Made in Chinese America
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Palm Drive
Every palm tree lining Palm Drive, gateway to Stanford university, was planted by a Chinese worker employed by Leland Stanford, one of the Big Four railroad barrons and Governor of California.
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Citrus Wizard
For his contribution to Florida’s citrus industry, Lue Gim Gong (刘锦浓, August 24, 1857 – June 3, 1925) was called “the wizard of citrus growers".
The New York Times (1925) reported that “he [Lue] saved the industry millions of dollars by his perfection of an orange tree on which fruit would remain until far beyond maturity.” For this achievement, the American Pomological Society awarded Lue a Silver Wilder Medal in 1911, the first time such an award was made for citrus.
Wine Country
California’s Napa Valley is one of the most famous wine-growing regions in the world. Its 475 wineries typically draw almost four million visitors a year and contribute over $34 billion annually to the US economy. The wine industry in this region from 1870 through 1900 was built predominantly using Chinese immigrant labor.
Asparagus King
Thomas Foon Chew (赵灿垣, 1889 - 1931) was the richest Chinese American in California in the 1920s.
Upon his passing, Chew was honored with a memorial parade, not in San Jose, but along one of the most famous routes in America: Grant Avenue in San Francisco, the heart of the West’s largest Chinatown.
Twenty-five thousand people turned out to honor him that day in 1931: a worthy tribute to an American entrepreneur whose fascinating life story is at last being rediscovered.
Senator Fong's Garden - Oahu
U.S. Senator Hiram Fong (鄺友良, 1906 - 2004) purchased the land in 1950. Fong, who served in the U.S. Senate for 17 years (1959 - 1977), divided the plantation into five sections, each one bearing the names of different presidents from Eisenhower to Ford he served under.
Senator Fong is the seventh of 11 children of a Chinese immigrant who came to Hawaii to work as an indentured plantation worker. Fong's mother Fong Lum Shee, arrived in Hawai'i when she was 10 years old and worked as a maidservant.
In 1988, the State Department of Agriculture donated 100 rare sandalwood trees to the Senator Fong’s Plantation & Gardens to commemorate the bicentennial of Chinese immigrants to Hawaii.
Political Pioneer