This month, let’s herald those early Chinese families who made America their home, raising families and subsequent generations in the Bay Area. Their stories represent the many immigrants who came from China seeking a better life, and the hard work it took attaining that American dream.
Gloria Hom, chairwoman of the Mission College Economics Department for 35 years, shares the story of four generations of her family: “My maternal grandfather, Thomas Foon Chew emigrated from Toy Shan, China in 1907, and by the 1920’s he took over the canning business founded by his father Yen Chew. He became known as the ‘asparagus king’ when he developed canning and preserving asparagus.”
Thomas Foon Chew’s daughter Lonnie, Gloria’s mother, worked for Erle Stanley Gardner, author of the Perry Mason books. Brother Tim and sister Frances became bankers. Lonnie married Stanford foreign student, Patrick Sun, who later circled the world on diplomatic posts as Consul General for the Republic of China. “Returning to the US, daughter Pat went to Mills before settling in the Philippines. Sylvia went to University of Pacific settling in Stockton, brother Philip graduated from Rice University, and I attended Dominican College,” said Hom.
Marrying Peter Hom, the first Chinese attorney in Santa Clara County, together they raised three girls in Palo Alto: Patty, an architect, Jenny, mechanical engineer, and daughter Leslie Kingsbury, an attorney with Golden Gate University. Their close family ties are apparent as the three generations eat together almost nightly. As Gloria Hom reminisces, “I think my California-born mother would be proud to see how close we are with our five grandchildren, carrying on the Chinese traditions of being a tight knit family involved in each other’s lives.”
Newly retired Foothill College President Bernadine Chuck Fong’s family history in America began at the end of the 1800s when her maternal grandfather Bing Tong and his wife settled in San Francisco. Her mother and 4 siblings were born from 190l-1910 and all attended Chinese Commodore Stockton Elementary School. Bernadine’s paternal grandfather, Chock Hee Hong Sen immigrated to Kauai from China to become a pineapple plantation owner and teacher. His son, Frank Chuck, came to Stanford in 1919, earning his Ph.D. in chemical engineering. He ultimately opened his own research lab, Fla-Pana, to develop the process of powdered milk. Always community-minded, he helped co-found the Chinese Six Companies, the governance body of San Francisco’s Chinatown. Bernadine’s husband, Herbert worked in family markets since he was 10 and retired as an executive for Unified Western Grocers. Their two children, the fourth generation of the Chock family, are Jordan and Jennifer. Jordan is completing a Masters program at S.F. Academy of Art and Jennifer is presently a research scientist at Gilead Sciences, Inc. while preparing to return to graduate school to study medical research. From humble beginnings at the turn of the century, the four-generation Chock Family epitomizes the Chinese immigrant story of hard work, education values and family unity.
Norman Tu’s family came to America in 1956 sponsored by the First Baptist Church of Oakland. Patriarch Joseph Tu had been Vice President of a shipping company in China, but American jobs were hard to obtain, so worked as a postal clerk at UC Berkeley. Wanting to immerse his children into American culture, they moved to San Leandro away from a Chinese community. In 1982, son Norman with wife Antonia and brother David co-founded supply chain solutions company DisCopyLabs. Of the other children, Elaine has two children who are urologists, Harold is a surgeon with 3 children practicing law and business, Ann has degrees in nutrition and computer science, and David has two children in college. Norman’s oldest son, David, directs business development at DCL, son Brian is VP at Break.com and daughter Leslie is with RedEnvelope.com. Joseph and Sieu Mei Tu should be proud of the American way of life they have achieved in only 50 years.
Billy Ma had to work many years in America before he could bring his wife and two children here in 1936. Their recollections of being separated from their young children and the inquisition at Angel Island remain a painful memory. The couple worked side by side in their San Francisco Japantown restaurant, Billy’s Waffle Shop, while raising six children. They later bought a downtown grocery store which opened 18 hours a day to send their children to college, their main goal. Benefiting from their parents hard work were their offspring Eudora, Betty, Judy, Dr. Gordon Ma, and pharmacists Louie Ma and Cleo Jong. Cleo was the first Chinese woman to earn a UCSF Doctor of Pharmacy degree in 1962. Both Billy and Wong Toy would be very proud to see their growing family of eighteen grandchildren and 26 great grandchildren carrying on their family values.
Former Hollywood Reporter correspondent Frank Eng says: “My father, Ng Kay Jom, was born in the 1868 in the village of Ha Peng, near Toishan in the delta region southeast of Canton. He came to seek his fortune in “Gold Mountain” with his two brothers in 1882, ironically in the year of the infamous Exclusion Act.”
Clan brothers helped “arrange” the marriage to Lum Kay Yoke and they and their nine children resided in San Jose’s Heinlenville Chinatown until his death in 1923.The first American-born citizens of the Eng family were Margaret, Ann, Peggy, William, Arthur, Alyce and Frank.
Second oldest daughter Ann married Dr. Joe Lee, an herbalist in San Jose’s Chinatown, and raised daughter Mitzi living above their Pekin Herb Co. Mitzi married Salinas grocery entrepreneur Jim Don, and together they ran the family Wing’s Supermarket in San Jose for 20 years before retiring to Lake Tahoe. Oldest son Rick is a Kaiser physician in the Roseville area, and son Jay is the first of the Don/Eng family after five generations to move back to China “where I am raising my own family of three children, ages 9, 6 and 5, and working as a consultant.”
Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge James Chang’s family began in America in 1940 when his father, Stephen Chang came from China. Meeting wife Elsie while attending Pacific Union College, he moved to Mountain View to run a small grocery store while Elsie taught. Their family eventually grew to include Stephen Jr., an ophthalmologist with two children, James with three children and realtor Esther Tan with two children, and U.C. grad architect Tanne. Now retired, James and Shirley spend time with Santa Clara Deputy District Attorney Charlotte, ophthalmologist Charlene and her two children and Janice, a Kaiser doctor in Family Practice.
Six generations of the Kwok family have lived in the Bay Area since Quock Fook Lai first stepped foot in America sometime near 1867, according to great granddaughter Sylvia Eng. Originating from Guangdong, Heungshan county, he and wife Han Shee arrived in a junk boat in Monterey. Quong Yow Choy also immigrated to America in 1868 and was joined by his wife Cheung Shee in 1875 to raise eight children. One son, Wing Joe Kwok (Tom), Sylvia’s maternal grandfather, had 11 children who moved to San Francisco.
Tom’s daughter Anne married William Jack Chow, an ambitious young man working his way through law school to become San Francisco’s first Chinese Deputy District Attorney. Jack and Anne had two children, Sylvia and Edward. Sylvia had careers as a real estate broker, Certified Financial Planner and Probate Referee, while Edward attended St. Louis Medical School and is now serving as Medical Director of the Chinese Community Health Plan. He is married to Loretta and has two children.
Sylvia and Dr. Roger Eng raised four children as the Kwok family’s fifth generation: Dr. Roger Eng, Jr., Chinese Hospital chief radiologist, with two young sons Jackson Thomas and Nicolas; Radiologic Technologist Sharisse Eng Koelbel with her children Sydney and Logan; and youngest daughter Shanelle, a missionary serving in New Zealand. Anne Quock Chow, matriarch of the Quock family, recently returned from a Mexican Rivera cruise, which she spent with all of her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren. In true Chinese tradition, she believes family togetherness is a very important attitude towards life.