Library Guides: A Year on Angel Island (2022-23): Primary Sources

Selected Oral History Collections

Angel Island Oral History Project, 1975-1990.
The Angel Island Oral History Project, sponsored by the Asian American Studies Program. of the University of Calif., Berkeley, was funded by the Calif. State Dept. of Parks and Recreation in 1988-1990 to record the immigration experience of former Chinese detainees of the Angel Island Immigration Station. L. Ling-chi Wang and Him Mark Lai were co-directors of the project, and Judy Yung, a graduate student in Ethnic Studies, was hired to interview, translate, transcribe, and photograph immigrants detained at the station between 1910 and 1940.
Angel Island Oral History Project, 2004-2006
The Pacific Regional Humanities Center at the University of California, Davis collected oral histories of immigrants who passed through the Angel Island Immigrant Station. This collection contains transcriptions of the fourteen oral histories as well as the original recordings.
Immigrant Voices: Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation
A growing archive of personal stories of immigrants to the Pacific Coast
from Angel Island Immigration Station detainees to those arriving today.

Selected Oral Histories and Family Stories

Voices of Angel Island by Charles Egan
ISBN: 9781501360459
Publication Date: 2020-12-24
Voices of Angel Island is a historical and literary anthology of the writings of immigrants detained at Angel Island, designed to provide a conduit for readers today to connect with early-20th-century perspectives on the process of "becoming American." The Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco Bay has been called the "Ellis Island of the West," but its purpose was quite different. It was primarily a detention center, established in large part to discourage immigration by Asians. The station barracks contain an extraordinary archive: hundreds of poems and prose records in half a dozen languages are on the walls, inscribed by immigrant detainees between 1910 and 1940, and by POWs and "enemy aliens" during World War II. Charles Egan draws on over a decade's work deciphering the wall inscriptions by Japanese, Chinese, Korean, European, and other detainees to assemble a selection of their writings in this book, alongside literary materials from Bay Area ethnic newspapers. While each inscription tells the story of an individual, taken together they illuminate the historical, economic, and cultural forces that shaped the lives of ordinary people in the early 20th century.
The Chinese Exclusion Act and Angel Island by Judy Yung
ISBN: 1319077870
Publication Date: 2018-09-28
The Chinese Exclusion Act and Angel Island will introduce students to a broader and more inclusive vision of U.S. immigration history and, ultimately, a better understanding of the world we live in. What is uniquely important about this book are the personal stories and viewpoints of proponents and opponents of the Chinese exclusion laws; of Chinese immigrants who posed as "paper sons" and "paper daughters" to evade the exclusion laws; and of immigration officials who held strong convictions about how the immigration laws should be enforced. The introduction provides students with an over-arching historical, socio-economic, and political context by which to understand the compilation of primary documents that follow. For the same reason, each document has its own headnote with background information about the author and comments on its historical significance. Further pedagogical aids include a Chronology, new Questions for Consideration, and a revised Selected Bibliography.
Passages to America by Emmy E. Werner
ISBN: 1597976342
Publication Date: 2011-01-01
More than twelve million immigrants, many of them children, passed through Ellis Island's gates between 1892 and 1954. Children also came through the "Guardian of the Western Gate," the detention center on Angel Island in California that was designed to keep Chinese immigrants out of the United States. Based on the oral histories of fifty children who came to the United States before 1950, this book chronicles their American odyssey against the backdrop of World Wars I and II, the rise and fall of Hitler's Third Reich, and the hardships of the Great Depression. Ranging in age from four to sixteen years old, the children hailed from Northern, Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe; the Middle East; and China. Across ethnic lines, the child immigrants' life stories tell a remarkable tale of human resilience. The sources of family and community support that they relied on, their educational aims and accomplishments, their hard work, and their optimism about the future are just as crucial today for the new immigrants of the twenty-first century. These personal narratives offer unique perspectives on the psychological experience of being an immigrant child and its impact on later development and well-being. They chronicle the joys and sorrows, the aspirations and achievements, and the challenges that these small strangers faced while becoming grown citizens.
See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love by Valarie Kaur
Publication Date: 2020-06-16
How do we love in a time of rage? How do we fix a broken world while not breaking ourselves? Valarie Kaur--renowned Sikh activist, filmmaker, and civil rights lawyer--describes revolutionary love as the call of our time, a radical, joyful practice that extends in three directions: to others, to our opponents, and to ourselves. It enjoins us to see no stranger but instead look at others and say: You are part of me I do not yet know. Starting from that place of wonder, the world begins to change: It is a practice that can transform a relationship, a community, a culture, even a nation. Kaur takes readers through her own riveting journey--as a brown girl growing up in California farmland finding her place in the world; as a young adult galvanized by the murders of Sikhs after 9/11; as a law student fighting injustices in American prisons and on Guantánamo Bay; as an activist working with communities recovering from xenophobic attacks; and as a woman trying to heal from her own experiences with police violence and sexual assault. Drawing from the wisdom of sages, scientists, and activists, Kaur reclaims love as an active, public, and revolutionary force that creates new possibilities for ourselves, our communities, and our world. See No Stranger helps us imagine new ways of being with each other--and with ourselves--so that together we can begin to build the world we want to see.

Archival Collections

Him Mark Lai Papers, 1778-[on-going] (bulk 1970- 1995)
The Him Mark Lai Papers are divided into four series: Research Files, Professional Activities, Writings, and Personal Papers.
Lai's extensive research spans over four decades, with the bulk of materials dating from 1970 to 1995. Although Lai was born
and raised in the United States, he is fluent in both English and Chinese and this bilingualism is evident in the materials
contained in the collection. His commitment to documenting this history is reflected in the numerous biographies of Chinese
and Chinese Americans, and in the materials on Chinese overseas, particularly within the United States, and their homeland
relations. His research files include information relating to family associations, Chinese American organizations,
Chinatowns, the Kuomintang (Nationalist Party), and the history of China. Also represented in the collection are Lai's
teaching files, materials gathered during his participation in various professional activities, his writings, biographical
information, and personal miscellany. Lai's interest in Chinese newspapers is unparalleled: he subscribes to practically every
Chinese newspaper available in the United States. This interest resulted in the inclusion of a significant number of
newsclippings along with correspondence, interviews, manuscripts, drafts, monographs, journals, statistical data, photocopies of legal documents and FBI files, bylaws, minutes, organization records, historical documents, maps, slides, photographs and
negatives.
Him Mark Lai research files, additions, 1834-2009 (bulk 1970-2008)
The research files are a continuation of (AAS ARC 2000/80) Him Mark Lai’s collected sources, along with his own
writings and professional activity materials that relate to the history, communities, and organizations of Chinese
Americans and Chinese overseas. The collection is divided into four series: Research Files, including general subjects,
people, and organizations; Writings, including books, articles and indexes; Professional activities, primarily including
teaching lectures, Chinese Community Hour program tapes, In Search of Roots program materials, consultation projects,
interviews with Chinese Americans, conference and community events; Personal, including memorial tributes;
correspondence, photographs, and slides of family and friends. The collection consists of manuscripts, papers, drafts,
indexes, correspondence, organization records, reports, legal documents, yearbooks, announcements, articles,
newspaper samples, newspaper clippings, publications, photographs, slides, maps, and audio tapes.

Angel Island Poetry

Island: poetry and history of Chinese immigrants on Angel Island, 1910-1940 by Him Mark Lai (Editor); Genny Lim (Editor); Judy Yung (Editor)
Publication Date: 2014-09-01
In the early twentieth century, most Chinese immigrants coming to the United States were detained at the Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco Bay. There, they were subject to physical exams, interrogations, and often long detentions aimed at upholding the exclusion laws that kept Chinese out of the country. Many detainees recorded their anger and frustrations, hopes and despair in poetry written and carved on the barrack walls. Island tells these immigrants? stories while underscoring their relevance to contemporary immigration issues. First published in 1980, this book is now offered in an updated, expanded edition including a new historical introduction, 150 annotated poems in Chinese and English translation, extensive profiles of immigrants gleaned through oral histories, and dozens of new photographs from public archives and family albums. An important historical document as well as a significant work of literature, Island is a testament to the hardships Chinese immigrants endured on Angel Island, their perseverance, and their determination to make a new life in America. Watch the book trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch'v=Vn7kJscWIaM
Voices of Angel Island : inscriptions and immigrant poetry, 1910-1945 by Egan, Charles
Publication Date: 2021
Voices of Angel Island is a historical and literary anthology of the writings of immigrants detained at Angel Island, designed to provide a conduit for readers today to connect with early 20th-century perspectives on the process of "becoming American." The Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco Bay has been called the "Ellis Island of the West," but its purpose was quite different. It was primarily a detention center, established in large part to discourage immigration by Asians. The station barracks contains an extraordinary archive: hundreds of poems and prose records in half a dozen languages are on the walls, inscribed by immigrant detainees between 1910 and 1940, and by P.O.W.s and "enemy aliens" during World War II. Charles Egan draws on over a decade's work deciphering the wall inscriptions by Japanese, Chinese, Korean, European, and other detainees to assemble a selection of their writings in this book, alongside literary materials from Bay Area ethnic newspapers. While each inscription tells the story of an individual, taken together they illuminate historical, economic and cultural forces that shaped the lives of ordinary people in the early 20th century.
Wild Geese Sorrow: The Chinese Wall Inscriptions at Angel Island by Jeffrey Thomas Leong (Translator)
Publication Date: 2018-02-15
Wild Geese Sorrow renders full the story of Chinese immigrants detained at the Angel Island Immigration Station between 1910-1940. Based upon new translations of the mostly anonymous poems carved into the men's barracks walls, these words express the deep anger, sorrow, and loneliness felt by the detainees, and are a powerful testament to human resiliency and perseverance everywhere.