You Ching (Y.C.) Hong was the first Chinese American in Los Angeles to pass the California Bar Examination to become an attorney. He was also a strong advocate for issues within the community, especially relating to the rights of immigrants. He was instrumental in the development of New Chinatown and had erected the East Gate monument in honor of his mother, Yee Shee.
Today’s Chinatown is famous for its charming novelty items, restaurants with succulent dim sum, and hidden places to sit, relax, and enjoy the scenery. Many of us have walked the dynamic streets of Chinatown with its twists and turns taking us to markets, plazas, and boutiques, but hear only whispers of Old Chinatown which dates back almost 166 years.
The Chinatown we know today was not always in that ever so familiar locale. It was originally located in an alleyway between El Pueblo Plaza and Old Arcadia Street from the 1850s to the late 1930s. Old Chinatown sat on the very location which is now the home of Union Station.
Chinese inhabitants totaled about 200 in Old Chinatown. The population began to proliferate and by the 1910’s there were over 3000 people in the community. By then the congested alleyway in which the small community had first started off, had expanded past Alameda Street. This thriving community began to be referred to as ‘Chinatown’ and the name held. Chinatown was starting to become a prosperous society. The area had well loved temples, restaurants, a grocery store, a theater as well as commercial space and residential buildings.
By the 1930s, Chinatown’s buildings and the living conditions of its inhabitants eventually became unkempt and too far beyond repair. Chinatown’s flourishing society began to decline faster than it had been created. This was due to iniquities such as opium dens, gambling places, as well as gentrification, and its capacity for redevelopment. There was a project in the works to implement a transportation system in the city and Chinatown was the perfect location for the aforementioned Union Station.
For years, many legal battles were fought over the land and relocation of Chinatown’s residents. During that time many of Chinatown’s residents were being evicted and had nowhere to go. On May 19, 1931 the construction of Union Station was approved by the California Supreme Court.
In the meantime, Peter Soo Hoo, Sr., a civil engineer, and Herbert Lapham who was a mediator for the Santa Fe Railway, negotiated a land purchase for a site to build a New Chinatown. Funding for this purchase came from Chinese entrepreneurs. With plans to finance and maintain their own land, they raised $40,000 for the entire relocation project in August 1937.
On June 25, 1938 a ceremony for the dedication of the East Gate Monument in New Chinatown’s Central Plaza took place, marking the Broadway entrance to Chinatown. The site housed permanent motion-picture art installations constructed from props donated by Cecil B. De Mille, which added vibrant colors to the venue. Fred Hust and Adrian Wilson, both architects, Tom Kemp, a construction expert and William Puntke who was a set designer for Paramount, and many others were an integral part in bringing to life the vision of what New Chinatown was supposed to represent: the perfect balance of traditional and authentic Chinese architecture, taking architectural lessons from as far back as the Tang Dynasty. The monument was referred to as the “Gate of Maternal Virtues”. It is elaborately decorated and displays a four-character poem by Dr. T.K. Chang who was a Chinese Consul.
Inscribed across the top, the poem reads, “The spirit of Meng and Ow”. Meng and Ow were celebrated mothers in Chinese history. The poem pays tribute to mothers throughout Chinese tradition and essentially all mothers, by celebrating their immaculate essences.
You Ching Hong, or Y.C. Hong left his mark in history becoming a famous Downtown Los Angeles dignitary and overall VIP, still memorialized today.
Photos Courtesy of Huntington Library, Pasadena, CA
