For more information: “Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month,” National Archives News
Below is a copy of the original Act to designate May of each year as “Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month”
The first document in Chee Tuck’s file is a 10 August 1899 affidavit. He was applying for a certificate of departure and return at Port Townsend, Washington for his trip to China. His witnesses, Eng See Fay, of the firm Lun Ying Co., and Clew Non, both swore that they were in debt to Chee Tuck for a total of $1,200. A photo of Eng See Fay with his name written across the photo is attached to the affidavit. According to his interview, Chee Tuck obtained a Certificate of Residence in Oregon in 1894, he lived in Port Gamble, Washington; was 31 years old, and worked as a cook. He planned on leaving from the Port of Tacoma, Washington.
The file does not show when he returned but he applied to leave again in 1904. Lung Kee still owed him $1,100 and was his witness. There was no official note for the transaction, but A. F. Richardson, the Chinese Inspector, believed it was valid. A photo of Chee Tuck was attached to the affidavit. He was then living in Port Ludlow and was a cook in the Port Ludlow Hotel, making $45 a month.
Lung Kee was interviewed in 1905. He testified that he borrowed $1,100 in gold from Chee Tuck in 1902 so he could build a house in China. (Eng) Lung Kee obtained his chak chi (Certificate of Residence) in 1894 at Portland.
In 1905 another witness, Ng Gow, testified that he witnessed Chee Tuck transferring the $1,100 in gold to Lung Kee in 1902. When Chee Tuck returned from China in September 1905, he was admitted as a duly registered Chinese laborer. He testified that he was twelve years old when he landed at the Port of San Francisco in 1880. From there he went to Port Townsend.
Chee Tuck applied to leave in 1911. He gave his married name as Ng Yee Ham. His wife was Lee She and they had a six-year-old son named Koon Dock. They were living in Gim Lung village, Sunning District, China. Chee Tuck returned in November 1912 and was admitted.
In 1929 Chee Tuck, age 61, applied for a laborer’s return certificate. Another son was born after his last visit but now both sons had died. It is assumed that his debt due from Lung Kee was paid off because now he filled the debt requirement by owning a $1,000 Liberty Loan bond. Chee Tuck returned in November 1930 and was admitted. There is no more information in his file.
Chee Tuck’s file contains nothing jarring or unusual . He fulfilled all the requirements for a returning laborer. Immigration officials reviewed his paperwork and approved it. The photos stand out—one for his witness in 1899 and photos of Chee Tuck in 1904, 1911, and 1929. It had been eighteen years between Tuck’s last visits to China and by the time he went back, both of his sons had died. How sad.
On April 14, 2025, staff from the Wing Luke Museum was treated to a special behind-the-scenes tour of the National Archives at Seattle. During their visit, NARA staff provided an overview of the extensive collection of original historical documents housed at the facility. I had the opportunity to share details about our ongoing indexing project related to the Chinese Exclusion Act (CEA) case files, as well as the CEA blog that highlights summaries from the records. Following the tour, the group explored selected materials from various Record Groups, including notable case files and documents connected to the Chinese Exclusion Act.
The Wing Luke Museum, located in Seattle’s historic Chinatown-International District, is a vibrant art and history museum dedicated to the stories of Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders. Founded in 1967, the museum is a proud Smithsonian Institution affiliate and remains the only community-based museum in the U.S. with a pan-Asian Pacific American focus.
Elise Chung Lyon was born in Stawell, Australia, about one hundred forty miles from Melbourne. She first come to the United States in 1923 from China with her husband Bayard Lyon. They lived in Elkhorn, Wisconsin with their three children, Marguerite, Hugh, and David. Her brother Fred Mowfung Chung also lived in Elkhorn.
Elsie’s exempt status was “wife of citizen, admitted to U.S. prior to July 1, 1924.” She had reentry permits from 1928, 1929, 1930, 1931, and 1934, each with her photograph attached. When she arrived in 1934, she was forty-seven years old. Her file does not have much personal information. Elsie’s 1929 Form 505, Certificate of Admission of Alien, lists her occupation as lecturer.
Elsie’s file does record a confusing incident with immigration authorities upon her arrival in Seattle from China via Vancouver, B.C. on Saturday, 10 November 1928. She was returning from a three-month tour of China. Mrs. Lyon, a lecturer on international relations, and nine other Chinese passengers were threatened with being locked up by immigration authorities for the weekend. David Young, a representative of the Seattle Chinese consulate, managed to get Mrs. Lyon released to his custody as a matter of courtesy.
A 13 November 1928 newspaper article titled, “Chinese Wife of American is Held Here”1 is included in her file. The article quoted Elsie Chung Lyon, “I’m rather sorry now that I did not suffer myself to be locked up because I would be better able to understand the indignation my countrymen feel on entering this country.” She noted that her papers were in order and she had been admitted two times previously without a problem. She promised that she would take the matter up with Secretary Kellogg in Washington, D.C. [Frank Billings Kellogg served in the U.S. Senate and as U.S. Secretary of State.] The article or the 1928 forms in her file do not say exactly why Lyon was being held or what happened to the other Chinese passengers.
In September 1929, Mr. J. J. Forster, Steamship General Passenger Agent of Vancouver, British Columbia wrote a letter to Mr. Luther Weedin, Commissioner of the U.S. Department of labor in Seattle concerning a compliant of Mrs. Elsie Chung Lyon about the ports of entry for readmittance to the United States. Mrs. Lyon was complaining that she had not been told the requirements covering her entry. Forster explained:
1. All Chinese ports of entry are not advised when return permits are issued.
2. The Vancouver office did not know where the permit was issued or which port she departed to China from.
3. Chinese with return permits are entitled to admission to the U.S. through any port designated as a port of admission for Chinese.
Rules of October 1, 1926, governing the admission of Chinese gives the following on Ports on Entry:
“No Chinese person, other than a Chinese diplomatic or consular officer, shall be permitted to enter the United States at any seaport other than at the ports of Port Townsend or Seattle, Wash.; Portland, Oreg.; San Francisco, San Pedro, or San Diego, Calif; New Orleans, La.; New York, N.Y.; Boston, Mass.; San Juan or Ponce, P.R.; and Honolulu, Hawaii.”
According to her file, Elsie Chung Lyon continued traveling without any problems. The last entry notes that she left from San Francisco on 19 October 1936. “See Imm. File 117/9/36.”
Other information not included in the file:
On 12 September 1947, Elsie Chung Lyon’s letter to The New York Times criticizing General Wedemeyer’s statement on China was published. Lyon had recently worked seventeen months with the Chinese Nationalist Army in China and thought she was more able than Wedemeyer to evaluate the miserable and dehumanizing condition of the Chinese people and their need for honest leadership. She did not want America to continue “to grant aid to the present tyrannical regime…”
Death Information and Obituary for Elsie Chung Lyon:
Elsie Chung Lyon, the daughter of Mow Fun Chung and Mow Fung Huishe of China, was born in Australia in 1887. She died at Fort Worth, Texas on 16 Dec 1963 at age 76 years.2
Elsie graduated as a registered nurse from London School of Nursing and Medical Administration in England and was a registered nurse at the American Bureau for Medical Aid to China. She served as a lieutenant colonel in the Nationalist Chinese Army during World War II. After her return to the U.S., she translated English language nursing texts into Chinese. Her translation of Midwifery for Nurses (Hu shi jie chan xu zhi ) by Henry Russell is listed in the National Institutes of Health library catalog.3
Elsie Chung Lyon became a U.S. citizen in 1947. She was survived by a son David in Missouri, a son Hugh in Virginia and a daughter, Mrs. Margaret McHarg of Bellevue, Washington.4
[This file is the combined effort of the Chinese Exclusion Act Indexing team at the National Archives at Seattle. Rhonda Farrer indexed the file. She was intrigued by the story and shared it with Joyce Liu. Joyce found the NYT’s article. They gave me a copy of their findings. From there I obtained Elsie’s death certificate and obituary and wrote it up for the blog. THN]
In September 1925, C. Y. Shiu, age 37, applied to the American Consular Service at Vancouver, British Columbia for a nonquota immigration visa. He was 37 years old and was born at Canton, China. He had lived in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada since 1920 and was a Methodist minister. He had eight children, Mary, age 11, born in China, and seven younger sons all born in Canada. His church would be paying for the family’s passage from Vancouver, B. C. to Los Angeles, and they expected him to minister to his congregation for about five years.
His birth certificate, a letter of recommendation, a letter from his church and his Section 6 certificate were reviewed by Immigration and his application was approved and his photo was attached to the form.
Shui was ordained as a minister in the Methodist Church at Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan in June 1922 and a member of the British Columbia Conference since 1923. Rev. S. S. Osterhout, Superintendent of Methodist Oriental Missions in Canada, confirmed that Shui had been a missionary for the past nine years and a member in good standing. A letter from Rev. D. H. Klinefelter, superintendent of Pacific Coast Methodist Episcopal Chinese Missions, confirmed Shui’s transfer to Los Angeles and Pasadena with a salary of $100 per month and a house to live in.
In his letter of recommendation, George Bell stated that Shui carried out his missionary duties faithfully in Kamloops and the District of North Saskatchewan for nine years.
The nonquota visa issued to Shiu Chiu Yiu contained photos of him, his wife, and their eight children.
Top row: Tai Duck, wife; Rev. Shiu Chiu Yiu, baby Andrew (b. 1925)
Middle row: Paul (b. 1917), Timothy (b. 1923), Luke (b. 1922)
Bottom row: Peter (b. 1919), Mary (b. 1914), John (b. 1920), overlap: James (b. 1921)
The family arrived at the Port of Seattle on 26 September 1925 and were admitted.
In his Board of Special Inquiry interview, Shiu testified that his marriage name was See Wai and that he was born on 1 October 1888 in Canton, China. His parents were David Shiu and Leong Shee. He had one brother and three sisters. His mother had died but his father and sisters were all living in China. His brother, Shiu Chiu Chung, a Presbyterian minister, was living in Winnipeg, Canada. After their arrival was approved, the family left for Los Angeles on the Princess Marguerite.
The ship must have stopped in San Francisco. Although Shiu intending to on going to Los Angeles, he found out he was needed in San Francisco. He and his family were there three years, then went to Sacramento for five years and had been in Portland for two years. In 1935, his salary was $120 a month.
In 1935, Shui applied for a reentry permit. It was approved, and he spent two weeks in Canada.
In June 1937, Shiu Chiu Yiu and his daughter, Shui Kuo Ying (Mary Shiu) applied for re-entry permits. Shui gave his marriage name as Chew Lui. By then he had ten children, eight living. His sons John and Andrew had died. His children Thomas and Ruth were born in California. Shiu’s wife and the children were living in Portland, Oregon. Mary, now 23 years old, was going to China to teach for two years. She graduated from Albany College in June 1936 and her father had been teaching her Chinese. Mary had a separate file, 4009/1-3. Her father planned to go to with her as far as Vancouver, Canada and then return to Portland within two months. Mary presented her diplomas from Albany College in Albany, Oregon; Oregon State Teachers Certificate, Sacramento High School, and Junior High School in Sacramento. Their reentry permits were approved.
Shiu Chiu Yiu returned to Portland in August 1937 and was admitted.
The reference sheet in the file gives the file numbers for his wife, eight sons, one daughter, and his brother.
the Indexes to the CEA files at NARA-Seattle have been updated to September 2024.
In 1922 Lam Mai (Mai Euon Lam) arrived in Seattle from China with his mother, brother and his brother’s family. Lam Mai’s file contains his Section 6 Student visa with his photo, giving his date of birth as 13 December 1913 at Tai Ling village, Toishan district, China. His father died about 1918. He was admitted as a student at the Port of Seattle in December 1922. He was nine years old.
Since he was so young, his brother, Lam Yuk Tsun, filled out the paperwork for him. His brother was a college student, and his sister-in-law, Chan Kim Ho, was a practicing physician. They lived in Tacoma, Washington. Lam Mai went to school at Central Public School, until he moved to Portland, Oregon. He graduated from Lincoln High School in June 1931 and attended North Pacific College, majoring in pharmacy. In February 1932, Lam Mai applied for a return permit as a student for a trip to China. One of his teachers was a witness for him. Charles W. Abbott testified that Lam Mai was a very good student, and he did not know why he left school.
Lam Mai’s reason for leaving his pharmacy studies is not mentioned in his file but findings through additional research show that he left to attend pilot training school at Swan Island airport in Portland, Oregon. The Adcox School of Aviation in Portland trained thirty-six pilots over two terms. Most of them went to China and flew for the Chinese Air Force after Japan’s attack on Manchuria. By 1937 Lam Mai was a chief test pilot for the Chinese central government air force.
In letters to his brother Y.T. Lam, a Portland naturopath, Mai recounted some of the heroic acts of his pilot school classmates, John Key Wong (a.k.a. Wong Pan-Yang, Hwang Pan-Yang), Arthur Chin and others. All together the Portland-trained pilots shot down more than sixty Japanese planes.
Sadly, Lam Mai was shot down over Nanchong, China, in December 1937 and died from his injuries. File numbers for his mother, brother, and sister-in-law are included in the file.
To find out more about the Chinese pilots training program in Portland in the 1930s go to my article, “I think I am going to fly: Chinese Pilots Trained in Portland During the 1930s,” Oregon Historical Quarterly, Winter 2021, p532-542.
In 1936 Hui Cheung, Hui Hin’s father, wanted his son to visit China for a few months before returning to Spokane, Washington. His status would be as the son of a merchant. As the laws became stricter on Chinese immigration, it became harder for a merchant to prove his status as a merchant. Although in many cases, Hui Hin’s father, Hui Cheung, would probably have been thought of as a merchant, a strict reading of the Act put him in the manufacturing category and therefore a laborer. Being a merchant would have most likely assured his son’s readmittance to the United States.
Hui Hin was originally admitted to the United States at the Port of Seattle on 12 December 1927 as a student and the minor son of Hui Cheung, a merchant at Wing Wo Chinese Medicine Company in Spokane, Washington. Hui Hin was nine years old. He settled in, was called by the American name, Bill Huie, and attended school at Hawthorne School, Washington School, and Louis & Clark High School in Spokane.
Cheung started the paperwork to get approval for the trip. Two white witnesses swore that Hui Cheung was a merchant. Hui Hin’s application for predetermination of his status as the minor son of merchant was disapproved and his right of appeal to the local Secretary of Labor was disapproved by the District Director of Immigration and Naturalization at Seattle on the grounds that Hui Cheung is not a merchant within the meaning of the law and regulations but was engaged in manufacturing but he did have the right to appeal to the Secretary of Labor in Washington, D.C.
On the day Immigrant Inspector Herbert Nice stopped in to observe the Wing Wo Chinese Medicine Company he found Hui Cheung washing medicine bottles in the sink. Cheung said it was because regular clerk was at lunch. The inspector verified that it was lunch time. Next, Inspector Nice found herbs cooking on the stove in the kitchen. Cheung said that was also the duty of the clerk who was at lunch. Nice asked Hui Cheung to explain the company’s process of making the medicine. Cheung said the medicinal herbs were sent from China to San Francisco, then shipped to Spokane. One of the clerks would cook the herbs to make the medicines. Dr. Hui Yut Seng, the other partner in the company, would see the patient and prescribe the medicine. The clerk would fix the medicine and give it to the patient. Inspector Nice concluded that Hui Cheung was engaged in manual labor and that his application should be denied. Hui Cheung swore in an affidavit that he was one of the partners and owners of the Wing Wo Chinese Medicine Company on Wall Street in Spokane. He had been a partner since 1918 and had not engaged in manual labor of any kind.
Hui Hin was interviewed twice in 1936 about his life in his village in China before he came to the U.S. when he was nine years old. There were six pages of questions about his deceased grandparents, where they were buried, number of houses in his village, where the front door of their house was located, the size of doors, what were they made of, he was asked to draw a diagram of his village, tell how many rooms in his house, color of tile floor, if there was a courtyard, any skylights, a rice mill, rice pounder, any pictures, a balcony, any clocks, where everyone slept, who lived in the houses in the village, who lived in the first house in the fourth row, how far away was the school, were there gardens or farms, what did they grow, was there a river or steam, any bridges, where was the market, how old when your father visited, (He was 7 or 8), and about three more pages of questions. He did not know many of the answers. His answers were compared to his 1928 interview. The Immigration Inspector also had some doubts that Hui Hin was Hui Cheung’s son. Hui Hin could not remember his mother’s name, the names of his grandparents and various neighbors, or details about his home and village. Hui Hin was nine when he entered this country, and it was now eight years later. He may have been nervous about the interview. He knew how important it was to get everything correct. It was understandable that he would not remember his village and classmates in great detail.
Immigration reviewed Hui Cheung file. Hui Cheung had made two trips to China as a laborer. The interviewer noted that one of his trips shows him being admitted in April 1918 which would have made it possible for him to “render his paternity of the applicant possible.”
When Hui Cheung returned from his 1927 trip to China, he and his witnesses had lengthy interrogations. Clearly, Immigration was not comfortable about Hui Cheung current status as a merchant or that Hui Hin was his son. Cheung answers were not always consistent from one trip to the next. In 1918 he stated that he had two sons and a daughter. In 1927 he says he never had a daughter or any children that died.
Hui Hin did not make his 1936 trip to China. His application was disapproved, and no appeal was filed.
When Sullivan T. Mar, a Chinese citizen, entered the United States in 1927 his status was as a student with a diplomatic passport.
This section of the Chinese Exclusion Act applied to him:
SEC.13. That this act shall not apply to diplomatic and other officers of the Chinese Government traveling upon the business of that government, whose credentials shall be taken as equivalent to the certificate in this act mentioned and shall exempt them and their body and house- hold servants from the provisions of this act as to other Chinese persons.1
Sullivan T. Mar (Teh-Chien Mar) was the Chancellor of Chinese Consulate in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. On 11 January 1927 he traveled from Vancouver by train stopping in Blaine, Washington before arriving in Seattle. He was thirty-one years old and was born in Foochow, China. He had a diplomatic passport issued by the Chinese Consulate in Vancouver and a U.S. passport issued by the American Consulate General. According to the Bureau of Immigration in Washington, D.C. since Mar was admitted as an official, he was not required to comply with the rules governing alien students even though he had originally been admitted as a student at the University of Washington.
Mar made a short visit to Vancouver on 17 July 1928. The Immigration Service office in Seattle gave him a one-page certificate for identification. It contained his photo and signature and was only valid for one week for his readmission through the Port of Seattle. It could not be used as a certificate of residence or certificate of landing. He returned the next day and was admitted with his diplomatic passport.
Although there is no more official immigration activity in Sullivan T. Mar’s file, an undated newspaper clipping was inserted into his file. Mar wrote to the editor of the Seattle Daily Times regarding the September 1931 Japanese Imperial Army invasion of Manchuria, China.
Japan had suffered heavy financial losses from the 1929 Great Depression and Manchuria was rich in natural resources, forests and fertile farmland. Japan had already invested in Manchurian railroads and wanted to expand their holdings in China. These activities led to the 2nd Sino-Japanese War which began in 1937 when China began full-scale resistance to the expansion of Japanese influence in its territory.2
Mar wrote a letter to the editor because he disagreed with a speech Dr. Herbert H. Gowan had given on 18 December 1931 at the Lions’ Club concluding that Japan’s military activities were not an act of aggression. Mar was a former student of Dr. Gowan at the University of Washington. He respected Gowan’s knowledge of “Orient history” but thought Gowan was ill-informed about the current conditions. Mar listed six points of disagreement in Dr. Gowan’s stance. Mar listed Japan’s 1915 Twenty-0ne Demands, the large number of troops entering Manchuria, President Wilson’s response to the demands, Japan’s demand that China recognize the demands, Japan setting up a puppet government in Mukden, and Dr. Gowan presumption that he had more knowledge of the situation than the United States government and League of Nations. Mar suggested American business interests should consult with the reports on file at the State Department and the Department of Commerce for a history of Japan’s activities to control trade in Manchuria.
He signed his letter S. T. Mar [Sullivan T. Mar]. A handwritten note beside the newspaper clipping states, “One S. J. Mar has an oriental shop in Shafer Building—across from F & N [Frederick & Nelson]. Also Telephone Book shows S. J. Mar 700 – 8th Ave.”
See September 2024’s blog entry for the details of Ng Back Ging’s file up to his admittance to the U.S. in 1926.
In 1929 Ng Back Ging wanted to make a trip to China. The Immigration Act of 1924 made it more complicated to get approval for his trip. The 1924 Act prevented immigration from Asia except under certain circumstances. It capped total immigration to 165,000 and set the nationality quotas to 2% based on the 1890 census
The First Supplement to Chinese General Order No. 13 fixed this problem. It said that if the husband or father who was admitted before July 1, 1924, has maintained his status as a merchant, the wives and minor children admitted after June 30, 1924, would be lawfully admitted to the United States.
The Immigration Act of 1924 as it relates to Ng Buck Look and his son Ng Back Ging:
1. Ng Buck Look, a merchant, was the father of Ng Back Ging. Ng Buck Look was lawfully admitted to the United States prior to 1 July 1924.
2. Ng Buck Look, the father, maintained his merchant status.
3. Ng Back Ging, his son, was lawfully admitted after 30 June 1924.
In late December 1929 Ng Back Ging applied for a Predetermination of Status Under General Order No. 13 to make a trip to China. He swore that his American name was Harold Ng and he was not married. He was born on 11 January 1913 in Mun Low village, Sun Woy District. He wanted to get treatment for his leg which was broken in August 1928 and was not healing. Since his arrival in 1926 he attended Pacific College in Seattle. He was asked some of the same questions he was asked during his 1926 interview. His answers were consistent with his earlier testimony. His father was interviewed again and testified that he had worked at Lin Shing Jewelry Store in Vancouver, B.C. for about two years before he came to Seattle. He showed the interviewer his papers from his admittance in 1926.
William Francis Roark and Ralph E. Olsen were interviewed and swore in an affidavit that they had been residents of Seattle for several years and were not Chinese. They knew Ng Buck Look for more than one year and believed that he was a member of the Quong Chong Company in Seattle, and he had not performed any manual labor during that time. Olsen was in the wholesale meat business and Roark was a passenger agent for the Milwaukee Railway. They both stated the Quong Chong Company was not associated with a restaurant, laundry, or gambling house.
Purely G. Hall, examining inspector, visited the company and reviewed three current years of the partnership books and noted that the gross sales for 1929 were over $40,000. He recommended that Ng Back Ging receive his certificate.
Ng Back Ging left for China after in December 1929 and returned to Seattle on 3 November 1930 and was admitted to the United States.
For more information on the Immigration Act of 1924, see
Jay D. Green, “Passage of the 1924 Immigration Act,” 23 April 2024