Courtesy of Maya Lin Studio/Museum of Chinese in America

Inside an old manufacturing building in downtown New York City you’ll find a general store. Canned foods, tins of tea, and linens are set on its shelves. You can’t buy anything there, however. Now it has a new purpose: It tells a story.

The general store is inside the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA) in New York City, not far from the city’s ‘Chinatown.’ The store is part of an exhibit called “With a Single Step: Stories in the Making of America.” It’s a replica of a Chinatown general store—one of hundreds—that would have stood in Chinese-American communities during the 19th and 20th centuries. That’s when tens of thousands of Chinese people were immigrating, or coming, to the United States. And the history of Chinese in America, says Cynthia Lee, curator and director of exhibitions for the MOCA, is the history of America.

Between 1849 and 1882, a large number of Chinese came to America seeking work. They settled in neighborhoods in every major American city, including New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Seattle. At first, they were drawn by the California gold rush. Many also found jobs on the transcontinental railroad, on fishing boats, and in factories and farms. But European immigrants were competing with Chinese for the same jobs, and they began to distrust the Chinese. Riots broke out against the Chinese.

In 1882, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, which prevented most Chinese from coming to the U.S. The law also meant Chinese could not become American citizens. However, merchants were exempt from this act. They could bring their families to America.

Those Chinese who did manage to come to America during this time were mostly single men, or men whose families remained in China. “It was a community of bachelors,” explains Lee.

As with most immigrant groups, Chinese settled in neighborhoods with others of the same background. In each city, the Chinese neighborhood became known as Chinatown. Chinese merchants opened general stores there. People used the stores not only to buy items they needed, but as community centers.

“All the Chinese would hang out at the store, where mail was sent, and everyone spoke the same dialect,” explains Lee. Stores became places to get together for news, gossip, and a cup of tea. “They were very male spaces,” Lee says. Though women in Chinatown were scarce, those that were there “were mostly at home, not out in public.”

Courtesy of Maya Lin Studio/Museum of Chinese in America; permanent exhibition designed by Matter Practice/mgmt. design, with lighting by Marcus Doshi

The MOCA shares the story of Chinatown and its general store as part of a greater story of the Chinese experience in America from the first immigrants in the late 1700s to the present day. The museum’s curators use artifacts such as those that make up the general store exhibit (the store is rebuilt from furnishings of many different Chinatown general stores). They also use primary documents, such as letters, photographs, and oral histories. Visitors to the museum listen to recordings of people telling their own stories. Visitors read the letters sent to and from China.

The exhibit makes you feel a part of the story. “We’re a history museum, but history is an ongoing narrative,” says Lee. “We want people to feel they are part of history."

Listen to an oral history about the Chinatown general stores.  Audio is based on the oral history of Lung Chin, New York City, ca. 1988.
MOCA Collection.

Think About It: Are you a part of a story of history? Why or why not?
 

Words to Know
artifacts: objects (such as tools) showing human work and representing a culture or a stage in the development of a culture
curator: a person in charge of managing collections in a museum
documents: written or printed papers giving information about or proof of something
exempt: free or released from some condition or requirement that others must meet
immigrating: arriving from one country to live in another
narrative: something that is told or written
replica: a copy
transcontinental: reaching or going across a continent

Learn more about the "With a Single Step" exhibit at the Museum of Chinese in America.

Exhibition interiors (including the treatment of walls and flooring within the exhibition galleries) were designed by Matter Architecture Practice with graphics by mgmt. Design, lighting by Marcus Doshi Lighting Design, fabrication by ExPlus Incorporated, and audiovisual installation by VideoSonic Systems.