Rare Book Reveals Dark Time In Chinese Immigration To The United States

Posted by admin on Nov 27, 2009

A discovery recently made at the National Archives in New York City which turned up documents that were found as part of a narcotics arrest made on Stuyvesant Avenue in Lyndhurst nearly 70 years ago sheds light on the plight of Asian, specifically Chinese, immigrants to the United States at the time and highlights what strides have been made in the acceptance of Asians into the community.

“When you’re going through the records, some things just jump out at you,” said Patrick Connelly, a researcher at the National Archives. This was one of them. He knew immediately that this was a very unique document they had on their hands.

What they found was a small, fragile book of browning paper containing what are called “coaching documents” used by the Chinese to gain entrance into the U.S. To understand what these documents are and why their survival is a rarity, one has to understand the history of Asian immigration into the United States at the time.

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