The Lucky Ones: One Family and the Extraordinary Invention of Chinese America
2011; Oxford University Press; Volume: 98; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1093/jahist/jar500
ISSN1945-2314
Autores Tópico(s)Latin American and Latino Studies
ResumoIn 1884 a young Chinese immigrant couple, Joseph Tape and Mary Tape, sued the San Francisco school board on behalf of their daughter, Mamie. The landmark California Supreme Court case Tape v. Hurley (1885) established the right of Chinese children to a public education in California. In The Lucky Ones Mae Ngai tells the story of the Tape family and its remarkable rise in America. Joseph and Mary Tape were exceptional among Chinese in nineteenth-century San Francisco. Both arrived as children without parents and lived outside Chinatown. Joseph worked as a domestic servant, and Mary grew up a ward of the Ladies’ Protective and Relief Society. Ngai argues that distance from Chinatown, fluency in English, and immigrant's ambition were the keys to the Tape family's fortune. Joseph amassed a fortune by servicing every stage of the immigration process from drayman at the docks to interpreter, ticket agent, and broker. Mary raised their four children in white neighborhoods in the city and later in Berkeley while establishing a reputation as a talented amateur painter and photographer. By the beginning of twentieth century the Tape family could spend their holidays at two country estates in Sonoma and Hayward.
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