Seeing America's Greatest Chinatown San Francisco 1912 (Patreon)

more at http://quickfound.net/

Silent, with title cards. 'Chinatown, San Francisco, California: Captain Lewis was a licensed Chinatown guide; these films represent what was salvaged from a multi-reel film.

Captain Lewis (himself) / aerial view of Chinatown buildings, showing flags flying for the new Republic of China led by Sun Yat-Sen / street scenes / grocery stores / church / parade / Sing Fat Co. and Sing Fat himself / temple / interior temple with men / small boy on street selling bag of peanuts / children / men smoking long pipes / Chinese drama / apothecary sequence...'

Originally a public domain film from the Library of Congress Prelinger Archives, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinatown,_San_Francisco

Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

The Chinatown centered on Grant Avenue and Stockton Street in San Francisco, California, (Chinese: 唐人街; pinyin: tángrénjiē; Jyutping: tong4 jan4 gaai1) is the oldest Chinatown in North America and the largest Chinese enclave outside Asia. It is also the oldest and largest of the four notable Chinese enclaves within San Francisco. Since its establishment in 1848, it has been highly important and influential in the history and culture of ethnic Chinese immigrants in North America. Chinatown is an enclave that continues to retain its own customs, languages, places of worship, social clubs, and identity. There are two hospitals, several parks and squares, numerous churches, a post office, and other infrastructure. Recent immigrants, many of whom are elderly, opt to live in Chinatown because of the availability of affordable housing and their familiarity with the culture. San Francisco's Chinatown is also renowned as a major tourist attraction, drawing more visitors annually than the Golden Gate Bridge...

Guangdong pioneers

San Francisco's Chinatown was the port of entry for early Chinese immigrants from the west side of the Pearl River Delta, speaking mainly Hoisanese and Zhongshanese,[20] in the Guangdong province of southern China from the 1850s to the 1900s. On August 28, 1850, at Portsmouth Square, San Francisco's first mayor, John Geary, officially welcomed 300 "China Boys" to San Francisco. By 1854, the Alta California, a local newspaper which had previously taken a supportive stance on Chinese immigrants in San Francisco, began attacking them, writing after a recent influx that "if the city continues to fill up with these people, it will be ere long become necessary to make them subject of special legislation".

Sacramento St.; 唐人街: literally "Tang people street"

These early immigrant settled near Portsmouth Square and around Dupont Street (now called Grant Ave). As the settlement grew in the early 1850s, Chinese shops opened on Sacramento St, which the Guangdong pioneers called "Tang people street" (唐人街); and the settlement became known as "Tang people town" (唐人埠), which in Cantonese is Tong Yun Fow. By the 1870s, the economic center of Chinatown moved from Sacramento St to Dupont St; e.g., in 1878, out of 423 Chinese firms in Chinatown, 121 were located on Dupont St, 60 on Sacramento St, 60 on Jackson St, and the remainder elsewhere.

The area was the one geographical region deeded by the city government and private property owners which allowed Chinese persons to inherit and inhabit dwellings within the city. The majority of these Chinese shopkeepers, restaurant owners, and hired workers in San Francisco Chinatown were predominantly Hoisanese and male. For example, in 1851, the reported Chinese population in California was about 12,000 men and less than ten women. Some of the early immigrants worked as mine workers or independent prospectors hoping to strike it rich during the 1849 Gold Rush. Many Chinese found jobs working for large companies seeking a source of labor, most famously as part of the Central Pacific on the Transcontinental Railroad, from 1865–1869...