Chinese American historian Philip Choy grew up in segregated San Francisco Chinatown and it bothered him.
“I recognized early on that we were not part of a larger society,” Choy said to the San Francisco Chronicle,
“and it plagued my young mind.” He’s written a new book “San Francisco Chinatown” that goes all the way back to the early days of California to the election of Mayor Ed Lee as San Francisco’s first elected Chinese American mayor. The city has come a long when since the days he was growing up. There were schools set up specifically for Chinese so as not to mix the races. But Choy refused to go along, and forced the school district to enroll him into a “white” school away from Chinatown. He recalls when Chinatown was promoted as a dark sinister place in an effort to attract tourist dollars. The myth has died, but the tourists remain. Choy recently discussed his new book in a fascinating hour long interview on KQED. You can here it here.
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