech on SecondGeneration Chinese in U.S.A.," presented to the Chinese Women's Association in New York: "These college and high school students are sometimes referred to as the cream of Second Generation Chinese, for only a few members of the average Chinese commu
nity are students seeking higher learning" (Chinese Digest, August 7, 1936, p. 6).

  56. Florence Chinn Kwan, interview with author.

  57. Christopher Chow and Russell Leong, "A Pioneer Chinatown Teacher: An Interview with Alice Fong Yu," Amerasia journal 5, no. 1 (1978): 77. See also Katie Choy, "Alice Fong Yu: Remembrances of a Chinese Pioneer," Prism 11, no. z (December 1974): 5-8.

  58. Bessie Jeong, interview with Suellen Cheng and Munson Kwok, December 17, 1981, Southern California Chinese American Oral History Project, Chinese Historical Society of Southern California, Los Angeles.

  59. San Francisco Chronicle, May 14, 1914, p. 8.

  60. Edwin Owyang, interview with author, September to, 1987.

  61. Mrs. William Z. L. Sung, "A Pioneer Chinese Family," in The Life, Influence, and the Role of the Chinese in the United States, 1776-1960 (San Francisco: Chinese Historical Society of America, 1976), p. 291.

  6z. See E. Glenn, "Split Household, Small Producer."

  63. May Kew Fung, interview with Jeffrey Ow, March z5, 199o, Jeffrey Ow private collection.

  64. According to Mickey Lee, the first Chinese girls to take jobs at the 1915 Exposition at Treasure Island were calledgee yoiv nu (liberated women) because they had broken with tradition and left home to work (Mickey Lee, interview with author, November 1, 1989).

  65. Quoted in Louis, "Study of American-born and American-reared Chinese," p. 85. His reference to "the Americans" as exclusively the white dominant group was common during this period, and even today most Chinese, regardless of where they were born, do not feel they are a part of America or that they are Americans.

  66. Community Chest 1930 Survey, pp. 22-23.

  67. Eliot Grinnell Mears, Resident Orientals on the American Pacific Coast: Their Legal and Economic Status (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1928), p. zoo.

  68. Donaldina Cameron, "Salvaged for Service," Women and Mission 4, no. 5 (August 1927): 65.

  69. Pascoe, Relations of Rescue, pp. 166-71. For a comparative analysis of how and why Japanese American women became concentrated in domestic work, see E. Glenn, Issei, Nisei, Warbride.

  70. William Carlson Smith, Americans in Process: A Study of Our Citizens of Oriental Ancestry (Ann Arbor: Edwards Bros., 1937), PP. 92-93, 301.

  71. Gladys Ng Gin, interview with author, November 4, 1988-

  72. Rose Yuen Ow, interview with Philip P. Choy and Him Mark Lai, September 9, 1970, Him Mark Lai private collection.

  73. "Savings Development," Bulletin, Financial Advertisers Association, May 1941,P-269.

  74. Ibid.

  75. "Our Chinatown Branch," Bank American, January, 1956, p. 7.

  76. Chinese Digest, April 10, 1936, pp. io, 14.

  77. Ruth Fong Chinn, "Square and Circle Club of San Francisco: A Chinese Women's Culture" (Senior thesis, University of California, Santa Cruz, 1987), PP. 29-43; Mrs. Choy Lee, interview with Him Mark Lai and Helen Lai, March z, 1975, Him Mark Lai private collection; and Cameron, "Salvaged for Service," p. 70.

  78. During the 191os, with the assistance of the female-dominated Telephone Operators Union, thousands of women across the country walked off their jobs to protest the industry's autocratic methods and to demand better hours, wages, and benefits. Although significant, their resistance and union militancy were short-lived. See Stephan H. Norwood, Labor's Flaming Youth: Telephone Operators and Worker Militancy, 1878-1923 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 199o).

  79. See Broussard, Black San Francisco, chap. z; and Elizabeth Higginbotham, "Employment for Professional Black Women in the Twentieth Century," paper prepared for the Albany Conference, Ingredients for Women's Employment Policy, April 19-zo, 1985.

  8o. J. Wong, Fifth Chinese Daughter, p. 188.

  8i. Ibid., p. 234.

  8z. K. Choy, "Alice Fong Yu," p. 7.

  83. Mickey Fong Lee, interview with Ernest Chann, February z3, 1982, Ernest Chann private collection.

  84. Bessie Jeong, interview.

  85. Margaret Chung, "TV Summary," unpublished autobiography, Asian American Studies Library, University of California, Berkeley.

  86. Chinese Hospital Medical Staff Archives,1978-1981 (San Francisco: Chinese Hospital, 1982), pp. 8-9.

  87. J. Wong, Fifth Chinese Daughter, p. 95.

  88. Alice Fong Yu, interview with Gordon Chang, November z 1, 1986, Gordon Chang private collection.

  89. Flora Belle Jan's daughters (names withheld by request), interview with author, August 6, 1989.

  9o. Flora Belle Jan, letter to Ludmelia Holstein, December 1944.

  91. Ibid., July 16, 1947.

  92. R. Lee, Chinese in the United States, p. 124.

  93. Barbara Sickerman, ed., Notable American Women: The Modern Period (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980), PP. 414-15•

  94. See Fass, Damned and the Beautiful; D'Emilio and Freedman, Intimate Matters, chap. 11; and Mary P. Ryan, Womanhood in America: From Colonial Times to the Present (New York: Franklin Watts, 1983), chap. 5.

  95. Chingwah Lee, "The Second Generation of the Chinese," Hospital Social Service 21, no. 3 (March 1930): 193

  96. Janie Chu, "Oriental Girl," p. 175.

  97. Other minority women experienced the same predicament. See Ruiz, "`Star Struck"'; and Matsumoto, "Desperately Seeking `Deirdre."'

  98. Chinese YWCA, "Annual Report," 1926.

  99. CSYP, August 23, 1915.

  ioo. Sexual exploitation becomes more pronounced when beauty contests turn into bathing suit contests in the post-World War II period. See Judy Yung, "Miss Chinatown USA and the Representation of Beauty," paper presented at the Ninth National Conference of the Association of Asian American Studies, San Jose, Calif.: May 30, 1992.

  1oi. San Francisco Examiner, March 27, 1924, P. 9.

  ioz. Flora Belle Jan, letter to Ludmelia Holstein, November 27, 19z5-

  103. Florence Lee Loo, interview with June Quan, January 6, 1982, Chinese Women of America Research Project, Chinese Culture Foundation of San Francisco.

  104. In 193 5, five denominational institutions provided for the care and welfare of Chinese children: Presbyterian Girls Home, Methodist Home (for girls), Ming Quong Home (established by Presbyterians for girls), Chung Mci Home (established by Baptists for boys), and Mei Lun Yuen Home (established by Presbyterians for infants). See CSERA 1935 Survey, pp. 47-5 z.

  105. F. Chinn, "Religious Education," pp. 49-5o; Community Chest 1930 Survey, pp. 17-18; CSERA 1935 Survey, pp. 53-58; and Him Mark Lai, Cong huaqiao dao huaren (From overseas Chinese to Chinese American) (Hong Kong: Joint Publishing Co., 199z), pp. 138-49.

  io6. F. Chinn, "Religious Education," p. 46; and Chinese YWCA, correspondence, board minutes, and staff reports.

  107. CSYP, November 4, 1928.

  io8. R. Chinn, "Square and Circle Club," pp. 46-47; T. Chinn, Bridging the Pacific, pp. 129-30; and San Francisco Examiner, March 12, 1975, P. 22.

  109. San Francisco Daily News, September 17, 1924.

  11o. See Linda Gordon, "Black and White Visions of Welfare: Women's Welfare Activism, 18go-1945," in Unequal Sisters: A Multicultural Reader in U.S. Women's History, zd ed., ed. Vicki L. Ruiz and Ellen Carol DuBois (New York: Routledge, 1994), PP. 157-85•

  111. I am indebted to Rosemary Chan for giving me access, with the permission of the Square and Circle Club, to the club's past minutes and scrapbooks.

  iiz. Had they passed, the Dickstein Nationality Bill would have denied citizenship to foreign-born children of Chinese Americans, and the Anti-Alien Land Bill would have barred aliens ineligible to citizenship (Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, and Asian Indians) from owning property in Texas.

  r13. R. Chinn, "Square and Circle Club," p. 54.

  114. Chinese Digest, October z3, 1936, p. Ti.

  IT 5. Louis, "Study of American-born and American-reared Chinese," p. 127.

  116. See Sanchez, Becoming Mexican American; and Bill Hosokawa, Nisei: The Quiet Americans (New York: William Morrow, 1969).

  117. The Ging Hawk Club,
an organization of young Chinese American women in New York, was founded in 1gz9 under the auspices of the International Institute of the YWCA. The club's name meant "Striving for Learning," and its purpose was "to absorb the best of American culture without losing their Chinese heritage." See Lorraine Wong, "Chinese All American Girl," Record, January 1935, P. zI.

  118. Robert Dunn, "Does My Future Lie in China or America?" Chinese D i g e s t , May 1 5 , 1936, PP• 3, 13.

  119. Kaye Hong, "Does My Future Lie in China or America?" Chinese Digest, May zz, 1936, PP. 3, 14.

  I zo. Jane Kwong Lee, "The Future of Second Generation Chinese Lies in China and America," Chinese Digest, June 5, 1936, P- 5.

  IzI. Chinese Digest, May 1937, P- 8.

  1zz. Chinese Digest, July 3, 1936, p. 14.

  123. CSYP, June 25, 1935•

  124. CSYP, March 3, 1937.

  Iz5. J. Wong, Fifth Chinese Daughter, pp. 134-35.

  126. It is uncertain how many Chinese Americans actually went to China for work in the 19zos and 193os. Rose Hum Lee, in her article "Chinese Dilemma," Phylon 1o, no. z (1949): 140, indicated that "many Chinese-Americans have journeyed to the land of their forefathers to pursue their professional and occupational careers. China's need for leadership has opened avenues of expression which the society here did not offer. Since many are the first-generation born on American soil, they are bi-lingual and had a knowledge of the ideographic language. Their adjustment there was notable, and the Chinese-American group was a sizeable one in any port city of importance, with California, of course, sending the largest contingent." According to Kum Pui Lai, in "Attitudes of the Chinese in Hawaii Toward Chinese Language Schools," Sociology and Social Research zo, no. z (November 1935): 140-44, 741 Chinese Americans from Hawaii were in China, mainly teaching in universities and colleges like Lingnam University, St. John's Shanghai University, Peking Union Medical College, and Yenjing University. Another article, "California-educated Chinese Rebuild Canton" by Julean Arnold, in the Chinese Christian Student, May-June 1934, PP. 8-9, 34, noted that only about 6o Chinese Americans had gone to China; most of them, Arnold stated, were alumni of the University of California who lived and worked in Shanghai and Canton as bankers, businesspeople, engineers, and government officials.