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Imagine strolling the Plazuela Machado, watching families socializing, kids
playing…but wait… the faces look more Asian than Mexican! If you were here
in the late 1920s, you would have seen more Chinese than Americans or Canadians.
Chinese faces may be rare here now, but they have graced this part of the
hemisphere since the 1600s when the “Manila Galleons” plied the luxury trade
route between the Spanish ports of Manila and Acapulco. However, it was
not until the latter part of the 1800s that the Chinese came in large numbers.
Significant factors in motivating Chinese people to seek outside opportunities
were their impoverishment from foreign invasions, social upheavals from
rebellions, and the destruction of land from floods and typhoons. Peasant
farmers had to sell out to pay their debts, leaving them landless, jobless,
and homeless. Drawing them was the growing demand for labour, first in the
United States and then Mexico. Their migration to the Americas happened
in waves. In the United States, the California Gold Rush drew over 20,000
Chinese to California by 1852. With the expansion of fruit growing between
1850-1880, over 200,000 Chinese were brought over as contract labourers.
The Chinese were also in demand as railroad builders. The Burlingame agreement
of 1868 between the US and China allowed unrestricted Chinese immigration.
When the economy took a downturn, the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882 closed
the doors to immigration and citizenship. The unwanted Chinese labourers
started to look south to Mexico. Interestingly, as railroad construction
continued in the United States and into Mexico between 1880 and the early
part of the twentieth century, Mexican workers replaced the Chinese. In
1876, President Porfirio Diaz initiated a program of economic expansion
based on foreign investment, know-how, and markets. They also needed foreign
workers, people with the ability to meet the demands created by new industries
and urban growth. The Chinese met these requirements. To increase access
to Chinese markets, a Treaty of Amity and Commerce was signed in 1893 between
Mexico and China, which included a “most favoured nation” clause. By this
time, there were Chinese colonies in Sinaloa as well as the states of Baja
California, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Sonora and Tamaulipas. From 1890 onward,
the Chinese population in Sonora alone ranked first or second as the most
populous foreign group, forming a significant social and economic presence.
With their habits of working hard, living frugally, and using inter-personal
networks for social and financial aide, the Chinese labourers were better
able than their Mexican counterparts to prosper, even if only modestly.
They were adept at market gardening, small grocery and variety sales. They
provided personal services such as laundry, cooking and sewing. Eventually,
they entered into manufacturing, providing cheap shoes and clothing for
locals, and by 1903 they owned one-third of the shoe factories in Sonora
with sales of $100,000US a year. By 1907, the Chinese were involved in the
merchant class, owning department stores that traded with major cities in
the United States and Europe. By 1911, an estimated 35,000 Chinese had entered
Mexico. While some may have used this country as a back door into the United
States, most Chinese immigrants came to settle in Mexico. They focussed
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bettering their
lives and improving their children’s prospects. Carlos Ley’s story, recounted
with pride and love by his daughter Carmen, is typical. Carlos lived in
a village close to Guangzhou and came to Mazatlán as a young boy barely
in his teens. An uncle, a merchant, sponsored him. There were opportunities
in Mexico in the early 1900s for a boy who was willing to work hard and
save. After a few years he had enough money from working with his uncle
to buy a passage back to China to find a wife. He returned to Mazatlán with
her in 1917. With some partners, he started a business. He eventually opened
up his own dry goods store, selling fabric in El Centro. As his business
grew, so did his family. He and his wife raised seven children, six boys
and a girl. While there was no area in Mazatlán where Chinese concentrated
that could be described as a Chinatown by North American standards, families
maintained close social ties, likely gathering at a community centre on
Calle Libertad close to the Angela Peralta Theatre. “I remember we used
to get together with other Chinese families to celebrate Chinese New Year.
Our parents gave us little red envelopes filled with money!” recalled Carmen
with a nostalgic grin and twinkle in her eyes. Perhaps the adults also used
the opportunity to speak together in their native language, for their children
were becoming acculturated. While at home, the Ley parents spoke to each
other in Chinese and addressed the children in the same language, but the
youngsters responded in Spanish. Eventually all the boys married local Mexican
girls. However, Carmen married a Chinese-Canadian man who had come to Mazatlán
on holiday. As with overseas Chinese everywhere and in every generation,
higher education was seen as a way to ensure a better life. All the children
were educated. At one point, three of their sons were in university in Mexico
City and Guadalajara. Among the family were a doctor and an engineer. The
younger boys helped their father and became businessmen. “My father created
a strong foundation for us,” said Carmen. “He taught us the value of honesty,
hard work and saving money. He started with nothing, but he built a successful
business and a strong family. That was his legacy.” Their large numbers,
visibility, success, and tendency to stay close to their own kind made the
Chinese population in Mexico targets of discrimination. This was especially
strong during the time of the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920). They were
seen as blocking opportunities for middle and lower-class Mexicans with
aspirations for advancement. But the Chinese persevered in the face of legislation,
harassment, riots, raids and even massacres. By 1923, Chinese immigrants
had become the largest food dealers on the Mexican West Coast, including
Culiacán and Mazatlán. Immigration increased until the Great Depression
of 1929. The United States expelled Mexicans, exacerbating the unemployment
situation in Mexico. In Sonora, again using legislation (making it, among
other things, illegal for a Chinese person to marry a Mexican), the Chinese
were given an ultimatum to comply within a limited period or leave. With
the terms stacked against them, many abandoned their homes and businesses.
By 1931, the Chinese and their families had made a mass exodus from the
state, never to return in the same numbers again. Mazatlán was not immune.
(Next month, Part II: The Present Generation of Chinese in Mazatlán) |
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