Pop Quiz: Where Was L.A.’s First Chinatown?
As the world celebrates the Beijing Olympic Games, it seems only fitting to serve up a pop quiz paying tribute to the City of Angels’ Chinese community, which has overcome tremendous adversity over the last 156 years…
The Question: Centered around North Broadway, New Chinatown is among L.A.’s most popular tourist attractions. However, as the name implies, it’s not the city’s original Chinese settlement. So where was the first Chinatown, and what occupies that site today? (Click the continuation link to find out.)
The Answer: The 1850 Census listed two Chinese men living in Los Angeles. By the 1860s, the Chinese population had grown to about 178. Prohibited from property ownership, they built their small community around Calle de los Negros (Street of the Dark Ones, left), the skid row of the day. An unpaved, 500-foot alley, it ran from the intersection of Los Angeles and Arcadia Streets toward the town plaza. (The tower of the old Plaza Firehouse can be seen way off to the left in this photo.)
Bigotry, Violence and a New Beginning…
Unfortunately, the area is best remembered for the Chinese Massacre, a shameful race riot that erupted the night of Oct. 24, 1871. A shooting between rival tong leaders allegedly sparked the violence, but Anglo and Latino residents quickly turned the incident into an excuse to vent their hostilities toward their Chinese neighbors. They descended on Old Chinatown by the hundreds, sacking businesses, brutalizing the inhabitants, and callously lynching some 18 young Chinese men. (Sources vary on the actual number.) Law enforcement did little to restrain the melee, and the few rioters eventually tried and convicted of murder saw their convictions overturned on legal technicalities.
Despite this disgrace, by the late 1890s, L.A.’s Chinese population had swelled to about 3,000. By 1910, Old Chinatown was a thriving business and residential district encompassing about 200 buildings stretching along 15 streets. In the 1930s, the area was leveled to make way for Union Station (left). New Chinatown’s central plaza was dedicated almost a mile north on June 25, 1938, near the heart of what was then Little Italy. (Which explains the presence of an Italian-American Catholic Church and the now-closed Little Joe’s Italian Restaurant in the area.) The famous district now boasts more than 15,000 residents and, of course, an eclectic mix of shops, galleries, restaurants and cultural monuments.
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