San Diego

San Diego is a city in southern California near the Mexican border. Known for generally moderate climate year round and being near the ocean, it's a generally a Republican leaning city with high housing prices, a growing traffic problem, and little mass transit. San Diego is a city that is heavily into the arts. Pro sporting teams are:

• San Diego Chargers (Football)
• San Diego Padres (Baseball)

Chinese

The Chinese settled in San Diego beginning in the 1870s and found work in the fishing industry, railroad construction, service industry, general construction work, food industry, and merchandising. They were forced into a Chinatown but otherwise received less violent attention than suffered by Chinese elsewhere in the West.

They soon formed district associations, family and clan associations, secret societies, and business guilds, including the Chee Kung Tong (est. 1885), the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association (est. 1907), the Bing Kung Tong (est. 1922), and the Ying On Tong (est. 1945). In the 1870s and 1880s, two Chinese Christian missions were organized to help the Chinese with housing, employment, recreational activities, and English language instruction.

The Chinese population increased dramatically, especially after the 1965 Immigration Act allowed large numbers of businessmen and professionals to migrate from Hong Kong, Taiwan and China. Many Chinese Americans achieved prominent community status, including Tom Hom, a city councilman and state assemblyman.

The late-20th-century San Diego Chinese community is made up of a heterogeneous population that includes Cantonese-speaking, Mandarin-speaking, and Hokkien-speaking members, as well as those from a variety of places of origin, including Southeast Asia. Many in the San Diego community have joined together to determine and further their Chinese-American identity.