Five Chinatowns | 5 个中国城
Five Chinatowns
Historically, five different “Chinatowns” developed within Santa Cruz County:
Pacific Avenue Chinatown was the original Chinatown in Santa Cruz. It was located on Willow Street, now Pacific Avenue, for about 12 years.
Front Street Chinatown was the second Chinatown in the City of Santa Cruz. After it burned in 1895, the displaced residents developed Birkenseer’s Chinatown and Blackburn’s Chinatown. Eventually it was once again established along Front Street. The last remaining structure was razed in 1955.
Blackburn’s Chinatown, City of Santa Cruz, developed after the Front Street Chinatown fire of 1895, on land owned by Harriet Mead Blackburn.
Watsonville Chinatown near the center of Watsonville at Maple Street and Union Street. The Chinese agreed to move about one mile south, across the Pajaro River into Monterey County, in 1888. By 1900, it had a population of about 800. Watsonville Chinese Concentration was located on Grove Street in Watsonville, near the apple drying houses in the 1930’s. Its disappearance was attributed to an aging Chinese population and the second generation relocating away from the concentration.
Birkenseer’s Chinatown, Santa Cruz, c. 1900. China Lane angles off to the river on the right, while the buildings in the left foreground (Bowman’s Carriage works) face Front Street. Part of the Garibaldi Hotel can be seen on the far left. San Lorenzo River can be seen beyond the Chinatown, and there is snow visible on the Santa Cruz mountains in the distance. Most of the residents of Birkenseer’s Chinatown were domestics, cooks, and laundrymen.
The First Chinatown
The first Chinatown in Santa Cruz came together in the mid 1860s and was located on the west side of Willow Street (what is now Pacific Ave.) A collection of 12 men took up most of one block between Lincoln and Walnut Streets. In a group of single-story buildings, there were two laundries, a temple, one or two small stores, and a cigar shop that catered to whites in the community. As Santa Cruz’s economy began to boom in the late 1860s, South Willow Street began to become inundated with businesses relocating to areas where the rents were more affordable. This pushed the Chinese from Willow Street, to vacant buildings along Front Street. By 1877 the last Chinese moved from Willow Street location to the new Front Street Chinatown, which consisted of 37 men and one woman. There were 31 laundrymen, two cooks, one domestic, and one merchant. Of the 98 Chinese people living in Santa Cruz at that time, less than half lived in Chinatown. Most lived at their place of work: the railroad depot, the laundry, or as a domestic.
By Flex Kids Culture.
