Los Altos History Museum 51 So. San Antonio Road Los Altos, CA 94022
Event Details
Award-winning author Connie Young Yu will explore the Chinese experience during the Gold Rush.
Chinese miners were among the ‘Forty-Niners,’ sailing from Canton to “Gold Mountain,” Gum San, their name for America. Catching “gold fever”, more and more of their countrymen came to join them despite hostility faced by white miners. In their search for the precious metal, they were thwarted by the “Foreign Miner’s Tax”, discriminatory laws and racial violence. Driven from the mines, they moved on to other occupations. They would become cooks, laundrymen, levee builders and workers on the railroad that would unite the country.
She’ll talk about the life and times of early Chinese in California, and how the racial strife they faced in the gold country grew into a nation wide-anti-Chinese movement.
Connie Young Yu, author and historian, is a 4th–generation Californian and a long-time resident of Los Altos Hills. She has written extensively on Asian American history, and is the author of Chinatown, San Jose, USA, and co-author of Voices of the Railroad: Stories by Descendants of Chinese Railroad Workers.
The event is free to attend and will be held both in person AND via Zoom. Registration is required and enables attendance to either venue.
[chineseamericanfamilyhistory] National Archives Announces Limited Reopening of Research RoomsInbox
Marisa Louie Lee 6:37 AM (3 hours ago)to chineseamericanfamilyhistory
Hi everyone: Sharing the news about NARA reopening most research rooms starting August 2! I don’t yet have an appointment on the books for our local facility in San Bruno (the National Archives at San Francisco) but I’m looking forward to returning after so many months away.
———- Forwarded message ——— From: National Archives <public.affairs@nara.gov> Date: Fri, Jul 16, 2021 at 11:21 AM Subject: National Archives Announces Limited Reopening of Research Rooms
National Archives Announces Limited Reopening of Research Rooms WASHINGTON, July 16, 2021–The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is starting to resume research room operations. Several locations have already begun pilots to test research room policies and procedures that promote social distancing, while otherwise allowing us to serve records in a secure manner, and starting Monday, August 2, most National Archives research rooms will reopen for research on a limited basis. NARA services will look very different from the services provided prior to COVID-19. Research visits will be by appointment only and will require a virtual consultation prior to the onsite visit. Boxes of records will be pulled in advance and will be waiting at an assigned table. Research appointments will initially be for 4-5 hours total, depending on the location. In addition, we have implemented a number of measures to ensure the safety of our researchers and staff: Requiring that unvaccinated visitors wear face coverings during their visit.
Limiting the number of people in each research room. Requiring that those who are sick or do not feel well stay home. Implementing safe social distancing through stanchions, physical barriers, floor markings, one-way paths, and directional guidance. Chairs will be removed and workspaces will be blocked to promote physical distancing between researchers. Following CDC cleaning guidance. In addition, researchers will contribute to sanitizing procedures by cleaning their assigned tables and equipment before and after their research. Researchers should wash their hands thoroughly before entering and after exiting research rooms and regularly throughout their visit to the facility. Hand sanitizer will be readily available outside of the research rooms. Records quarantine: All record material accessed by a researcher will be quarantined after use for three full days, and the records will not be available to other researchers during the quarantine period. Contact tracing: If a researcher or NARA employee experiences COVID-19 symptoms while in a NARA research room or later reports symptoms, a diagnosis, or a close contact with a person who tested positive for COVID-19, NARA will use contact information collected during the researcher registration process to notify other researchers of a potential exposure.Please email the relevant facility using the contact information on their facility page to request an appointment. Researchers should check the specific facility page for details and updates, as the situation can change quickly. Thank you for your patience and understanding as we work to reopen our facilities in a careful and deliberate manner that prioritizes the safety of staff and the public. We look forward to welcoming you back to our research facilities.# # # For press information, contact the National Archives Public and Media Communications staff at public.affairs@nara.gov. 21-50NARA locations nationwide Our mailing address is: 700 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington DC, 20408
Thank you again for all who attended the Northern Califiornia Chinese American WWII Veterans Congressional Gold Medal Presentation event July 3-5th, 2021. I was so moved to see all the families receiving the medals and being so proud of the veteran in their family who served the country during WWII with dignity and bravery.
A Chinese Family History Group of Southern California Webinar
Registration Now Open – Register Here The event is FREE. You must also have a Zoom Account. Register at zoom.us/signup
As a pioneer immigration attorney of Chinese American descent, You Chung (Y.C.) Hong (1898-1977) practiced during and after the enactment of the Chinese Exclusion Acts. Li Wei Yang from the Huntington Library, will paint a picture of the prominent attorney and advocate of equality through his curation of over 7,600 case files bequeathed to the library by Hong’s family.
In addition, Li Wei will discuss the Hong family’s involvement in the creation of the new Los Angeles Chinatown in the 1930s, which still exists today. Lastly, you will learn about the Huntington Library and how it makes primary source materials in collections available to researchers.
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Li Wei Yang is Curator of Pacific Rim Collections at The Huntington Library. Prior to being named Curator, he held the positions of Institutional Archivist and Project Archivist from 2008 to 2014. Li Wei has served as a board member for the Society of California Archivists from 2015-2017. He received his MSc in History from the University of Edinburgh and MLIS from San Jose State University. His exhibition, Y.C. Hong: Advocate for Chinese American Inclusion, was on view at The Huntington in 2015. Li Wei’s next exhibition, Printed in 1085, will focus on the Huntington’s acquisition of the oldest printed book and is scheduled to go on view in 2023.
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Hollaback! teaches bystander intervention using our proven 5D’s methodology: Distract, Delegate, Document, Delay, and Direct. Exit polls show that 99% of people we train leave confident they will intervene next time they witness disrespect or harassment. Here are specific trainings in this space that we offer:
Thank you for your interest in the virtual First Day of Issue Ceremony for the Chien-Shiung Wu Commemorative Forever® Stamp. This virtual ceremony will be carried on the Postal Service’s social media channels, Facebook and Twitter. The USPS video is longer available.
Do click on the start triangle to view a video about Chien-Shiung Wu video below.
Dr. Chien-Shiung Wu (1912-1997) was a Chinese immigrant who became a nuclear physicist in an almost entirely male-dominated field in the 1950s. She worked with Oppenheimer and Fermi on the Manhattan Project, helping develop the method for separating nonfissionable uranium 238 from fissionable U-235—the bomb’s key fuel. Her experiment on the non-conservation of parity disproved a fundamental law of physics that had been considered incontrovertible for 30 years. The male theoretical physicists she worked with were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1957, but she did not get the award this time, nor for earlier work on Beta decay that was also considered Nobel-worthy. She was awarded the inaugural Wolf Prize in Physics in 1978. Her expertise in experimental physics evoked comparisons to Marie Curie. She’s one of only two individuals being honored with stamps this year, and in a year that the USPS is honoring Asian-American achievement. The art for her stamp was done by Asian-American painter Kam Mak.
I hope 2021 finds you healthy, and looking forward to new BACGG programs. Our potlucks at the Family History Center are sorely missed. But the biggest loss due to COVID, was being and bonding as a genealogy family. Missed are the live sharing of stories and family history.
It is time to sign up for your 2021 membership, of $25, payable by Feb 11, the day before Chinese New Years when you traditionally pay your debts. Please consider continuing your membership and supporting BACGG with $25 online by Paypal, Zelle, Apple Pay, credit card using Square, google payment or Venmo at: https://bacgg.org/index.php/due/ Or, you may send a check written to BACGG, 4391 26th St., San Francisco, CA, 94131-1809. BACGG is not a nonprofit organization and your payment is not tax deductible.
It looks like we will not be meeting live in the near term, so you probably asking why should I continue being a member? Well, it actually costs us more to run BACGG remotely due to technology costs, rather than live. BACGG cannot survive without your support as we are a 100% all volunteer organization.
Here are some of the things we delivered in 2020, despite COVID.
New BACGG Website (bacgg.org). We had 10,033 logins viewing 19,893 pages for news, new programs and family history research tips.
1 Live Event, and 6 Webinars covering Chinese New Year, Family Associations, Chinese Night Clubs, Operation: WWII Chinese American GI, and how to use Census / Vital Records data to find your past.
Networking. Through the BACGG network, members have helped members overcome genealogy roadblocks.
Power in Partnerships. BACGG partnered with the Chinese Historical Society of America and Chinese Historical and Cultural Project resulting in our most successful webinar ever, honoring WWII Veterans with 1500 participants online! 100% of the support you made to our webinars went directly to our partners to help pay for the sessions. Thank you for helping keep us solvent.
OK, so what is in it for me in 2021? We only have a limited number of seats available in our webinars. As a byproduct of doing online sessions, our program participation capacity spreads far beyond our original live Bay Area roots. So as a benefit of being a member, you get first right of refusal to a seat in all our programs and projects.
Paying members are offered webinar seats first, with any remaining offered to nonmembers. Paying members also can participate in programs like posting a WWII Veteran Remembrance, https://bacgg.org/index.php/ww2-rememberances/ .
Although 2021 is still in the planning process, we have great plans to kickoff the new year.
February. The year of the Ox is fast approaching. Last year David Lei shared the history of how to prepare for the new year, but did you actually follow through? Watch for announcements to help you get ready for the new year of the Ox.
April. Still in the planning process, but we are working out the details for a special program to potentially include an Angel Island Immigration Center virtual tour, and a presentation on its genealogical relevance to our family history .
and more to come with your continuous input!
It does not go without saying that BACGG is only as good as its team. So I would like to thank the volunteer Planning Committee, Gail Chong, Jeannie Young, Leona Lau, Bruce Chin, Doug Joe and our newest member Al Low. Plus all those of you who have contributed in posting BACGG web updates.
If you would like to assist with planning our activities, or have speakers / topics you wish to hear, please contact me. It has been an honor to serve as Executive Director from BACGG’s inception through 2021. I look forward to “seeing” you all soon.
Until then, be well. Be safe. \r
Ron Chan 陳光宗 , Executive Director, Bay Area Chinese Genealogy Group
Join the world’s largest family celebration for free to unlock your family’s history and learn how to preserve the stories of your life.
25 – 27 FEBRUARY, 2021
Introducing RootsTech Connect: A Free Online Conference Experience
For the first time ever, the world’s largest family celebration event will be entirely virtual and completely free. Get ready to celebrate shared connections with people from around the world. Connect with friends, your family, your past, and your heritage and homelands—all from the comfort of your home and in your browser.
Celebrity Keynote Speakers
Keynotes are a huge part of RootsTech events. They deliver messages of inspiration and hope. Stay tuned for the full lineup of keynote speakers to be announced soon.
Virtual Marketplace
The virtual Marketplace will be the perfect place to see the latest innovations, interact with companies from around the world, and find answers and resources to aid you in your work. Plus, get real-time help via video or live chat!
Cultural Activities
Celebrate the world’s cultures with activities such as homeland cooking demonstrations, yoga, and music from around the world. These experiences will be available throughout the online event and on demand.
Connect with Family from Anywhere
Finding cousins and interacting with other attendees is an important part of the RootsTech model. Enjoy exclusive opportunities to chat with other attendees through various messaging boards, social media interactions, and video chats.
Marisa Louie Lee
