For those of you who have not read my Group Discussion post, this unit is very personal to me because my husband is a 3rd generation Chinese American. He grew up in the Mississippi Delta about 50 miles south of Memphis, Tennessee, as did his parents. One of the things I learned very quickly when asking questions about his family was that my husband really did not know very much about his ancestry as there was always some doubt about the real story of their coming to the US. Last semester, our daughter had to do a genealogy project for school, so we made a concerted effort to find out as much as we could. From questioning the older family members, one of whom was a Chinese "bought bride" and through reading the transcripts of a University of Southern Mississippi oral history project about he Delta Chinese, we were able to find out a few family facts.
My memory for dates is not what it used to be, but sometime before the turn of the 20th century, Chinese immigration to the US was completely outlawed. When the San Francisco fire happened and all of the documents were lost, the law allowed children of Chinese already in America to immigrate. In order to get into the US, many Chinese used forged documents and were called "paper sons", or sons on paper only. My husband's grandfather appears to have been one of these paper sons, and that is why the family has never talked much about the immigration. Grandfather made his way from San Francisco across the country to Chicago working in grocery stores. From Chicago, he traveled south to the Mississippi Delta and opened a small town grocery store where he ultimately raised his family and where most of them are still today. Most people would be surprised at how many Chinese families there are in the area from Memphis to Vicksburg, Mississippi. I will attempt to post a photograph that was sent to my husband's father a couple of months ago by a cousin who recently visited their village in China. The picture shows the village gate, but since I don't read Chinese, I cannot tell you what the writing says.
2 comments:
What an interesting story about your family. Thanks for sharing it. I have a very close Chinese friend who came to the US when he was 18 so he could study medicine. We've had a lot to talk about due to the lesson on China and since my parents have been importing from China for nearly 20 years, my interest in the cultural revolution and other historical events has heightened and I hope to do more reading and research after this course is over.
It is nice to have a diverse family with a variety of cultures and history. Great connection! Thanks for sharing.
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