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Driven Out: The Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans
A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK
The brutal and systematic “ethnic cleansing” of Chinese Americans in California and the Pacific Northwest in the second half of the nineteenth century is a shocking–and virtually unexplored–chapter of American history. Driven Out unearths this forgotten episode in our nation’s past. Drawing on years of groundbreaking research, Jean Pfaelzer reveals how, beginning in 1848, lawless citizens and duplicitous politicians purged dozens of communities of thousands of Chinese residents–and how the victims bravely fought back.
In town after town, as races and classes were pitted against one another in the raw and anarchistic West, Chinese miners and merchants, lumberjacks and field workers, prostitutes and merchants’ wives, were gathered up at gunpoint and marched out of town, sometimes thrown into railroad cars along the very tracks they had built.
Here, in vivid detail, are unforgettable incidents such as the torching of the Chinatown in Antioch, California, after Chinese prostitutes were accused of giving seven young men syphilis, and a series of lynchings in Los Angeles bizarrely provoked by a Chinese wedding. From the port of Seattle to the mining towns in California’s Siskiyou Mountains to “Nigger Alley” in Los Angeles, the first Chinese Americans were hanged, purged, and banished. Chinatowns across the West were burned to the ground.
But the Chinese fought They filed the first lawsuits for reparations in the United States, sued for the restoration of their property, prosecuted white vigilantes, demanded the right to own land, and, years before Brown v. Board of Education , won access to public education for their children. Chinese Americans organized strikes and vegetable boycotts in order to starve out towns that tried to expel them. They ordered arms from China and, with Winchester rifles and Colt revolvers, defended themselves. In 1893, more than 100,000 Chinese Americans refused the government’s order to wear photo identity cards to prove their legal status–the largest mass civil disobedience in United States history to that point.
Driven Out features riveting characters, both heroic and villainous, white and Asian. Charles McGlashen, a newspaper editor, spearheaded a shift in the tactics of persecution, from brutality to legal boycotts of the Chinese, in order to mount a run for governor of California. Fred Bee, a creator of the Pony Express, became the Chinese consul and one of the few attorneys willing to defend the Chinese. Lum May, a dry goods store owner, saw his wife dragged from their home and driven insane. President Grover Cleveland, hoping that China’s 400,000 subjects would buy the United States out of its economic crisis, persuaded China to abandon the overseas Chinese in return for a trade treaty. Quen Hing Tong, a merchant, sought an injunction against the city of San Jose in an important precursor to today’s suits against racial profiling and police brutality.
In Driven Out , Jean Pfaelzer sheds a harsh light on America’s past. This is a story of hitherto unknown racial pogroms, purges, roundups, and brutal terror, but also a record of valiant resistance and community. This deeply resonant and eye-opening work documents a significant and disturbing episode in American history.
“Jean Pfaelzer has pulled back the veil on one of the most horrendous, frightening, violent, and little known moments in American history, when the Chinese were driven from their homes and businesses in an effort to expel them from communities, states, and ultimately the country. This is the most comprehensive history of this period I have ever read, and Pfaelzer has written it with sensitivity and a keen eye for the horrifying, heartbreaking, and often uplifting and triumphant details. Driven Out couldn't be more timely or important.”
–Lisa See, Author, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
“Driven the Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans is a meticulously researched and very readable recounting of America’s systematic effort to purge all Chinese immigrants, from the mid-19th into the early-20th centuries. Jean Pfaelzer documents hundreds of cases in which the Chinese were lynched, maimed, burned out of their neighborhoods, and forced at gunpoint to leave mining camps, small villages, Indian reservations, and Chinatowns. The methodical and ruthless nature of this ethnic cleansing was matched only by the resistance from the Chinese — sometimes with guns and knives or fists and sometimes with savvy recourse to their government representatives as well as petitions, public confrontations, and hundreds of lawsuits using white attorneys up to the U.S. Supreme Court. Pfaelzer has names and stories for these incidents — making the actors real and accessible. This is a valuable addition to our understanding of the making of modern America.”
–Franklin Odo, Director, Smithsonian Institution Asian Pacific American Program; Author, The Columbia Documentary History of the Asian...
The brutal and systematic “ethnic cleansing” of Chinese Americans in California and the Pacific Northwest in the second half of the nineteenth century is a shocking–and virtually unexplored–chapter of American history. Driven Out unearths this forgotten episode in our nation’s past. Drawing on years of groundbreaking research, Jean Pfaelzer reveals how, beginning in 1848, lawless citizens and duplicitous politicians purged dozens of communities of thousands of Chinese residents–and how the victims bravely fought back.
In town after town, as races and classes were pitted against one another in the raw and anarchistic West, Chinese miners and merchants, lumberjacks and field workers, prostitutes and merchants’ wives, were gathered up at gunpoint and marched out of town, sometimes thrown into railroad cars along the very tracks they had built.
Here, in vivid detail, are unforgettable incidents such as the torching of the Chinatown in Antioch, California, after Chinese prostitutes were accused of giving seven young men syphilis, and a series of lynchings in Los Angeles bizarrely provoked by a Chinese wedding. From the port of Seattle to the mining towns in California’s Siskiyou Mountains to “Nigger Alley” in Los Angeles, the first Chinese Americans were hanged, purged, and banished. Chinatowns across the West were burned to the ground.
But the Chinese fought They filed the first lawsuits for reparations in the United States, sued for the restoration of their property, prosecuted white vigilantes, demanded the right to own land, and, years before Brown v. Board of Education , won access to public education for their children. Chinese Americans organized strikes and vegetable boycotts in order to starve out towns that tried to expel them. They ordered arms from China and, with Winchester rifles and Colt revolvers, defended themselves. In 1893, more than 100,000 Chinese Americans refused the government’s order to wear photo identity cards to prove their legal status–the largest mass civil disobedience in United States history to that point.
Driven Out features riveting characters, both heroic and villainous, white and Asian. Charles McGlashen, a newspaper editor, spearheaded a shift in the tactics of persecution, from brutality to legal boycotts of the Chinese, in order to mount a run for governor of California. Fred Bee, a creator of the Pony Express, became the Chinese consul and one of the few attorneys willing to defend the Chinese. Lum May, a dry goods store owner, saw his wife dragged from their home and driven insane. President Grover Cleveland, hoping that China’s 400,000 subjects would buy the United States out of its economic crisis, persuaded China to abandon the overseas Chinese in return for a trade treaty. Quen Hing Tong, a merchant, sought an injunction against the city of San Jose in an important precursor to today’s suits against racial profiling and police brutality.
In Driven Out , Jean Pfaelzer sheds a harsh light on America’s past. This is a story of hitherto unknown racial pogroms, purges, roundups, and brutal terror, but also a record of valiant resistance and community. This deeply resonant and eye-opening work documents a significant and disturbing episode in American history.
“Jean Pfaelzer has pulled back the veil on one of the most horrendous, frightening, violent, and little known moments in American history, when the Chinese were driven from their homes and businesses in an effort to expel them from communities, states, and ultimately the country. This is the most comprehensive history of this period I have ever read, and Pfaelzer has written it with sensitivity and a keen eye for the horrifying, heartbreaking, and often uplifting and triumphant details. Driven Out couldn't be more timely or important.”
–Lisa See, Author, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
“Driven the Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans is a meticulously researched and very readable recounting of America’s systematic effort to purge all Chinese immigrants, from the mid-19th into the early-20th centuries. Jean Pfaelzer documents hundreds of cases in which the Chinese were lynched, maimed, burned out of their neighborhoods, and forced at gunpoint to leave mining camps, small villages, Indian reservations, and Chinatowns. The methodical and ruthless nature of this ethnic cleansing was matched only by the resistance from the Chinese — sometimes with guns and knives or fists and sometimes with savvy recourse to their government representatives as well as petitions, public confrontations, and hundreds of lawsuits using white attorneys up to the U.S. Supreme Court. Pfaelzer has names and stories for these incidents — making the actors real and accessible. This is a valuable addition to our understanding of the making of modern America.”
–Franklin Odo, Director, Smithsonian Institution Asian Pacific American Program; Author, The Columbia Documentary History of the Asian...
432 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
February 13, 2020
Jean Pfaelzer's Driven Out: The Forgotten War Against Chinese-Americans explores the harrowing story of harassment, prejudice and violence faced by Asian immigrants to the United States in the 19th Century. Pfaelzer's book analyzes the motives and ambitions of these immigrants - Chinese hoping to strike it rich in the New World, indentured servants and sex workers exploited by Chinese and American employers alike - while assessing the panicked white reaction, ranging from discriminatory laws to violence, from lynchings and riots to full-on pogroms. The book shows how both unscrupulous politicians, businessmen and even (especially?) unions became complicit in redirecting white working class wage against the Chinese aliens," employing xenophobic rhetoric and slurs sadly still in currency. She also commendably avoids the pitfalls common to this sort of book, showing the Chinese as possessing agency and the ability to fight back, whether through legal challenges and boycotts through armed resistance. The prose is a bit dry and academic for easy reading, but it's worthwhile look at a sad chapter of American history whose repercussions are still felt.
July 22, 2015
This is an extremely well-written book about horrible things. I really had to push myself through the last hundred pages because I felt the increasing need to go back in time and punch people for being so ignorant and cruel. I have been reading a great deal about the experiences of Chinese in America at the turn of the 20th century, but this is by far the most graphic, the most detailed, when it comes to the matter of the pogroms and massacres that occurred throughout California and north to Washington.
It's a hard read. It made me angry and frustrated. I'm a native Californian. The more I research, the more I realize how poorly educated I was about real history. In my hometown of Hanford, we were taught to celebrate our pioneer heritage and be proud of China Alley, and history books pretty much said "Chinese were treated badly." That was it. I didn't know that 30 minutes away, Tulare's Chinatown was razed, repeatedly, and the Chinese run out of town. That the same happened in nearby Fresno and Visalia, with Chinese murdered in vineyards as they worked. I called up my mom, who was born and raised in the heart of the state. She had never heard of those incidents, either. I bet 99% of people born and raised in Central California don't know.
Pfaelzer did an excellent job on this book. At times, the details felt a bit too exhaustive--I wanted to know more about incidents outside of Truckee and Humboldt county--but that may have been because of my own emotional exhaustion at reading about inexcusable brutality.
If you want to know about a hidden history of California and the west, seek out this book. Just be sure to pause in reading to go hug kittens or seek out pleasant things, though. I definitely need a lighter read after this.
It's a hard read. It made me angry and frustrated. I'm a native Californian. The more I research, the more I realize how poorly educated I was about real history. In my hometown of Hanford, we were taught to celebrate our pioneer heritage and be proud of China Alley, and history books pretty much said "Chinese were treated badly." That was it. I didn't know that 30 minutes away, Tulare's Chinatown was razed, repeatedly, and the Chinese run out of town. That the same happened in nearby Fresno and Visalia, with Chinese murdered in vineyards as they worked. I called up my mom, who was born and raised in the heart of the state. She had never heard of those incidents, either. I bet 99% of people born and raised in Central California don't know.
Pfaelzer did an excellent job on this book. At times, the details felt a bit too exhaustive--I wanted to know more about incidents outside of Truckee and Humboldt county--but that may have been because of my own emotional exhaustion at reading about inexcusable brutality.
If you want to know about a hidden history of California and the west, seek out this book. Just be sure to pause in reading to go hug kittens or seek out pleasant things, though. I definitely need a lighter read after this.
March 10, 2008
People are stupid and suck. What the hell? Excellent book, just a downer. Where's my wine? What? It's only 8 am? Bah!
June 5, 2024
Ran out of time :(
June 3, 2018
Chinese expatriates have often been called the "Jews of Asia," and been treated accordingly in the Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, and elsewhere. Also too in the United States, which put American constitutional principles to the test and found them wanting in flesh and blood practice. That this major attempt at ethnic cleansing came on the heels of a civil war to "make men free" is doubly ironic; and perhaps why its history has been so determinedly funneled down the Orwellian memory hole.
What has also been benignly neglected is the role of organized labor in this legalized lynchery. Although slighted by labor and left historians, the anti-Chinese movement was the greatest organizing draw for fledgling unions and the Democratic Party throughout the West. There is much hypocrisy all around in this, too: In 400 grinding pages, Jean Pfaelzer shows an endless attack upon a vulnerable minority, instead of dealing with the powerful vested interests exploiting foreign labor and pitting it against the native-born. Much safer to burn Chinatowns than capitalist property, for that would be "anarchy." In a period when workers' strikes and riots were put down with ruthless fury - per the Chicago Haymarket - disgruntled employees were allowed by officials, police, and courts to take their full wrath upon a scapegoat of convenience: much like German conservatives used Hitler to bash the Jews instead of the Gentile rich. That Americans could embrace such demagoguery in the name of freedom shows us how self-interest triumphs over principles virtually every time.
One critique I'll make is the author's grammar. Repeated use of "the Chinese's" as a possessive clattered like a rock on a roof every time it crossed the page. "The role of the Chinese" just sounds right; "the Chinese's role" does not. Overall, though, her book remains the definitive examination of this purposely-suppressed history of the American West and the US in general. I say purposely, because nare a breath is drawn to it in popular Western literature and film, aside from the Cartwright family butler Hop Sing. (This was, btw, the name of a Chinese tong society: yet the violence of highbinder hatchet men, although alluded to, seemed never a direct cause of anti-Chinese rioting. Organized crime in Chinatown rarely touched whites.) The question remains as to why this history was swept under the bamboo mat.
It seems, ironically, due to the triumph of liberalism. Conforming to modern racial etiquette gives an out for perpetrators and apologists to hide their crimes; absolving their role to avoid negativity and divisiveness, allowing healing for later generations. There is a point here. But like suppressing the history of lynchings and race riots, it also allows popular culture to revel in American exceptionalism; and thereby launch crusades in full self-righteousness against other nations for crimes it has also perpetrated. A case in point was the Boxer Rebellion of 1900. Retaliation against Western missionaries was in direct response to the "bulldozing" of Chinese in America, and no doubt more than a few Boxers had experienced the wrong end of a fist themselves in a California mining camp. Such was beyond the comprehension of the five-power coalition of the willing that invaded China to teach it a lesson about human rights. This inspiring tradition continues.
What has also been benignly neglected is the role of organized labor in this legalized lynchery. Although slighted by labor and left historians, the anti-Chinese movement was the greatest organizing draw for fledgling unions and the Democratic Party throughout the West. There is much hypocrisy all around in this, too: In 400 grinding pages, Jean Pfaelzer shows an endless attack upon a vulnerable minority, instead of dealing with the powerful vested interests exploiting foreign labor and pitting it against the native-born. Much safer to burn Chinatowns than capitalist property, for that would be "anarchy." In a period when workers' strikes and riots were put down with ruthless fury - per the Chicago Haymarket - disgruntled employees were allowed by officials, police, and courts to take their full wrath upon a scapegoat of convenience: much like German conservatives used Hitler to bash the Jews instead of the Gentile rich. That Americans could embrace such demagoguery in the name of freedom shows us how self-interest triumphs over principles virtually every time.
One critique I'll make is the author's grammar. Repeated use of "the Chinese's" as a possessive clattered like a rock on a roof every time it crossed the page. "The role of the Chinese" just sounds right; "the Chinese's role" does not. Overall, though, her book remains the definitive examination of this purposely-suppressed history of the American West and the US in general. I say purposely, because nare a breath is drawn to it in popular Western literature and film, aside from the Cartwright family butler Hop Sing. (This was, btw, the name of a Chinese tong society: yet the violence of highbinder hatchet men, although alluded to, seemed never a direct cause of anti-Chinese rioting. Organized crime in Chinatown rarely touched whites.) The question remains as to why this history was swept under the bamboo mat.
It seems, ironically, due to the triumph of liberalism. Conforming to modern racial etiquette gives an out for perpetrators and apologists to hide their crimes; absolving their role to avoid negativity and divisiveness, allowing healing for later generations. There is a point here. But like suppressing the history of lynchings and race riots, it also allows popular culture to revel in American exceptionalism; and thereby launch crusades in full self-righteousness against other nations for crimes it has also perpetrated. A case in point was the Boxer Rebellion of 1900. Retaliation against Western missionaries was in direct response to the "bulldozing" of Chinese in America, and no doubt more than a few Boxers had experienced the wrong end of a fist themselves in a California mining camp. Such was beyond the comprehension of the five-power coalition of the willing that invaded China to teach it a lesson about human rights. This inspiring tradition continues.
July 4, 2021
Shocking! I knew that Chinese immigrants worked on the railroads in the most dangerous jobs, like up high on the cliffs with dynamite, and that they were excluded from the final celebratory photo. That history is exhibited in the California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento. But there is much more to their story. According to his book, the brutality of the mobs throughout the West was nearly always supported by the local governments, police, and fire departments. Their treatment rivaled that of the freed slaves in the South after Reconstruction.
The thread of hope in the book was how, even after being burned out and forced from town, they kept standing up for their rights, usually in the courts, and sometimes even won. And they often returned to those same towns.
Why has this history been overlooked? It should be common knowledge and taught in school. Growing up in Texas, I probably would not have learned about this in school. But is it even taught now in western states? I doubt it.
I happen to have visited many of the cities and towns in California where the Chinese were driven out, without realizing the history till now. Which makes their tales even more chilling.
Very recommended.
The thread of hope in the book was how, even after being burned out and forced from town, they kept standing up for their rights, usually in the courts, and sometimes even won. And they often returned to those same towns.
Why has this history been overlooked? It should be common knowledge and taught in school. Growing up in Texas, I probably would not have learned about this in school. But is it even taught now in western states? I doubt it.
I happen to have visited many of the cities and towns in California where the Chinese were driven out, without realizing the history till now. Which makes their tales even more chilling.
Very recommended.
April 25, 2020
When we think of ethnic cleansing, we think of Rwanda, Bosnia, World War Two, something that happens overseas. We never stop to think about the fact that we committed ethnic cleansing against Native-Americans, African-Americans, Mexican-Americans and Chinese-Americans. Settlements burned to the ground. Men lynched. Women raped. Children sold off into slavery. We never stop to consider the fact that it was LEGALIZED. The US Army exterminated Native Americans. White supremacist state governments enforced racial laws against African-Americans. The Texas Rangers destroyed Mexican-American and Apache settlements. West Coast communities forcing Chinese-Americans to leave at gunpoint. These terrible things happened. And they can easily happen again.
August 6, 2016
A painful look at a part of our history that is so often ignored. It's even more relevant in today's climate where once again immigrants are being denigrated and blamed for all the ills in society instead of being recognized for what they are and always have been -- the core of this nation. Imagine an America without the Chinese, or the Irish or Italians or Latinos or blacks? Yet each group has been targeted at one time or another, or continues to be targeted as a bad force when they are anything but.
This is a book that should be read by anyone who wants to understand the immigrant experience or wants to see one of the hidden aspects of American history. Highly recommended.
This is a book that should be read by anyone who wants to understand the immigrant experience or wants to see one of the hidden aspects of American history. Highly recommended.
October 21, 2013
It is upsetting just skimming through the book. Instance upon instance of local governments resorting to all sorts of political tactics in addition to mob violence to persecute the Chinese.
Skimming I couldn't help comparing the 19th Century hate towards the Chinese to the current campaign of hate against Mexicans.
Skimming I couldn't help comparing the 19th Century hate towards the Chinese to the current campaign of hate against Mexicans.
September 27, 2021
Like atrocities committed by whites against Native Americans, the history of atrocities committed by white people against the Chinese is similarly horrific. This is a tale that needed to be told. Surprisingly, many records are missing or have been destroyed, like the National Archives destroying all the internal identity cards in 1952. Why?
However, the author really needed an editor. The book is often repetitive and is much longer than it needed to be. And certain facts are just plain wrong--like when she attributes the joining of the transcontinental railroads in 1869 to having taken place in Provo, Utah.
This was a very hard book to finish because of the repetitive information and the back-and-forth chronology. The book jumped around in years and locations without a sense of flow. One time she talked about events in the 1890's and then we'd be taken back to 1885 without any explanation or sense of why we were abandoning the historical chronology. The section called “Litany of Hate” seemed misplace and much of it was a repeat of earlier events and atrocities. Many photos are great to include but some were included throughout the book without any detailed information or explanation.
Again, the horrific treatment of the Chinese--arsons, expulsions, rapes, murders, economic boycotts, internal identity cards, and the rest all expose our country as racist, murderous thieves. And it is obvious the courts were no recourse--they kept deciding Chinese weren't really "people" who, like blacks, had no rights that whites were obligated to respect. Their treatment and the identity cards are reminders of how horrible we are treating Hispanic immigrants from Mexico and Central America and misguided legislation like Arizona's SB 1070. That our courts and legal system could sanction round ups, expulsions, murder, arson and destruction of property is incredible and shows how much work we have to do to even come close to equity and fairness.
However, the author really needed an editor. The book is often repetitive and is much longer than it needed to be. And certain facts are just plain wrong--like when she attributes the joining of the transcontinental railroads in 1869 to having taken place in Provo, Utah.
This was a very hard book to finish because of the repetitive information and the back-and-forth chronology. The book jumped around in years and locations without a sense of flow. One time she talked about events in the 1890's and then we'd be taken back to 1885 without any explanation or sense of why we were abandoning the historical chronology. The section called “Litany of Hate” seemed misplace and much of it was a repeat of earlier events and atrocities. Many photos are great to include but some were included throughout the book without any detailed information or explanation.
Again, the horrific treatment of the Chinese--arsons, expulsions, rapes, murders, economic boycotts, internal identity cards, and the rest all expose our country as racist, murderous thieves. And it is obvious the courts were no recourse--they kept deciding Chinese weren't really "people" who, like blacks, had no rights that whites were obligated to respect. Their treatment and the identity cards are reminders of how horrible we are treating Hispanic immigrants from Mexico and Central America and misguided legislation like Arizona's SB 1070. That our courts and legal system could sanction round ups, expulsions, murder, arson and destruction of property is incredible and shows how much work we have to do to even come close to equity and fairness.
May 31, 2022
DNF at 21%. Although I think that this topic is important I also feel like this is a text book more than anything else. Giving it three stars because I knew about the U.S. history in relation to the Native-Americans and the African-Americans and also about the Japanese internment camps I had a very small idea about the lengths that mob mentality went against Chinese-Americans. Mostly my inklings came from when I was a kid and watched the original Kung-Fu series with David Carradine (talk about unlocked memories). I remember being a kid and thinking why are all of those people being so hostile towards him? After reading only the first two chapters I now know why. I enjoy a good history book, right now I need ones with good narratives.
June 3, 2022
A disturbing and difficult book about the abhorrent and racist treatment of the Chinese in the late 19th and early 20th century in the United States. Chinese were literally driven from their homes, forced to take all their belongings, and treated in a subhuman and racist way. Some were murdered, with no punishment. Others were beaten. Others sent on boats to a new city, away from where they had built homes and communities. All because they were Chinese. This book provides painstaking details about the treatment, and because it's so ugly it's tough to read. But it's well worth reading. Because it provides a lesson about our history, and reminds us that we should learn and pay attention to all of our history. Hiding from it, concealing it, denying it helps no one.
August 8, 2018
I'm giving this book 4 stars because of the monumental amount of research the author and her team put into uncovering the forgotten history of Chinese ethnic cleansing in the US. As an Asian American who was not taught my history in school, I appreciate Pfaelzer's effort more than words can say. I'm not giving the book 5 stars because the writing is very dense (in being packed with tremendous detail) and the storytelling is a little winding, all of which I sometimes found hard to follow. Otherwise, this book is an incredible reference tool and important addition to any people's history library.
September 8, 2024
Unsettling to say the least. The American brutal, racist and violent history, where the idea of white supremacy has polluted the American soul sometimes one wonders beyond repair. The treatment and handling of Chinese workers in America between 1860s to 1900 is harsh, cruel, appalling and inhumane. Economy and white supremacy are cited as underlying causes. A very thorough history of the race war against the Chinese in the American West.
November 14, 2019
3.2/5. Very informative, especially for a Chinese American (though not a direct ancestor of the ones in the book) Lots of backed up information, but can't help but think it could've been written with some more style to keep me interested. Found myself dozing off reading similar stories over and over.
November 11, 2023
A brutal, violent history of 19th century Chinese immigration - mostly to the Gold Rush and railroad building in the West - and a series of “pogroms” to either physically remove the Chinese, community by community, or freeze them out economically. Extensively researched and documented. A part of U.S. history that doesn’t seem to get much attention in school.
May 24, 2017
As I wrote both fiction and non fiction books on this topic I am in an especially good position to say what a truly fine job Jean Pfaelzer has done with Driven Out. I very much enjoyed reading it and learned a lot. What more can one ask of a book?
January 9, 2018
Maxine Hong Kingston mentioned “the driven out time” in China Men, but that didn’t prepare me for the horrific actions I found in this book.
August 7, 2023
This was a good read about largely untold history of the American West. It got a little dry at times, but the Litany of Hate chapter was incredibly powerful.
Read
July 24, 2011This book chronicles the racial conflicts in California from 1849 and the beginning of the Gold Rush to the turn of the century. During that time America's economy was in persistent depression, and white males took off for California, desperate for work and filled with dreams of a golden future. After the Civil War, veterans from both North and South came west, accustomed to using force to accomplish their goals. It wasn't called the "Wild Wild West" for nothing. The native Indian population was moved out, Congress gave away millions of acres of land to railroad barons and the Chinese Six Companies imported male Chinese for indentured service and women for prostitution. Especially after the Civil War, city, county and state government and law enforcement cooperated with vigilante groups to force the Chinese out. The book meticulously documents hundreds of public burnings of Chinatowns and individual atrocities. The author evaluates these events from a modern, politically correct, point of view and sensibility, as evidenced by use of the terms "ethnic cleansing," "racism," "homophobia," and the like. She usually attributes causes to economic forces, and is quick (and correct) to point out the inconsistency and hypocrisy of white objections to the Chinese presence. She does not take into account, however, two factors. First is that of language. When people from two very different cultures cannot communicate, then differences of dress, food and social customs cannot be discussed and one cannot come to an understanding of those differences. Conflict is inevitable. Second, the tale this book tells is also about the innate depravity of man: not just the whites, but the Chinese who exploited their own countrymen and profited from Chinese immigration also are culpable. As a native Californian who grew up in Northern California, it was disturbing to read about places I knew well where so much violence took place. I doubt very much that California was a pleasant or comfortable place even for whites in that era.
May 22, 2012
Having been born and raised in California, I was surprised to learn that the Chinese had lived not only in San Francisco and Los Angeles, but also many rural areas in the northern part of the state, in particular, the gold country. Thousands of them were driven out of their homes by mobs of racist white men. For example, in 1878 the Caucasian League drove the Chinese out of Truckee, California, burning their houses. In 1885, two hundred Chinese were purged from the logging town of Eureka. White arsonists repeatedly burned down San Jose's Chinatown. White racists forced the Chinese in Tacoma, Washington onto railroad trains taking them out of the state. The prejudice was not only racial, but also religious. The Christians called the Chinese heathens. Before reading this book, all I had known was that there had been an immigration law, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, that restricted the entry of Chinese women to the United States. In this book, I learned that one of the reasons given by the whites was that many Chinese women worked in brothels, as slaves. Another reason was to restrict the ability of the Chinese to reproduce. Now, of course, we realize that the yellow peril was actually a good thing. We now have Asian restaurants on every corner, and the thought of going back to eating bland, white American food is a horror we prefer not to contemplate.
September 30, 2020
This forgotten piece of American shame has definitely been forgotten by historians, so it was great that the author did all the research to bring it back to light. Thousands of Chinese were forced out of their homes, entire towns set afire, beaten, mob lynched, and forced out of “Dodge”, all because they worked harder, longer and for less pay than the privileged citizens. Laws were passed targeting an entire race and immigration laws targeting a racial group were passed, with the majority of the laws originating in California. Yet, when given an even less than fair and still unequal opportunity, the Chinese Americans succeeded beyond expectations with the core of family, education, persistence, hard work, dedication. No reparations were begged for, no freebies, no affirmative action, no woe is me negativity, just taking advantage of the freedoms and liberties available to all. The success of the Chinese in America is a lesson for this current generation asking for reparations, blaming what happened in 1619 for their current predicament, rather than taking personal responsibility for their lack of success.
August 15, 2007
This book covers events that tended to be left out of American History books and class discussions when I was growing up. Westward expansion and the gold rush were only about making the greatest country bigger, never about the struggle of a country and its people to actually live up to the ideals they established for themselves in the Declaration, Constitution, etc. Key interesting ideas discussed include the role of unions and workers' organizations in furthering racist ideology and action; the Chinese community's strategy of resistance to oppressive actions; and the interplay of larger international and national events with local community and individual struggles. Doesn't paint a very flattering portrait of many "heroes" of the old, traditional American story, a good lesson of history for anyone to learn. But an excellent portrait of one part of the struggle of a community to be a part of the so-called American Dream. And much of relevance for today's debate on immigration.
June 19, 2022
Even though the events in this book took place in the mid-late 1800s, the information is timely for 2021 with the rise in anti-Asian violence. So many of the inaccurate racist themes from the 1800s are mirrored in anti-Asian sentiment today: that Asians are dirty, disease ridden, etc. Now about the book itself, I only knew some very high level points about the Chinese Exclusion Act and what led up to it. I got this book to better understand the history of anti-Chinese sentiment and purges. I learned a lot! I’m so glad I found this book. For those that don’t know, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 was the first significant restriction on free immigration in U.S. history. The bill sought to bar new Chinese laborers from entering the country and denied citizenship to the Chinese already here. The law wasn’t repealed until 1943 (61 years later).
June 26, 2018
When I saw this book, I thought it might provide an interesting window into a little-known episode of American history. It does do that, but there's not much of a sense of an overarching narrative, nor is there much historical context. Essentially, each chapter analyzes a separate episode of expulsion, drawing heavily on period documents and oral history, and then moves to the next episode. I still feel like there's an important niche for this story, but this particular rendition of it wasn't as high-quality as I hoped.
October 28, 2008
A sad but important book that reinforces our understanding of white supremacy's grip on the history of the west. New Western historians know and understand this well, but the general public and our fearless leadership remain relatively clueless or in near total denial. While Pfaelzer could organize her ideas more thoroughly and be more concise, she makes a respectable case that the Chinese and their allies reshaped the legal as well as the physical landscape of the American West.
September 11, 2011
Having grown up in Northern California, I was amazed to learn how much history has been wiped away in the past 150 years. The contributions to building California have been left out of the history books and this book does a nice job of bringing some of that history back. A very important book for someone trying to understand the Chinese impact on the growth of the the U.S. or the systematic removal of a group of people from most of a country.
October 14, 2010
An important historical work that gives a detailed account of the widespread attempts to eradicate entire communities of Chinese immigrants in many parts of western America during the late 1880s and 1890s. Their homes and stores were destroyed by racist mobs that felt economic and cultural threats from these "foreigners."
July 15, 2008
Perhaps I'm cheating by putting this on my "read" list now, but after reading the first few chapters and skimming the first half, I just don't feel like finishing this book. The subject is very interesting, but the presentation was dry and boring.
August 18, 2009
This is a very comprehensive account of the travesties that Chinese immigrants endured in the U.S. These types of books help me to understand a history that was never popularized, usually overlooked.
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