American Paper Son: A Chinese Immigrant in the Midwest

by Wayne Hung Wong

In the early and mid-twentieth century, Chinese migrants evaded draconian anti-immigrant laws by entering the US under false papers that identified them as the sons of people who had returned to China to marry. Wayne Hung Wong tells the story of his life after emigrating to Wichita, Kansas, as a thirteen-year-old paper son. After working in his father’s restaurant as a teen, Wong served in an all-Chinese Air Force unit stationed in China during World War II. His account traces the impact of race and segregation on his service experience and follows his postwar life from finding a wife in Taishan through his involvement in the government’s amnesty program for Chinese immigrants and career in real estate. Throughout, Wong describes the realities of life as part of a small Chinese American community in a midwestern town. Vivid and rich with poignant insights, American Paper Son explores twentieth-century Asian American history through one person’s experiences.

Genres: Memoir

192 pages, Paperback

First published November 14, 2005

Reviews

[Kerstin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had to read this book for my history college class. I thought it was going to be boring but i really enjoyed it. I opened me up to how the Chinese lived when some of them were first coming to the United States. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in that time period.

[Victoria · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an absolutely beautiful and heartwarming read. It is surprising and defies what anyone would suspect the life of a Chinese immigrant in 1930s Wichita, Kansas, would be like. Wayne Wong enlisted in World War II and joined an all- Chinese American unit of the Flying Tigers.