Introduction
Ng Shing Gung, the last remnant of San Jose's Chinatown, was a religious and community center originally built in 1888 in San Jose's "Heinlenville". Heinlenville was San Jose's own Chinatown which was built in 1887 by John Heinlen, the Chinese quarter occupied a square block bounded by Sixth and Seventh streets and Tayor and Jackson streets. Chinatown was bisected by four narrow one block streets. Additionally, it was the last of San Jose's four Chinatowns that sprouted after 1852 when Chinese people poured into the valley and were forced to stay together because of vicious persecution by the American and Mexican population. When an earlier Chinese settlement at the present site of the San Jose Fairmont Hotel was destroyed by a suspicious fire in the 1870s, John Heinlenville, a local businessman, braved death threats to lease property to the displaced Chinese. This area which is near today's Japantown at Taylor and Sixth became known as Heinlenville.
By the 1930s, many of Heinlenville's original residents passed on. Their children grew up and integrated into the community at large, and the Chinese Exclusion Act had prevented new arrivals from China. When the Heinlenville estate declared bankruptcy, Heinlenville became the property of the City of San Jose. Due to this, the population of Chinatown gradually decreased and the Ng Shing Kung went into disuse. The San Jose Mercury News (1949) reported "Vandals broke in and stole or smashed the elaborate furnishings with which the old temple was once fitted. Windows were broken and the doorways were finally boarded up to prevent further vandalism." Also, the city government made an investigation of the temple and found the entire building was in danger of falling down and would endanger the fire house built behind it. Therefore, in 1949, despite the objection of some local historians, this last remnant of Heinlenville was dismantled.
In 1991, this piece of history was recovered by the CHCP (Chinese Historical and Cultural Project) which sponsored, replicated and dedicated the building to the San Jose Historical Museum. Now, the building is an artifact that represents the Chinese culture.
History Being Forgotten
After living in San Jose for almost 10 months, I never heard about there was a Chinatown existing in San Jose. After knowing the existence of this temple, I started to search for the history and meaning of it. For me, the meaning of this remnant is not just a temple, but a symbol of cultural pride. While tracing back the history of Chinese immigrants in San Jose, I realized that the Chinese immigrants endured through tough times. Most of the Chinese immigrants who went through the years, between 1882 to 1891, of discrimination had already passed away, their voices were rarely heard. Only a few people heard their voices and knew about the history of the people who were once marginalized and excluded from the mainstream of our society. Today, people know a Japantown in San Jose existed, but not many people know a Chinatown existed in San Jose. That means people selectively remember and forget history, the history of Chinese immigrants is selectively forgotten.
The History of Chinese Immigrants in San Jose's Chinatown
In 1848, after gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill, it had taken about a year and a half for the news of gold mining to reach China. By the end of 1851, more than 25,000 Chinese arrived in California, making up one-tenth of the state's population. Most of them came from Kwangtung Province, a province located in southern China. Some of these people who came to the United States worked as gold miners and the others became agricultural workers in the Santa Clara valley. Those who were agricultural workers found a different meaning of Gum San, Gold Mountain. Their gold was to come in the form of bountiful crops, grain, seeds, vegetables and different types of fruits.
Why did these Chinese people leave their homeland for a foreign country? In order to fulfill the "Gum San" dream, they came to the United States. "The "Gum San" dream originated in the villages of Kwangtung province in the mid-nineteenth century when word of California gold reached across the Pacific. In the years that followed, the call for labor in the new land attracted the Chinese."(Connie Young Yu, p.5) Between 1839 to 1851, in the course of over a decade of intense warfare in China, thirty million Chinese people were killed and huge areas of farmlands were devastated by the conflict. People living in the villages of southern China were left to their own resources, which were depleted. Their government, Manchu, could not aid them. Many people therefore decided to leave their homeland Chung kuo, meaning middle country, and came to United States for a better life.
In the 1860s and 1870s, the greatest number of Chinese worked for mining companies, and on land, a reclamation and construction project. Thousands of Chinese people contracted with the railroads. They also were hired to build canals, dikes, roads and wineries. Heavy labor in these times was not only hard and low-paying, but also dangerous. The management of these companies preferred to hire Chinese over white labor because they did not compensate the workers' families in case of fatal accidents. In addition, Chinese workers were easy to hire and manage. Although hard working Chinese people were easy to find or hire, due to the confrontation with the Foreign Miner's Tax, Chinese were attacked in the countryside and city streets and not allowed to fight against white aggressors.
Chinese Exclusion - Early Anti-Chinese Legislation
Long before passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Chinese had become a beleaguered minority in the United States. Early discrimination seemed more racially than economically motivated, but by the 1870s the complaints about Chinese economic competition merged with negative racial stereotypes and led to efforts to end Chinese immigration and to discourage those present from remaining. The dominant role California played in the anti-Chinese movement has obscured the significance of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act as an important departure in the history of American immigration: For the first time in the nation's history, an immigrant group was excluded on the basis of race." (Christian G. Fritz, Entry Denied, p.25)
During 1882-1891, due to anti-Chinese legislation, the anti-Chinese movement was prevalent. Chinese people were treated poorly during this period. Federick A Bee, Counsel for the Chinese, said in opening argument before the Joint Committee of the two Houses of Congress on Chinese Immigration, " I have seen them stoned from the time they passed out the ship, rocks thrown at them, until they reached Kearny Street. I have seen them leaning over the sides of the wagons with their scalps cut open. I have seen them stoned when going afoot from the steamships. No arrests were made, no police interfered." (Chinatown San Jose, USA, p.11) They were treated even worse than animals. They worked hard to build west railroads and contribute their labor to this country; however, they were only rewarded with discrimination and exclusion.
In May 4, 1887, San Jose's Chinatown was burned. The San Jose Mercury News reported on Feb. 24, 1986:
"It broke out in midafternoon in a vacant building on AH Toy Alley, a path that snaked its narrow way down the middle of the block between San Fernado and San Antonio Streets on the east side of the City Plaza. A brisk north wind was blowing, and the only water tank in the area was nearly dry. The next day, the San Jose Evening News reported that " there seems to be no doubt" the fire had been deliberately set. Whether or not, the city fathers welcomed it because they were getting ready at the time to lay the cornerstone for their new City Hall in the Plaza. Two months before the fire, Mayor C.W. Breyfogle had ordered the elimination of Chinatown's ramshackle tenements and shacks, which harbored gambling, prostitution, lotteries and opium traffic."
This fire was deliberately set for some purposes. The Mayor did not think about how important the Chinatown meant to the Chinese people; he described the Chinatown as a tumor which the city needed to eliminate. However, he did not know that it represented a sanctuary to the Chinese people who sought comfort and safety there.
The New Start of San Jose's Chinatown
After the fire, the Chinese people living in San Jose's Chinatown had nowhere to go. Fortunately, a German businessman named John Heinlen, contributed his own property land to Chinese people for rebuilding their homeland. During my interview with Dr. Chris Jochim, board member of Chinese Historical and Cultural Project, I knew that John Heinlen also encountered the same immigration struggle as the Chinese people did. Like the Chinese people, German immigrants, in the nineteenth century, fled their country because life in their homeland became unbearable, and their only hope was to travel to a new land. Consequently, he understood the hardship that the Chinese immigrants experienced and was willing to help the poor Chinese rebuild their homeland.
Rebuilding the new Chinatown was difficult since some of the leaders of the San Jose Home Protective Association argued for the total elimination of Chinese settlements within the city's perimeters, while others thought it would be impossible to prevent the Chinese from resettling. Even though rebuilding Chinatown was difficult task, John Heinlen still tried to help Chinese people. He discussed the plans for the new community with his friend Theodore Lenzen who was also a German American, and Lenzen did not object to the unpopularity of the new project. With their efforts combined, the new Chinatown named "Heinlenville" was rebuilt on July 18, 1887. John Heinlen and eleven Chinese people, representing stores and associations, signed the contract to build brick buildings which would be rented by Chinese people living in Heinlenville. The rents were a reasonable price for the time, especially since Heinlen paid the tax bill on the property.
The Decline of San Jose's Chinatown
In 1931, the John Heinlen Company went bankrupt because the second-generation Heinlens who were in real estate were not able to collect rents, and they could not pay property taxes on Chinatown. Heinlenville, therefore, became the property of the city of San Jose. Also, the Chinese Exclusion Laws prevented the arrival of Chinese immigrants. The whole Chinatown was declining, and the Chinese could not afford to keep it. There was quantitative report as to the declining of the "Heinlenville". " From 1880 to 1900, the Chinese population declined from 2,695 or 7.7 percent of Santa Clara County's population, to 1,738 or 2.9 percent of the County population." (John Handly, Toward the Gold Mountain, p. 13) In 1931, as the number of residents continued to decline, the city of San Jose then razed the San Jose's Chinatown with the exception of the Ng Shing Kung which was saved by the public opinion.
However, the fate of the Ng Shing Kung, once named Joss House, was still on other's hand. The reports studied by the City officials reflected that the building is in danger of toppling on the new fire house built behind it, and the rear wall out of plumb and cracks showing in the red brick walls. In 1949, despite the objections of local historians, the last remnant of Heinlenville, was dismantled. After the dismantling of this historical building, San Jose's Chinatown did not exist and became a name in history.
In memory of San Jose's Chinatown
In 1975, a leader of San Jose's Chinese-American community, Frank Lowe, president of the Institute of Sino-American studies, asked the City Council to come up with $50,000 to construct a replica of the old Joss House (the Ng Shing Kung). He said the funds would pay for the construction of a Joss House in the city's historical Museum complex of buildings at Kelly Park. Also, the Chinese-American community could use the building to display priceless artifacts brought over by the early Chinese emigrants - mainly during the Ching Dynasty. The reason why they wanted to rebuild this building was to memorize the early Chinese immigrants since these people contributed greatly to the development of this valley, especially in its agriculture and canning industry. They started to raise funds and organize an organization called CHCP (Chinese Historical and Cultural Project) to replicate the building. During my interview with Rose Marie, the board member of CHCP, she said the whole project was running smoothly at that time. They received great support from the City government of San Jose and Chinese people who were Chinese-American and Chinese coming from overseas. Finally, in 1991, the Ng Shing Kung was recovered and dedicated to the San Jose Historical Museum by CHCP.
The meaning of the Ng Shing Gung (Wu Sheng Gung )
The literal meaning of Ng Shing Gung means "Five Gods". In Cantonese, "Five Gods" is pronounced Ng Shing Gung. In Mandarin, it is pronounced Wu Sheng Gung. Even though the pronunciation is different, it shares the same word character with the same meaning. The "Five Gods" are five deities named Choi Sun, god of wealth; Kwan Yin, the goddess of mercy; Kwan Gung, god of war and protector of the people; Wah Tau, god of medicine; and Tien Hou, the goddess of heaven. These deities are represented deities of Taoism, a belief which was based on the doctrines of a sixth century Chinese philosopher named Lao-tse. "Lao-tse preached simplicity and freedom from materialism, the harmony of man and nature. However, as the religion espoused belief in saints, Toaists developed many deities, their places of worship evolved into ornate buildings, resplendent with gilt trimmings." (Connie Young Yu, San Jose Chinatown USA, p.51) The five deities worshipped in the Ng Shing Kung are some of the representative deities developed in Taoism.
The meaning of Ng Shing Kung to Chinese immigrants of Heinlenville
In late 18th and early 19th , the Ng Shing Kung was the religious and social center of the community. It was the finest building in Heinlenville and places for all Chinese celebrations. The Chinese people called it "Tao Miu", meaning temple of Taoism, and outsiders dubbed it "the joss house". It was a two-story building. The lower floor was once a schoolroom, and later used as a storeroom. Its second floor was an altar where five gods keep watch. The people of Heinlenville went to this temple to seek spiritual protection and aid. Unlike church, no weekly services were conducted in the temple; also, no sermons were given and no congregation assembled there. Worshippers could drop in at anytime and buy incense to make an offering and ask for help from the five deities. Since Chinese people were seriously discriminated against during the era of "Heinlenville", the temple therefore played an important role in their lives. It offered a place for people of Heinlenville to recover from the trauma they experienced from the outside world.
The meaning of Ng Shing Kung to Chinese-Americans nowadays
Since the Ng Shing Kung already became an exhibition which displayed Chinese culture artifacts, the temple was no longer used for worship because its meaning has already been changed. During my interview with Rose Mari, she told me that the temple has already become a symbol of Chines culture. For Chinese-Americans who could not speak Chinese, this temple helped them realize their own culture and gave an understanding of the history of Chinese immigrants.
The meaning of Ng Shing Kung to people from different races
While interviewing Mr. clemens Van Perre, volunteer and tour guide of the San Jose Historical Museum, we discussed how people from different races perceive the Ng Shing Kung. He mentioned, for Americans, they are aware of the different worship style of Chinese people. For them, they went to church at the same time; however, Chinese worshipped their gods whenever they wanted. By observing this temple, we can see how different cultures view the temple.
The meaning of Ng Shing Kung to new arrival Chinese in the States
As I mentioned above, after living here for almost ten months, I never knew Chinese culture existed in San Jose. Even though a large population of Chinese people lives in San Jose, little is known about the Chinese Culture. After becoming aware of the existence of this temple, I started to read more history about Chinese immigrants. As a result of reading and searching, I not only learn the history of the Chinese immigrants, but also learned about my Chinese heritage. I appreciate the same cultural artifacts with these Chinese-immigrants, i.e., the five deities of the temple. Also, I knew the discrimination and exclusion they went through. The struggles they went through are close to my hearts. The meaning of this building is a source of cultural pride to me.
Bibliography
Connie Young Yu, (1991). Chinatown San Jose, USA. CA: San Jose Historical Museum Association
John Handley (1997, April) Toward the Gold Mountain
Sucheng Chan, (1991), Entry denied. Philadelphia: Temple University
The Jose House (1949). San Jose Mercury News
Only the victims mourned burning of S.J. Chinatown (1986, Feb. 24). San Jose Mercury News
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