Chinatown | |
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Coordinates: 38°53′59″N77°01′18″W / 38.8998°N 77.0217°W | |
Country | United States |
District | Washington, D.C. |
Ward | Ward 2 |
Government | |
• Councilmember | Brooke Pinto |
ZIP Code | 20001 |
Area code | 202 |
Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown is a small, historic area of Downtown Washington, D.C. along H and I Streets between 5th and 8th Streets, Northwest. The area was once home to thousands of Chinese immigrants, but fewer than 300 remained in 2017. The current neighborhood was the second in Washington to be called “Chinatown” since 1931. Originally, the first Chinatown was built in the Federal Triangle on the south side of Pennsylvania Avenue some time after 1851, but was moved to the H Street area when a new federal building was built there. [1] In 1986, a Chinese gate was built over H Street at 7th Street. By 1997, prominent landmarks such as the Capital One Arena, a sports and entertainment arena, occupied the area. The neighborhood is served by the Gallery Place station of the Washington Metro. [2]
The Chinatown area was once home to many Chinese immigrants, who began to move into the area in the 1930s, having been displaced from Washington's original Chinatown along Pennsylvania Avenue by the development of the Federal Triangle government office complex. The newcomers marked it with Chinese signage and decorative metal latticework and railings. At its peak, Chinatown extended from G Street north to Massachusetts Avenue, and from 9th Street east to 5th Street.
Chinatown remained a strong community into the 1960s, but the 1968 Washington, D.C., riots that followed Martin Luther King's assassination, and the ensuing decline of D.C.'s downtown area, led many of the Chinese residents of Chinatown to move to the suburbs of Maryland and Virginia. [3] [4] [5] Throughout the 1970s, Eastern Wind: The Asian-American Community Newsletter of Washington, D.C. published editorials and opinions reacting to the changing neighborhood. An "Open Letter to the Asian Community" advocated for political engagement from the community to preserve Chinatown, and a petition sought to protest the displacement of residents by new plans for development in the area. [6]
In the early 1980s, the D.C. government built a new convention center between 9th and 11th streets, displacing Chinese residents living in the area. [3] In 1982, the city built the Wah Luck House apartments at 6th and H Streets, NW, to accommodate the displaced residents. Designed by architect Alfred Liu, the apartment building introduced modern Chinese design motifs due to the red-paneled balconies. [7]
In 1986, the city dedicated the Friendship Archway, a traditional Chinese gate. [8] This was a collaboration between the Washington DC government and its sister city Beijing. It was intended to attract visitors in addition to recognizing the local Chinese residents. [9] As part of the same effort, the Metro station was given the name Gallery Place-Chinatown until 2011.
The MCI Center was completed in 1997 (renamed Verizon Center in 2006 and Capital One Arena in 2017). After the construction of the arena, AsianWeek said in 2000 that the neighborhood "barely" remains. [10]
Numerous writers have cited Chinatown as an example of gentrification [9] [11] [12] [13] and an example of the commodification of culture. [14] In 2015, the Washington Post reported that only about 300 Chinese-Americans remained in the borough, and many of them were being forced out by their landlords. [15] [16] In 2022 Ruth Tam, et al. stated in a WAMU-FM article that Chinese ethnic activity moved to suburban areas outside of Washington, DC, and shopping for ethnic related goods is no longer done in Washington, DC itself. [17]
Each year the China Lunar New Year is celebrated with a parade that The Washington Post called, "one of the city’s signature events for more than 50 years". Lunar New Year is a celebration of light with honors family and is said to wipe away bad luck. The annual parade is described as a "massive parade" features dragon dances. The parade was cancelled in 2021 because of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. [18]
On February 10, 2019, the parade celebrated the year of the pig. "It featured traditional lion and dragon dances, firecrackers, beauty pageant winners and community groups". [19] The parade route runs along 8th Street NW and in 2020 it featured a person dressed as Caishen and another dressed as a Giant panda. 2020 was the year of the rat and some parade goers had small rat toys. [20]
Another parade which occurs in Chinatown is The Chinese Merchants Association parade. One such parade was hosted on September 10, 1957, William C. Beall was in the Chinatown section of Washington D.C. to photograph a parade. He worked as a staff photographer for The Washington Daily News . [21] [22] Two-year-old Allan Weaver attended the parade and he approached police officer Maurice Cullinane to ask if he was a US Marine. The image was printed in many publications and it also appeared on the back cover of Life (magazine) and it won the 1958 Pulitzer Prize for Photography. Beall named the image Faith and Confidence . [21] [23]
Census | Pop. | Note | %± |
---|---|---|---|
1880 | 100 | — | |
1930 | 800 | — | |
2010 | 300 [24] | — | |
Chinese-American population [25] |
In 2010, the census tract that contains Chinatown has around 3,000 residents. Chinatown is only 21% Asian, compared to 1990, when it had a majority Chinese American population. In 1990, its population was 66% Asian and 20% African American. [26] Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown is relatively small in terms of size and number of Chinese residents in comparison to other major Chinatown neighborhoods in the U.S., such as those in San Francisco and in Manhattan. Approximately half of Chinatown's residents live in the Wah Luck House, which has 153 units of apartment complexes. The closest Chinese supermarket, the Great Wall Supermarket, is fourteen miles west in Falls Church, Virginia. [27]
After the deadly 1968 riots following the April assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., many Chinese people sought a more economically stable and safe environment and moved out of Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown, relocating to suburban neighborhoods in Fairfax County, Virginia, and Montgomery County, Maryland. [28] [29] In 1970, there were roughly 3,000 Chinese residents in Washington's Chinatown; by 2016, the number was fewer than 600, many of them seniors residing in two low-income housing developments. [29] North Potomac, Maryland, is 18.4% Chinese American, the highest of any community within the Washington metropolitan area. The Maryland city of Rockville also has a significant population of residents of Chinese descent, at eight percent. In Virginia, sizable Chinese American communities are located in Centreville, Chantilly, and Floris, south of Washington Dulles International Airport. [26] [30]
Along with the development of the Verizon Center, historic buildings, mainly along the west side of 7th Street, were renovated and tenanted, primarily with nationally known brand shops and dining establishments. Within a short time, a significant mixed-use office-residential-retail development on the southeast corner of 7th and H streets commenced construction. These developments, which included restaurants, shops, a cinema complex, and a bowling alley, together with the Verizon Center, transformed the area into a bustling scene for nightlife, shopping, and entertainment. An anomaly is that most of the businesses are no longer representative of Chinatown, yet due to city design mandates put in place by the Chinatown Steering Committee in anticipation of urban development, even national chains hang their names in Chinese outside their stores. As a result, D.C.'s Chinatown can be categorized as semiotic landscape different than other Chinatowns. [14] [31] Chinatown has become home to many high-growth technology companies, such as Blackboard, Blue State Digital, LivingSocial, and The Knowland Group. [32] It is also the location of the Washington branch of the Goethe-Institut.
Chinatown's most prominent businesses are the approximately 20 Chinese and Asian restaurants, almost all of which are owned by Asian American families. Among the most well-known are Chinatown Express, Eat First, Full Kee, and Tony Cheng's. One of the restaurants, Wok & Roll, occupies what was once the Mary E. Surratt Boarding House — the meeting place for John Wilkes Booth and his conspirators in Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Another is located in a house once owned by the On Leong Chinese Merchants Association, which was among the first Chinese organizations to move into the neighborhood; today the structure is on the National Register of Historic Places.
The neighborhood is home to a Chinese video store, several general stores, and numerous Chinese American cultural and religious charities. Chinatown has one Chinese church, Chinese Community Church, located at 500 I Street. Chinese Community Church was founded in 1935, initially at L Street, but relocated in 2006 to its current I Street location. [33] The Sixth & I Historic Synagogue has been restored and is the scene of cultural events.
The Washington DC Chinatown Community Cultural Center offers numerous activities, classes and services. [34]
As of 2019 [update] the housing stock includes rowhouses, condominium complexes, and a few townhouses. Much of the housing is for rental use. [35]
As of 2011 [update] the Wah Luck House (traditional Chinese :華樂大廈; simplified Chinese :华乐大厦; Jyutping :waa4 lok6 daai6 haa6; pinyin :Huá Lè Dàshà) has many of the remaining ethnic Chinese residents, [27] and this continued in 2018. The complex opened in 1982. [36] In a period until 2018, the ownership of the complex had changed. [37] The designer of the complex was Alfred H. Liu, who immigrated to the United States from Taiwan. [36]
The Gallery Place Washington Metro station (on the Red, Green, and Yellow Lines), which opened in 1976, serves the neighborhood. [28] The name of the station was changed to Gallery Place-Chinatown in 1986. Two important Metrobus routes cross at 7th and H Streets.
As of 2011 [update] , on a once monthly basis, a shuttle to a suburban shopping center allows the residents of Wah Luck House to shop for ethnic groceries. [27]
The law of the District of Columbia requires businesses in the Chinatown zone to have some form of name in Chinese characters, in either the Traditional Chinese or Simplified Chinese scripts. [38]
The chairperson of the Chinatown Development Corporation, Alfred Liu, designed the Friendship Archway, the community's paifang, which was commissioned by the District of Columbia Government. Construction of the paifang began in June 1986. The idea came when Marion Barry visited China in May 1984 and conversed with the Mayor of Beijing, Chen Xitong. There was criticism from Lawrence Locke, the head of the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association (CCBA), and other Chinatown residents who were aligned with the Republic of China on Taiwan, and who disagreed with influence from the People's Republic of China. The CCBA had plans to create a different paifang, through it never materialized and the CCBA announced in 1988 that it nixed the idea. [39]
Residents are zoned to District of Columbia Public Schools. As of 2019 [update] zoned schools are Walker-Jones Education Campus (a K-8 school) and Dunbar High School. [35]
Within the FBI-commissioned film Game of Pawns the D.C. Chinatown is used as a stand-in for Shanghai. [40]
Chinatown is the catch-all name for an ethnic enclave of Chinese people located outside Greater China, most often in an urban setting. Areas known as "Chinatown" exist throughout the world, including Europe, Asia, Africa, Oceania, and the Americas.
Manhattan's Chinatown is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City, bordering the Lower East Side to its east, Little Italy to its north, Civic Center to its south, and Tribeca to its west. With an estimated population of 90,000 to 100,000 people, Chinatown is home to the highest concentration of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere. Manhattan's Chinatown is also one of the oldest Chinese ethnic enclaves. The Manhattan Chinatown is one of nine Chinatown neighborhoods in New York City, as well as one of twelve in the New York metropolitan area, which contains the largest ethnic Chinese population outside of Asia, comprising an estimated 893,697 uniracial individuals as of 2017.
The Chinatown–International District is a neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. It is the center of the city's Asian American community. Within the district are the three neighborhoods known as Chinatown, Japantown and Little Saigon, named for the concentration of businesses owned by people of Chinese, Japanese and Vietnamese descent, respectively. The geographic area also once included Manilatown.
A paifang, also known as a pailou, is a traditional style of Chinese architecture, often used in arch or gateway structures.
The Chinatown neighborhood in Oakland, California, is traditionally Chinese which reflects Oakland's diverse Chinese American, and more broadly Asian American community. It is frequently referred to as "Oakland Chinatown" in order to distinguish it from nearby San Francisco's Chinatown. It lies at an elevation of 39 feet.
Chinatown is a neighbourhood located in the area of De la Gauchetière Street in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The neighbourhood contains many Asian restaurants, food markets, and convenience stores as well being home to many of Montreal's East Asian community centres, such as the Montreal Chinese Hospital and the Montreal Chinese Community and Cultural Centre.
Philadelphia Chinatown is a predominantly Asian American neighborhood in Center City, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corporation supports the area. The neighborhood stretches from Vine Street on the north, Arch Street on the south, North Franklin Street and N. 7th Street on the east, to North Broad Street on the west.
Chinatown, Boston is a neighborhood located in downtown Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It is the only surviving historic ethnic Chinese enclave in New England since the demise of the Chinatowns in Providence, Rhode Island and Portland, Maine after the 1950s. Because of the high population of Asians and Asian Americans living in this area of Boston, there is an abundance of Chinese and Vietnamese restaurants located in Chinatown. It is one of the most densely populated residential areas in Boston and serves as the largest center of its East Asian and Southeast Asian cultural life.
Chinatown in Adelaide, South Australia, Australia, also called Adelaide Chinatown or Moonta Street Chinatown, is located on Moonta Street, within the large Adelaide Central Markets precinct between Grote and Gouger streets in the Adelaide city centre. Two large Paifang, which were erected by the city council, are guarded by the Chinese guardian lions. They mark the entrances at either end. Adelaide Chinatown consists mainly of Chinese restaurants, grocery stores and markets but also consists of many non-Chinese Asian restaurants offering cuisines of Indian, Japanese, Korean, Malaysian, Nepali, Thai and Vietnamese origins.
Ottawa's Chinatown is located along Somerset Street west of downtown Ottawa. It runs from Bay Street in the east to Preston Street in the west. Signs for Chinatown continue along Somerset until Preston Street, and Chinese/Asian restaurants can be found even farther west.
The first Brooklyn Chinatown, was originally established in the Sunset Park area of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. It is one of the largest and fastest growing ethnic Chinese enclaves outside of Asia, as well as within New York City itself. Because this Chinatown is rapidly evolving into an enclave predominantly of Fuzhou immigrants from Fujian Province in China, it is now increasingly common to refer to it as the Little Fuzhou or Fuzhou Town of the Western Hemisphere; as well as the largest Fuzhou enclave of New York City.
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Chinatowns are enclaves of Chinese people outside of China. The first Chinatown in the United States was San Francisco's Chinatown in 1848, and many other Chinatowns were established in the 19th century by the Chinese diaspora on the West Coast. By 1875, Chinatowns had emerged in eastern cities such as New York City, Boston, Pittsburgh, and Philadelphia. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 barred Chinese immigration to the United States, but the Magnuson Act of 1943 repealed it, and the population of Chinatowns began to rise again.
The U.S. city of Baltimore, Maryland is home to a small Chinatown. Historically, Baltimore had at least two districts that were called "Chinatown" where the first one existed on the 200 block of Marion Street during the 1880s. A second and current location is at the 300 block of Park Ave., which was dominated by laundries and restaurants. The initial Chinese population came because of the transcontinental railroad, however, the Chinese population never exceeded 400 as of 1941. During segregation, Chinese children were classified as "white" and went to the white schools. Chinatown was largely gone by the First World War due to urban renewal. Although Chinatown was largely spared from the riots of the 1960s, most of the Chinese residents moved to the suburbs. As of 2009, the area still shows signs of blight and does not have a Chinese arch. As of 2017, the area has become an “immigration hub” for Ethiopian people. In 2018, a mural of a Chinese dragon and an African lion was painted to signify the past as a Chinatown and the present as an African neighborhood. A night market in September 2018 marked the first Asian celebration of the area to an area that was “long forgotten and neglected”.
The Chicago metropolitan area has an ethnic Chinese population. While historically small in comparison to populations on the coasts, the community is rapidly expanding. As of 2023, there are 78,547 Chinese Americans who live in Chicago, comprising 2.9% of the city's population, along with over 150,000 Chinese in the greater Chicago area - making Chicago's Chinese community the 8th largest among US metropolitan areas. This population includes native-born Chinese as well as immigrants from Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia, and also racially mixed Chinese.
Chinatown Gateway is an outdoor paifang and sculpture which serves as an entrance to Portland, Oregon's Old Town Chinatown neighborhood, in the United States. The gate was proposed by the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association in 1984. Architect Yu Tang Wang and artist Sun Chau completed the gate's design, which was built by Ting Hwa Architects in Taiwan. It was then shipped to Portland and installed in one week before being dedicated in November 1986. It cost $256,000 and was the largest of its kind in the United States until one in Washington, D.C. was completed several months later.
The Davao Chinatown, also known as Davao China Street, Davao City Chinatown, or Mindanao Chinatown, is a Chinatown located in Davao City and the only one on Mindanao island in the Philippines. It is the primary residential and trading area of the Chinese-Filipino community in the city. The area is bordered by Santa Ana Avenue, Monteverde Avenue, Ramón Magsaysay Street, and León García Street. Dubbed as the Philippines' largest Chinatown, it has a total land area of 44 hectares, comprising four barangays.
The Historic Chinatown Gate is a modern Paifang archway in the Chinatown-International District neighborhood of Seattle, Washington.
Friendship Archway is a paifang installed at Chinatown, Washington, D.C., United States. It is one of the largest ceremonial arches outside of China.
East Chinatown is a Chinese neighbourhood located in the city of Toronto's east end in Riverdale and one of the several Chinatowns in Toronto. It was formed during the early 1970s and is centred on Gerrard Street East between Broadview Avenue and Carlaw Avenue.
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