Thank you for coming to CHSNE's 2019 Annual Meeting & Dinner Banquet
We are grateful to everyone who joined us at CHSNE's 2019 Annual Meeting & Dinner Banquet. Thank you for your support for CHSNE's mission to document, preserve, and promote the history and legacy of Chinese immigration to New England.
CHSNE would like to extend a special thanks to our 2019 Sojourner Awardees:
Helen Chin Schlichte and Yu-Sing Jung
The early Chinese immigrant pioneers were typically sojourners–workers looking for a piece of the Gold Mountain to take back to China to help their families. Many faced conditions of racism, exclusion and economic exploitation, even as they helped transform America by building railroads, establishing fisheries, harvesting crops, and producing in factories. Our place today in this society rests, in part, on their legacy. It is in memory of their unrecognized struggles and profound contributions that we offer the Sojourner Award.
Helen Chin Schlichte Long-time public servant dedicated to the community's health and professional development
Yu-Sing Jung Renowned architect with many notable buildings in Boston
Chinese American World War II Veteran Congressional Gold Metal Lunch and Presentation with Major General William S. Chen, USA, Ret. TOMORROW Saturday, November 9 | 12:00 - 2:00
Sackler Auditorium, Tufts Medical Center | 145 Harrison Ave, Boston
General Chen is the first Chinese American 2-Star General in the U.S. Army; his father was a captain and pilot of the U.S. Army Air Forces assigned to the 14th Air Force (Flying Tigers) under General Claire Chennault in the Chinese-Burma-India Theatre during World War II.
General Chen will give highlights from his distinguished career, an Overview of Chinese American Veterans Involvement in WWII, the Status of the Congressional Gold Medal design process, the projected Spring 2020 DC ceremony, and the Project’s official registration process and database. Included will be coverage of Chinese Americans in the American Volunteer Group, China Air Task Force, and 14th Air Force.
CHSNE is contributing to a new exhibition at the Boston Athenæum
Required Reading Reimagining a Colonial Library Boston Athenæum | 10 1/2 Beacon St, Boston
September 2019 - March 2020
The exhibition showcases and interprets the King’s Chapel Library Collection, one of the surviving treasures of 17th century Boston, exploring the city's colonial history, the fine crafts of bookbinding and furniture-making, and the meaning of “essential knowledge.” In 1698, the set of more than 200 books crossed the Atlantic to serve as a compact library of necessary works for King’s Chapel, the first Anglican church in Boston. As this 1698 library was assembled from a singular point of view, the Athenaeum invited CHSNE, along with other community partners representing a plurality of perspectives, to share in curating the exhibition by providing our “required reading” list of ten titles.
CHSNE’s “essential reading” list seeks to give an overview of the struggles and triumphs of Chinese immigrants and their descendents in the United State. The list includes legislation, scholarly works that analyze the effects of these laws, and expressive works that offer more personal perspectives.
Gathering Collecting and Documenting Chinese American History
Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA), New York City
October 2019 - March 2020
Gathering: Collecting and Documenting Chinese American History will tell the origin story of historical societies, museums, and organized projects that document and make public the history of Chinese throughout America. This first-of-its-kind survey exhibition is part of MOCA's year-long initiative to commemorate the contributions of Chinese railroad workers in the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad 150 years ago. MOCA's goal is to showcase the breadth, depth, and investment of organized documentation and collection of Chinese history in America. Through this project MOCA hope to expand the dialogue, strengthen connections, and increase collaborative work among these organizations.
For Gathering, CHSNE submitted a variety of photographs and event materials from the past 27 years. We sent the architectural model of the Chinese Immigrant Memorial at Mount Hope Cemetery.
More than fifteen hundred Chinese immigrants have found their final resting place in three sections of Boston’s Mount Hope Cemetery since 1930. Many of them had been sojourner-workers who lived difficult lives during the Chinese Exclusion Era. Their customary final journey home after death was interrupted first by World War II and later by the civil strife in China. The once temporary burial ground on foreign soil became a permanent one.
CHSNE was founded in 1992 with a goal to restore the Chinese section of the cemetery and create a central memorial. In March 2007, after over 18 years of dedicated planning, fundraising, and gaining community support, CHSNE members and supporters dedicated the completed Chinese Immigrant Memorial to the unsung heroes buried at Mount Hope.
The memorial was designed by Joo Kun Lim of Twinspine Architects with input from the community. Lim explained that the modern design was chosen to “[give] the immigrants who are buried there a place in their new home. It’s been almost 100 years since some of them have died [and should] reflect where they are today.” The memorial provides a place for present and future generations to reflect on the contributions and sacrifices of those Chinese American pioneers who first settled in the Boston area.
CHSNE NEEDS YOU! CHSNE is dedicated solely to documenting, preserving, and promoting the history and legacy of Chinese immigration in New England. Please consider becoming a member or donating to help cover our projects and operating expenses.
