The Last March for the Bandleader
June 24, 2005
On a quiet street in North Beach just blocks away from Chinatown’s morning clatter, Lisa Pollard fingers the golden, winding braids of her black marching band uniform and sighs. She knows that she will no longer be able to call up her old friend for tea and custard pie. And when the Green Street Mortuary Band strikes up its procession, the bandleader will turn and smile to a blank window off Washington Street.
“Wilson was so integral to everything that happened in Chinatown,” Lisa says. “He was like a father to me. … He was brilliant. One of the true movers and shakers in Chinatown, and he opened doors for me when no one else would. I loved him as did many people.”
Wilson Wong was Chinatown’s original maverick son. He’s not mentioned in the history books –– like many of the original immigrants who first arrived on Angel Island. But for those who knew the glib and ever-entertaining octogenarian, he was a historical landmark.
He was there when Lisa first considered leading a marching band. And it was Wong who donated an entire storage locker full of instruments and books filled with original funeral march music from the turn of the century.
“Oh, he hated the first time we played. He said, ‘Ah, you guys sound like a bunch of amateurs.’ But he was right –– we weren’t any good. He showed us how to improve. He was always brutally honest like that.”
Wong was the eldest son, the last surviving member of the Wong Taw Clan of seven sisters and three brothers (one predeceased), and a lifelong bachelor who would come to proudly uphold his filial duties for more than half a century after his parents had passed away. He became the proprietor of Fat Ming Company, the second oldest store in Chinatown, and worked seven days a week.
He was born in Shanghai, China. As a young man struggling to become American in a nation rife with anti-immigration laws and overt racism, where more than 80 percent of Chinese were limited to Chinatown residences, Wong developed a knack for mischievous fun and philanthropy as a way of coping in segregated America. Of the tales he shared with his grandnieces and grandnephews, there were many days spent playing hooky, riding on the backs of great, heaving hay trucks to the Santa Cruz Boardwalk.
He was more cautious with strangers. A niece, Donna Leung, wrote in a genealogy tome that when, “Felicia Lowe asked if [she] could convince Uncle Wilson to participate, [sic] he was adamant that he would not.” Wong, however, became a natural celebrity, appearing in Emmy Award winning Lowe’s KQED documentary series, Neighborhoods: the Hidden Cities of San Francisco, and a CNN special.
He was a staple at community events, and a garrulous host at family banquets. Wilson and his sister Rose sponsored homecomings for his adopted daughters and sons after reuniting with long lost ancestors in Kwangchow in 1973.
Debbie Yee, who lived with Wong for many years, was the first to relay the news of his passing that spread quickly through family and friends.
Cultural anthropologist Linda Sun Crowder, who shared interviews on NPR’s All Things Considered with Wong, noticed that he was particularly tickled by the opening of the Cathay Band and Club exhibit at the Chinese Historical Society’s museum.
“There seemed to be a sense of satisfaction. He was witnessing something that was significant in his life being honored and recognized as part of Chinatown’s history.”
Wong’s passing reflects not the death of an era but the lifelong pursuit of adventure, family devotion, and the passionate drive to reunite with that which was lost before. He leaves behind his magnum opus of bulging family albums and devoted friends.
Memorial services were held on Saturday, June 18. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Self-Help for the Elderly, Hospice Care, 407 Sansome Street, San Francisco, CA 94111.
Green Street Mortuary Band
Chinese funerals with marching band processions are expressions of Chinatown’s public culture, identity and heritage. They developed from traditional Chinese mourning dirges mixed with British military pomp during the occupation of Hong Kong in the 1800s. The Cathay Chinese Boys Band started this distinctly Chinese American tradition in 1911. They played every Sunday –– sometimes twice –– and at the opening of the 1939 World’s Fair. Today the baton has been passed to the Green Street Mortuary Band, where bandleader Lisa Pollard tends to the rich tradition.
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