Chinese American Family Life on the West Coast Photo Album Documenting Post WWII Era Community, ca. 1950s to 1970s

Oregon Chinese American Family

Archive

[Chinese American] Chinese American family photo album, mid-20th century, recording the Chinese American diaspora in California and Oragon during the decades following the repeal of Chinese exclusion laws and the expansion of immigration policy in the United States. The album captures a period of social mobility among Chinese Americans in the Pacific Northwest, where earlier populations had been reduced by exclusionary legislation and racial violence.
The album contains over 130 black-and-white and color photographs mounted in a floral-patterned spiral-bound album with striped paper pages. Images include formal studio portraits, candid domestic scenes, weddings, graduations, and multi-generational group gatherings. Several images show architecture and flora consistent with southern California, and several images, including a graduation photo, appear to show UCLA, A color photograph depicts family members posed before a “Mt. Hood National Forest” sign, situating part of the album in Oregon, while other images show suburban homes and midcentury American automobiles consistent with West Coast settings. Early black-and-white photographs include studio portraits of elders in traditional Chinese attire alongside family groupings, while later images document weddings incorporating both Chinese and Western dress, banquet hall celebrations, and children in academic regalia posed at university campuses. The progression of imagery reflects shifts in dress, setting, and social positioning across generations.

This album records Chinese American life during a time of broad transformation of U.S. immigration and civil rights policy following the 1943 repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act and the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, which enabled renewed migration and family reunification. The presence of higher education imagery, suburban domestic settings, and hybrid ceremonial practices demonstrates participation in postwar American middle-class life while maintaining cultural continuity. Vernacular photographic archives are not often preserved with this level of cohesion and chronological depth. Photographs retain strong contrast and color; mounts secure; album intact with minor surface wear. Overall very good condition. A cohesive and substantive visual record of Chinese American family and community life on the West Coast.

Item #22241

Price: $950.00