LOW Yuet Wing was born around 1893. He was referred to as both LOW Yuet Wing and LOW Hay Hue. (Low in Cantonese is pronounced as “Lau”).

He arrived in Victoria, B.C. on May 9, 1913 as a 15-year-old labourer, paying the $500 head tax to enter Canada. Low hailed from Yuet Ming in the district of [新寧 Sunning / Xinning (name changed to 台山 Toisan / Taishan in 1914)] in China. Family accounts say he arrived to meet the father of Fred/Julian Low. His father was named Low Wai Foon.

Wing settled in Tilbury, ON, and there he owned and operated Reno’s Grill Restaurant. He was successful in his business and was able to travel back to China to see his family on several occasions, returning to Canada in 1920, 1923, 1935, and 1939. During these trips, he married his wife, Chan Na Hing, and fathered two sons, King Sam and Ming Sam.

Wing's eldest son, King Sam, went missing at some point in the 1930s. The family believes he may have died in the Sino-Japanese war or ended up addicted to opium. It is believed that younger son, Ming Sam, arrived in Canada after the repeal of the Exclusion Act, around 1950.

Wing wrote various letters to his grandson, Low Yut Luen (a.k.a. Len Lowe; King Sam’s son). His great-granddaughter, Lorraine Lowe, shared that “it looks like… he acted as my dad’s father figure since King Sam abandoned him… [and he] gave my Dad lots of advice on marriage, success, [and] politics. There [are] clearly addiction issues in our blood line as Wing also liked to gamble as well as his son Ming Sam. He loved cooking, gambling, smoking (and likely women too).”

Wing made his last journey from Vancouver to Hong Kong in 1969. He was very excited to return but had a heart attack in his sleep on a flight (CP Air) right before touching down in Hong Kong. His remains are buried in the St. Raphael Cemetery in Cheung Sha Wan, HK.

LOUIE Mun Sou arrived in Vancouver, B.C. in 1919 as a salesman.

KO Jan Quan arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1913 as a labourer. He is presumed to have died in 1933.

CHANG Chan Wah arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1912 as a labourer.

FONG Kum Dai arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1911 as a 23-year-old labourer. He sailed on the Mexico Maru.

MA Kam Poy arrived in Vancouver, B.C. in 1910 as a 20-year-old labourer.

FONG Jong Sing arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1903 as a labourer. He paid the $100 head tax shortly before it would be increased to $500.

LUM Chuck arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1911.

LUM Gow arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1902 as a 32-year-old labourer.

The Association of BC Grape Growers (ABCGG) was established on March 10, 1961. With permission of the provincial government, in 1970, the Association formed the BC Grape Growers Marketing Board (BCGGMB). The scope of the ABCGG and the BCGGMB has always been the support of viticulture; however, over time and through various administrative shifts, its focus has changed from table grapes to wine grapes.

The Board’s original mandate was to negotiate sales deals for grape growers by creating standard prices per ton by variety of grape each year. This was accomplished through the annual issuance of executive orders of the Board, with which member grape growers were to comply.

Over time, the organization has been composed of various committees such as the Viticulture Committee, which managed trials and research projects, most notably the Becker Project (1977-1985). The Becker Project experimented with plantings of vitis vinifera in the Okanagan Valley and attempted to improve the varietal’s hardiness in this climate. Key members of the Viticulture Committee included John Vielvoye, who was separate from the Association, but sat on the committee as a function of his work with the BC Ministry of Agriculture, and Lyall Denby representing the Summerland Research Station (Agriculture Canada).

Other activities included educational outreach to grape growers and advocacy for crop insurance.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the Board played a role in the negotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in its application to BC grapes. The implementation of NAFTA represented a key turning point for the organization in the Agreement’s influence over financing rules for the industry. As an outcome of NAFTA, events such as the Pull Out Program and the Replant Program took place under the provincial Social Credit government. By 1995, reference price had been discontinued. From that point, departing from the elimination of marketing negotiation space under NAFTA, the BC Grape Marketing Board dissolved.

The organization then experienced uncertainty in its mandate: service to wine, or grapes? This uncertainty coincided with the advent of the Farm Gate Retail model and the formation of BC Wine in the early 1990s. In 1997, some among the former Board who opposed a shift to wine called a meeting and agreed to continue, but have the association be composed only of independent growers, excluding licensed wineries. The organization was then renamed the BC Independent Grapegrowers’ Association.

This was short-lived in the face of opposition from wineries, who also wanted to participate in the research and education supported by the Association. A change in bylaws in the early 2004 saw licensed wineries readmitted, and the organization renamed again to the British Columbia Grapegrowers’ Association (BCGA), under which name it still operates.
As of 2023, the BCGA advances the objectives of supporting grape growers in BC, educating grape growers, building relationships with external stakeholder, and maintaining stable, profitable markets for BC grapes and wine. It has representation on the BC Wine Grape Council, Wine Growers BC, and the Interior Horticultural Sector Group (BC Agriculture Council).

NG Hung Jew arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1911 hailing from Tai Sun, [廣東 Guangdong], China. By the time he received Canadian citizenship in 1953, he was living in Goldbridge, B.C., working as a laundryman, married, and known also as Dan Eng.

WONG Yue (WONG Goey) arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1911 as a 35-year-old labourer.

Gam Jack JOHN was born in China around 1906 in the [新寧 Sunning / Xinning] county of [廣東 Guangdong] province. The area would later be known as [台山 Toisan / Taishan].

He arrived in Vancouver in 1919. By 1924, he was living in Toronto at 651 Queen Street West and working as a waiter. He traveled back to China at least once, in the mid-1930s.

He married CHAN Doong Yew and the couple settled in Vancouver and had three children, all born in Canada: Phoebe (b. December 18, 1939), Fred (b. May 9, 1941), and Henry (b. February 22, 1943). CHAN Doong Yew fell ill after Henry’s birth, so Phoebe and Fred moved in with a neighbour, Mrs. Dong, who took care of them for almost a decade along with her own four children.

He passed away on July 29, 1990.

LEW Hin was born in Vancouver in 1921. He was from a poor family that was made destitute when his father unexpectedly died and left his mother with four young children to raise.

When Hin finished high school, he signed up to learn radio repair. But his real dream was to attend university. He ended up being accepted into the University of British Columbia and used his own savings and some money from his mother to pay the tuition. At the time, he was one of only twenty Chinese students attending the university.

For his post-graduate studies, Hin moved to Toronto and was halfway to completing his doctorate in physics at the University of Toronto when WWII erupted.

Many graduate students were recruited to use their talents to help Canada’s war effort. Hin was offered a job with the prestigious National Research Council (NRC) working on a project that used ultrasound to detect submarines.

When the war was over, Hin returned to school, this time attending the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to complete his doctoral studies. Once finished, Hin went back to work at the NRC in Ottawa.

Hin‘s career at the NRC would span 38 years. And, for some of that time, Hin worked alongside Gerhard Herzberg, a famous German-Canadian pioneering physicist and physical chemist, who won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1971.

Besides science, Hin enjoyed photography and took images well into his retirement years.

He married Marion Lim and together they had three sons. Hin passed away in 2021 at 100 years of age.

JUNG Jong Jow was born in China in the Shek Ham village of [恩平 Yinping / Enping] county on July 28, 1903. He arrived in Canada in 1922, borrowing $500 from his #4 brother in Venezuela to pay the head tax.

Like many Chinese, he did a variety of odd jobs to survive. Over the years, these included mess boy on the CPR steamship Princess Marguerite that ran between Victoria and Seattle (1931); sawmill labourer (1942); cook at the Liberty Cafe on Granville Street in Vancouver (1946); cook and housekeeper for Mr. Hubert Wallace in Victoria Uplands (1949); and cook and housekeeper for Mr. Fred Brown in Vancouver Shaughnessy (1957).

In the midst of all these jobs and the Great depression, in 1937, he traveled to China to marry CHAN Suey How, returning to Canada in 1938. He would not see his wife again until 1947 after WWII. In 1948, they had their first son, Chuck Ying, in China. The immigration sponsorship process had the family reunited in Vancouver in February 1952. Canadian-born sons, Chuck Pang (b. 1952) and Chuck Hon (b. 1955) would complete the family.

Jong Jow retired in 1972 and lived in Vancouver Strathcona. His retirement years were spent gardening, watching basketball at Gibbs Boys Club, all-star wrestling on the television, and walks to Chinatown to meet up with friends. He enjoyed smoking and sipping Scotch at bedtime.

Some of his accomplishments include serving as a founding member of the Cheng Wing Yeong Tong Society (aka Jang Society) of Vancouver in 1926, and winning a $200 prize in the Chinese lottery in the 1930s.

His sons described their father as a "simple Chinaman who just wanted a better life for himself and his family. Dad told us he started making $2 a day and his best year was 1971 making $13.50 a day--that's only $3,600/year! He had to be very resourceful to accomplish all he did!!! "

He passed away July 12, 1981.

Harvey Lee was born LEE Gan Men on September 9, 1920 in Lethbridge, Alberta. He was the second son of LEE Duck (LE Hung Loy) who owned Lee Duck Cleaners. Harvey was one of six children Lee Duck had with his second wife, DER Soon Yet (also known as Doris Lee after marriage).

At age two, Harvey was taken back to his family village (Numchong village #49 ) in Toisan one of the provinces in the Pearl River Delta in China, to be raised by Lee Duck’s first wife. He would not return to Canada until he was 10 years old. Harvey remembers touching all the favourite parts of the family house while crying the day before leaving China.

Upon returning to Lethbridge, Lee Gen Man was enrolled in Grade One at Westminster Elementary School. Since Lee Gen Men needed an English name, his father, Lee Duck, asked the principal to give his son a name. The principal, whose first name was Harvey, chose the name “Harvey.” The principal gave Harvey his own namesake.

After school, Harvey would work at the family laundry. He would also help prepare the family meals. He quit school in Grade Six to work full time at the drycleaner.

Harvey loved hunting and fishing with his older brother. The family would go fishing to supplement the family diet. As well, he helped tend a large garden with seasonable vegetables and raised chickens.

As a teenager, Harvey took an interest in boxing, an uncommon sport for a Chinese man. But he was brave and would get into the boxing ring to fight a match.

Harvey married Ruth HOW, whose family ran a grocery store in Taber, Alberta. They would have three children: Carol, Ron and Candace.

At age 40, Harvey joined the YMCA to learn how to swim but soon took up weight training. He was still going to the YMCA shortly before he died. The YMCA awarded him a lifetime membership when he turned 80 for instructing YMCA members in how to weight train.

Harvey worked his whole life at Lee Duck Cleaners along with his two brothers, from 1934 to 1976. He finally retired at age 58. All the grandchildren also worked at the drycleaners through its 65 years as a family business.

Harvey passed away on May 23, 2015.

The Toronto Blue Jays were his hometown team and when he passed away, his Toronto Blue Jays cap was placed on his chest at the funeral home.

Roger K. Cheng was born CHENG Won Hin (Ka) in Lillooet, B.C. on May 16, 1915.

He was among the second generation in his family born in Lillooet in 1915, the eldest son of H.D. Cheng and WONG Lai Kwai; and one of seven siblings: Kuen, Roger, Patricia, Nina, Fook Cheong, Luna, and Elmer.

Roger’s grandfather, CHENG Won (CHENG Tien Soon) immigrated to Canada in 1881 with his wife Cheng Shun Shee (aka Chin Shee or Shun See). They each paid the $50 head tax.

Cheng Won was a local businessman who owned the Wo Hing General Store in Lillooet, among other enterprises, including a pig farm dubbed “China Ranch” on Hogback Mountain in West Pavillion, B.C., during the Gold Rush and railway construction.

They had two children: Cheng Hing Dien (known as H.D. Cheng), (Cheng Yong Gunn) and Yvonne (Cheng Soon Yee). H.D. Cheng was born in North Bend, B.C. near Lillooet in 1888. H.D also managed Cheng Won’s businesses; and married Roger’s mother, Wong Lai Kwai, in 1914.

Roger and his family moved to New Westminster and Vancouver after the Wo Hing General Store burned down in the 1930s. His parents ran a laundromat and a fish wholesale business, representing some of the few businesses Chinese were allowed to operate.

Roger attended McGill University to study Electrical Engineering and received his degree in 1936. Roger and his friend, Fred Chu, paid their way through university by working as houseboys for a wealthy Montreal family. Sadly, despite getting an Engineering degree, Roger could not obtain work in his field because he was Chinese.

Discrimination inspired Roger to join the military to serve Canada in WWII but Canada did not accept Chinese recruits.

Roger was hand-picked by British Special Operations Executive to lead Force 136, a clandestine mission of 13 Chinese Canadians. He was the first Chinese Canadian officer in Canada, as Captain of Force 136, and specialist in wireless operations. Force 136 soldiers were trained and organized by British SOE to operate in Japanese-occupied territories of Southeast Asia.

Roger's first mission was named Operation Oblivion. Roger led a small team of four Force 136 commandos into Japanese-occupied Borneo. Their mission included: contact and befriend Dyak headhunters; organize tribesmen into local security forces; provide equipment and training; assist with sabotage; defend villagers; locate isolated Japanese units and force surrender; find prisoner of war camps; patrol jungle rivers; and prevent revenge massacres of Japanese troops and suspected collaborators. They fought beyond the official end of WWII and completed their mission. Roger helped repatriate POWs in Australia, then returned home to Vancouver. Roger recommended medals to his four soldiers as commander but he did not receive one.

After WWII, Roger, with other Chinese Canadian veterans and civilians, helped rally the vote for Chinese to become citizens. The vote was gained in 1947, two years after the war ended.

Roger then worked in various jobs including import/export businesses in Vancouver. His father, H.D. Cheng, also worked in import/export at CT Takahashi Ltd, and introduced Roger to the owner. Roger worked at and later bought that business when the owner retired. He employed his sons and later passed on the business to his children. In the 1960s, he was also a partner in Ming’s, a popular Chinese restaurant in Vancouver’s Chinatown.

Starting in the late 1960s, Capt. Roger K. Cheng served as an Honourable Aide de Camp for at least two B.C. Lieutenant Governors: Lt Gov. John Robert Nicholson & Lt Gov. Walter Stewart Owen. He was the first Chinese Canadian to serve in this honour.

Roger married Hazel Lam in 1950. They had five children: Stephen, Michael, Allan, Brett and Madeline.

Roger passed away June 4, 1990 in Vancouver.

YIP Doo Tong (George Yip) was born in Cranbrook, B.C. on November 25, 1921. His father, YIP Chong Ban (aka YIP Chung Ben), ran a produce and grocery store on Durick Avenue in Cranbrook.

George completed Grade 8 and then was sent to China where he lived from 1933-1938. Upon returning to Canada in 1938, George spent three months working in a fish cannery in Prince Rupert. By 1939 he had moved to Vancouver and for five years worked as a clerk at the Shaughnessy Market, a produce store at 2915 Granville Street. He earned about $25 a week in that job.

Like many young Chinese men in Canada, George was willing to fight for Canada during WWII despite the discrimination faced by his community. He joined the Army on November 15, 1944 and did his basic training in Wetaskiwin, Alberta. George then volunteered to become a member of Force 136: a clandestine group of fighters trained and led by the British Special Operations Executive. These soldiers of Force 136 were trained in jungle survival and guerrilla warfare, and were sent on missions to undertake sabotage and espionage in Japanese-occupied territories.

George spent some time in London, England, and was then shipped to India for the final leg of training and to await his first assignment. He was stationed in Meerut, India and was being trained as a wireless radio operator. Fortunately, the war ended before George was assigned to any dangerous missions.

George was discharged on April 26, 1946 and later was awarded the Burma Star.

Within a couple of years, he married Tso Shee (aka Yip Chow Shee who was born December 28, 1922 in Canton, China). Together, they had two children: Ray and Ken.

Taking advantage of the Veterans Land Grant program, George acquired a 5-acre parcel of land on Byrne Road in Burnaby. There he operated a produce farm until his death in September 1971.

WONG Hong was born in China on August 12, 1886, the son of WONG Sai Ki and NG Wo.

Hong arrived in Canada in May 1902 as a 16-year-old labourer, and paid the $100 head tax. He disembarked in Victoria, BC and made the city his home, earning a living as a barber.

In 1912, when he was 25, he married Joy Chan in Victoria (also known as Miss CHIN Chow Hong). They had met when both of them spent time being cared for and living at the Oriental Home and School in Victoria, which was run by the Methodist Church.

When they married, Joy was 21 and had been born in China: the daughter of Chan Tung Yung and Muk Si Mai.

Hong and Joy would have six children.

Hong’s granddaughter, Yvonne Young (nee Wong), recalls an amusing story from her childhood. “My mother passed away in 1954, when I was 10 years old. Myself, younger sister and brother were sent to live with our grandparents. I remember my grandfather showing me how to make cigarettes on a cigarette rolling machine. We returned to Vancouver when our father remarried.”

Hong passed away December 13, 1967. His birthdate was listed on his death certificate as being August 14, 1882.

Born May 16, 1911 in Québec City, Alice Wilson Meyers FONG was active in the Canadian Girls in Training and was the scholar of the family. She was the daughter of Fong Mun King 鄺文瓊 and his wife Alice Fong 鄺文周氏女.

Alice graduated elementary school by winning the sole entrance scholarship for the high school.

Following the death of her older sister Margaret, Alice became the main support for her mother and her visually-impaired sister Gertrude. For over 40 years Alice worked in the finance department for Sun Life Insurance.

In her spare time she was an avid bowler and sports fan. She closely followed the Montreal Alouettes Football team (football was her favourite) and the Montréal Canadiens and always read the sports pages.

Alice loved to read historical romances but never had a conjugal relationship.

She was a truly selfless person. In 1969, when her brother-in-law (through sister, Ann Victoria Fong) lost his business and the family was effectively bankrupt, she cashed in her life savings to support them without hesitation.

During the 1980s, while baby-sitting her three-year-old grandnephew, she was discovered lying on her back with her feet in the air breakdancing with the toddler.

She passed away in Montreal on November 1, 1995.

Annie preferred to use her other middle name Victoria and never liked being called Annie, hence in her adult life went by Ann Victoria Fong. She was born March 19, 1916 in Montreal, the daughter of Fong Mun King 鄺文瓊 and his wife Alice Fong 鄺文周氏女.

As a child, she attended the Sprites, which was the Canadian Girls in Training group for younger children. She graduated from Montreal’s Commercial High School in 1931 and took commercial courses at Sir George Williams College.

A talented amateur painter, she went to work in the printing trades, where she learned how to do photograph layout. In 1938, she went to work at Ronalds Printing (which produced the Montreal telephone books), where she met her husband-to-be, Norman Greig Stanley. When they married in 1943, they encountered significant racism, including from some of Norman’s relatives. Their wedding attracted quite a crowd of onlookers as mixed marriages were so rare. Furthermore, Norman, as a pilot-in-training in the Canadian Air Force at the time, had to get the permission of his commanding officer to get married. The permission was originally denied; according to the commander, “these mixed marriages never work.”

The couple were together for 59 years until Norman’s death in 2003. When they got married, the racism they experienced was so intense that they agreed not to have any children “to avoid visiting the sins of the parents on the children.” It was not until after the War that they felt comfortable having children, welcoming sons Robert in 1950 and Timothy in 1953.

Ann returned to work outside of the household in the late 1960s and ultimately became the head of the stenography pool at the Protestant School Board of Greater Montreal, providing all the district’s school secretaries with their initial training. Ann played golf until the age of 95 and continued to paint until shortly before her death on July 31, 2016. At her passing, she left behind her two sons and four grandchildren.

When Ann was young everyone, especially her brother, called her baby. When Jeanette Hamelin visited their household for the first time, she brought presents for everything including a rattle for the 14-year-old “baby.”

Alice Fong appears in various records under her maiden name of Jew Toy, Jew Guey, Ho Len Toy and Alice Chew. She was born in China in Lai Yue Gong village in the [開平 Hoiping / Kaiping] district of 廣東 Guangdong province. Alice was an orphan brought to Canada by her “cousins” as a servant girl at the age of nine. They paid the head tax for her in 1893.

Alice became known as Alice Fong 鄺文周氏女 after marrying Fong Mun King 鄺文瓊 (c. 1860–1930) in 1903. He appears in commercial directories as Fong King, also known as John Fong merchant/restaurant owner.

Alice was active in the Chinese Presbyterian Church after being baptized in 1909. She was very close to the missionaries of Chinese Mission in Montreal and was often out of the house helping new Chinese brides get settled in the city. After the death of her husband, she worked as a domestic.

Alice Fong’s son-in-law would take her down to Montreal’s Chinatown a few times a year, where she would buy groceries and get caught up on the local gossip. The proprietor of the store would personally serve her after inviting her into the back of the store to sit down and drink several cups of tea. During this time, she was speaking Cantonese.

When her oldest grandson was about 3 years old, he observed this exchange with great interest. He turned to his father and with great delight said, “I didn’t know that Granny spoke French.”

CHANG Gan was born in 1912 in Vancouver’s Chinatown at 111 East Pender Street. He was the son of CHANG Toy, a prominent Chinese pioneer businessman who was also known as Sam Kee. His father had arrived in Canada in 1874.

Gan was well educated at a time when few Chinese attended university. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of British Columbia in 1934; followed by a Bachelor of Science in Agriculture degree in 1938, also from UBC.

When WWII erupted, Gan enlisted and was accepted into the Royal Canadian Air Force in 1942. He became a pilot officer and was trained as a bomb aimer. Before leaving for his post in Britain, he married Helen Lore of Victoria in 1943. By 1945, Gan was promoted to Flying Officer.

Two of his other brothers also served in the RCAF during the war.

When Gan returned from Europe, he worked for a time as an electrician at the Burrard Dry Dock. But being smart and ambitious, he decided to return to university and study dentistry. He graduated in 1949 from the University of Alberta and opened his own dental practice in the South Granville area of Vancouver.

Gan was active and was a member of the early Vancouver Chinese Tennis Club, and later the Vancouver Chinese Golf Club and the Arbutus Club.

He and his wife, Helen, had two children, both boys: Dwight and Blythe.

Gan’s C.I.45 was issued in 1939, about 15 years later than most other C.I.45s had been issued.

Gan passed away in Vancouver in 2005.

Helen LORE Hing Yee was born in Victoria, B.C. in 1919. She had two brothers and three sisters. She graduated from Victoria High School.

In 1943, during the war, she married CHANG Gan, the son of a well-known Chinese pioneer and businessman named Sam Kee. Helen and Gan would have two sons: Dwight and Blythe.

She worked as a homemaker but also helped in the office at her husband’s dental practice in Vancouver.

Helen’s oldest sister married Quene Yip from the well-known Yip Sang family. And her uncle, Lieutenant Commander William Lore, gained fame for his role in WWII. As an officer with the Royal Navy, he helped to liberate Hong Kong from the Japanese, and free Canadians from the Sham Shui Po Prisoner of War Camp.

Helen died in 2006.

LUE Jar was born in China in 1894 in the village of Sam Dor 三多, in the province of Guangdong 廣東, county of Taishan 台山 and the township of Tong Min Heung 塘面鄉.

In 1913, at age 19, he travelled to Canada for work, leaving behind his wife, Ng Shee 伍氏 and one-year-old son, Siu Lay 兆利. He landed at Victoria and was admitted to Canada upon paying the $500 head tax.

Lue Jar listed his destination as Calgary. He mentioned working for a white family as a house servant at one time and this may have been the work he was doing in that city. Other Chinese immigrants also have recalled working as house servants in Calgary when they first arrived in Canada.

Lue Jar was a quick study and this job gave him the opportunity to learn English. However, he was not happy with the work. The mischievous children were always going through his belongings when he was busy with chores. One day he was so fed up that he rigged a mouse trap within his belongings to teach them a lesson. He likely did stay long at this job.

Having learned some English, he found work at Fraser Mills as a mill worker in B.C.. He stayed for quite a number of years, eventually becoming a supervisor to the Chinese workers.

Lue Jar moved to Vancouver around 1922. From there, he found work at Dollar Mill in the Dollarton area of North Vancouver.

The 1923 Chinese Immigration Act required all Chinese immigrants in Canada to re-register. Shortly after Lue Jar did so, in January 1924, he left to visit China after being away for over a decade.

During his 15-month stay, he and his wife Ng Shee had two more sons in quick succession: Siu Yin 兆賢 and Siu Lung 兆能. Lue Jar was required to return to Canada in 1925 and to his job at Dollar Mill, so he did not see the birth of his youngest son.

In 1933, Ng Shee passed away due to poor health. She was only 40 or 41 years old. Lue Jar’s oldest son, Siu Lay, took over the care of the two younger children in addition to his own family.

During the war years, between 1941-1945, Lue Jar found work at Burrard Dry Dock in North Vancouver. Later, he spent a few years running a farm in Drumheller, Alberta.

After the repeal of the Exclusion Act, Lue Jar applied for his Canadian citizenship which he obtained on November 8, 1951.

In 1952, he purchased Ferry Rooms on Alexander Street in Vancouver: a rooming house with 34 rooms on three floors. Lue Jar operated the hotel until he retired in 1973.

Meanwhile, the youngest son, Siu Lung, immigrated to Canada around 1954. He arrived as a “paper son” with the surname Lee. He eventually corrected the surname of his family to Lui.

The middle son, Siu Yin and his family arrived in 1965. This son took over the operations of the hotel.

Lue Jar passed away in 1994, just two months shy of turning 100.

TSENG Yook Lahn wed LUM Joe Ming in China in 1929 through an arranged marriage by his parents. Ming was visiting from Canada where he had immigrated in 1922 to join his brothers.

Canada's Chinese Exclusion Act was in force; Yook Lahn would remain in China, living with her in-laws as Ming returned to Canada. The couple would be separated for a decade.

In 1940, Yook Lahn joined Ming in Canada as a ‘paper daughter’ under the assumed identity of Irene Wong of Victoria, B.C. Yook Lahn departed on one of the last boats leaving Hong Kong harbour before the Japanese captured the city.

In Canada, Yook Lahn joined her husband in his family's business in Vancouver; Canada Produce was a small grocery store and supplier of potatoes for White Spot's famous french fries. Their son, Raymond, would also work in the company.

Yook Lahn's husband Ming passed away unexpectedly of an aneurysm in 1987.

Irene Sosey Wong was born in Prince Rupert, BC, in a family that ran a grocery store. When she died at a young age, her identity was sold to another family. In the late 1930s or early 1940s, Irene's identity was assumed by a woman to enter Canada from China.

CHIN Ng Jai was born in China in Koo Lung village in the [台山 Toisan / Taishan] district of 廣東 Guangdong province on June 14, 1898.

He arrived in Canada in 1918 and worked as a laundryman in Toronto.

He had a family in China from which he remained separated due to the Chinese Immigration Act. As a result, Chin Ing Jai married a Jewish woman named Rose in Toronto. Together, they had three sons and one daughter.

Chin eventually lost all his laundries and restaurants to gambling debts. After he passed away, Rose married another Chinese man, Lew Doo (also known as Frank Lew).

FONG Wah Yen was born in China in 1892. He arrived in Vancouver in 1914 at the age of 22, paying the $500 head tax to enter Canada. He hailed from the Ning Kai Lee village in the [開平 Hoiping / Kaiping] district of 廣東 Guangdong province, and would travel home frequently to visit his wife and four children.

The village schoolteacher was separated from her husband; she would eventually become Wah’s second wife after his first wife died, securing a future for herself by writing Wah a letter proposing the marriage. She had gone to Nanking to learn about silkworm culture but had to flee on the last train when the Japanese descended in 1937, first to Shanghai, then to 廣州 Guangzhou. By that time, Wah was stranded in Canada, where he often went on business.

After the war ended in 1947, Wah sailed to Hong Kong to reunite with his second wife; they hadn’t seen each other for 15 years. In 1949, they had a daughter named Judy. The family immigrated to Canada in 1955, leaving the children from their first marriages in China. They lived in small Ontario towns, first Allandale (now part of Barrie), and later in Acton.

Wah and his wife ran a hand laundry. They had no refrigerator, no car, no bathtub, and no phone. Judy remembers watching from behind a curtain as customers came to hand over their dirty clothes and soiled underwear. “I never told my friends that my parents had to do this… It’s just with retrospect that you realize how humiliating it was.”

In the summer of 1972, Fong Wah Yen hanged himself in the basement of the tiny row house they had in Toronto’s Chinatown at age 80. His daughter remembers having just had lunch with her parents. The couple had quarrelled, as usual.

Judy would go on to share childhood memories in her novel, Midnight at the Dragon Café, as author Judy Fong Bates. "I think that writing this book was truly an act of love… It's giving back by saying this is what my parents did for me. They sacrificed for me."

DAR Woon was born in China in 1885 in the [開平 Hoiping / Kaiping] district. While in China, he married GUN Shee. The couple had one daughter, born in China in 1912: DERE Mee Gim.

He arrived in Vancouver, BC in 1900, and found work on the railways being constructed and operated by the Canadian Pacific Railway company, along with numerous other Chinese workers. In Canada, he was known as David DAR WOON.

David was among the numerous Chinese workers abandoned by the CPR and the Canadian government after completing its projects. However, David met a white man who also worked for the railroad, who asked David to accompany him to Calgary as a houseboy. David accepted, and went with the man to Calgary. The man also taught David the trade of tailoring.

Using the earnings he saved, David returned to China to bring his wife and daughter back to Calgary with him. In Calgary, David set up a tailor shop near 17th Avenue; later, he would move the shop to Centre Street and 4th Avenue. After reuniting with his wife, David and GUN Shee had nine more children in Canada.

In 1946, the family moved to Vancouver, settling in Chinatown, where David’s daughter, Hazel, opened a dry cleaning shop. David continued to work as a tailor out of the new shop, and also helped his daughter operate the business.

In the mid-1950s, the family sold the tailoring and dry cleaning shop. The family purchased a home in Kitsilano, where David would spend his retirement.

David passed away in 1972 in Burnaby, BC.

Won Alexander Cumyow is the first Chinese person recorded as being born in Canada, on February 14, 1861 in Port Douglas, B .C., located at the north end of Harrison Lake. Cumyow's parents had immigrated there from Canton (Guangzhou) and his father operated a business outfitting miners on their way to the Cariboo.

In addition to Chinese and English, Cumyow learned to speak Chinook which would prove useful in his future career. The family later moved to New Westminster, where Cumyow was educated in law and appointed court interpreter in 1888. He gained prominence as a merchant, community leader, and official Court Interpreter for the Vancouver City Police (1904-1936), and was involved with several groups, including the Chinese Empire Reform Association.

He married in 1889 and had ten children, including four sons and six daughters. His son, Gordon, succeeded him as Court Interpreter. He was the only Chinese person to have voted both before and after the Chinese were disenfranchised from voting, as recorded in a 1949 photo of an elderly Cumyow casting an election ballot.

Shong Yaw was born in China around 1893. He arrived in Canada at age 20 in 1913 on the Empress of India. He was listed as a "merchant's son" and therefore did not pay the head tax. His intended final destination for settlement was listed as Clinton, B.C.

WONG Seid Yew was born in China around 1894. He arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1912.

WONG Kwon Tet was born in China around 1892. He arrived in Victoria, B.C. in 1912.

Born in China on November 2, 1891, Wong Mow was a shirt tailor who arrived in Canada in 1911. He ran a tailoring shop on Main Street in Vancouver's Chinatown. He brought his wife, Lee Shee, to Canada just before the Exclusion Act went into effect. Together, they had four children: one of those children was community historian Larry Yung Wong. Wong Mow's wife died of tuberculosis in 1940 and he struggled to raise his family as a widower.

Wong Mow died in 1966 at age 74. On his death certificate, it was claimed that he fell and hit his head. But the accident happened due to a family altercation.

Helena Wong was born in Banff Alberta on August 23, 1917. As a young girl, she was sent back to China for schooling and did not return to Canada until 1935. Helena would later marry Peter Chow, the son of well-known photographer, Yucho Chow. Together they would have 8 children: Anna; Madeline (Wong); Veronica (Kagetsu); Vivian; Ben; Connie (Ho); Susan (Ho); and Jerome. Helena Wong Chow died August 24, 1999.

Born in China in 1876 in the [開平 Hoiping / Kaiping] county of 廣東 Guangdong province, Yucho Chow arrived in Vancouver in 1902, paying the head tax. Little is known about his early years in Vancouver; he offered translation and interpretation services and may have worked as a house servant.

Chow established his photography studio at 68 West Hastings Street in 1907, photographing families, individuals, and organizations, many of whom were recent immigrants to Canada. Chow welcomed clients from any background, and as such, his work documents diverse communities that have traditionally been excluded from dominant narratives of Vancouver’s history.

Chow operated the studio with assistance from his seven children, working out of 68 West Hastings Street from 1907-08, 5 West Pender Street from 1909-1913, 23 West Pender Street from 1914-1929, and 518 Main Street from 1930 until his sudden death in 1949, leaving his sons Peter and Philip to take over the business. Yucho Chow was recognized in Chinatown as a community leader and philanthropist. A community archive collection of his photographs is housed at the City of Vancouver Archives.

Huie Lung Foon was born in China in 1894 in the [台山 Toisan / Taishan] district of 廣東 Guangdong province. He arrived in Canada on 1, July 1911 at the age of 17 and paid the $500 head tax.

Foon went back to China several times and sent his earnings to support his extended family. He married his first wife in 1923 and had a daughter and a son. The son died and the couple adopted another son.

In 1935, tragedy struck again when Foon's first wife passed away. Now 41 years old, Fung went back to China to find a second wife to look after his children. His granddaughter, Esther Lee, describes how he chose his second wife. “He picked my grandmother out of a schoolyard. She was 19 and instantly became a stepmother to a 10-year-old daughter and 3-year-old son. She was pregnant when my grandfather returned to Canada and my mother was born in 1936. Due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, my grandfather spent most of his adult life without his family until 1953. The first time my mother met her father, she was 17.”

Foon worked as a cook in mining and forestry camps along the coast. Later in life, he was employed at an exclusive men’s business club in downtown Vancouver.

Foon is remembered by his family as a gentle soul who spoke very little English. They recall he made the best apple pies (flaky crust) and an amazing steak (seared on a cast iron pan). And he loved gardening, with his favourite flowers being roses and azaleas.

Esther recalls, “My earliest memory of Grandfather was taking me to a wading pool near our rooming house on Jackson Street. He would also take me on the bus to go to Woodward’s Department store and go down the escalator (which was scary for me) to get soft ice cream cones. Because he never learned to drive, he was proud when I got my first car. He was especially proud that I was driving to UBC -- his first grandchild to attend university.”

Foon eventually bought a new house on Venables Street in Vancouver and enjoyed his retirement. He lived to age 92 and had 11 grandchildren. Before he passed away in 1988, Foon had the joy of meeting his first great-grandchild (eventually there would be 29).

Esther sums up Foon’s life, “All of his sacrifices and hard work throughout his life was so that we could be given the opportunity for a better life. I am forever grateful to him.”

Lily CHUN was born in Vancouver on April 21, 1918, at 1672 Albert Street, to CHAN Wah Shuck (father) and Hoo Shee (mother). Dr. T.H. Agnew was in attendance, which was unusual for the time, that is, having a medical professional. Her Chinese name, Fong Yee, is on her birth certificate, with “Lily” penned in ink. As noted, her father’s business is at 26 Canton Street (Chinatown).

Lily, or Lillian, was the fourth of eight children born in Vancouver to Hoo Shee. She also had a half-sister, CHIN Kam (aka Grace), who arrived in Vancouver in October 1912 (C.I.30 #00599). Kam was with her stepmother, Hoo Shee, and another relative, CHIN Oy (aka Annie). Both Kam and Oy were listed as “merchant’s daughters” from Ging Boy village, Sun Wui county, China.

Lillian’s siblings were Jessie (b. 1913), Kwok On (aka Harry/Harris, b. 1915), Margaret (b. 1916), Mary (b. 1919), Kwok Long (aka Jimmie/James, b. 1921), Yen (Rose, b. 1923), and Kwok Wo (aka Norman, b. 1925). Though her father had a business in Chinatown, the family lived in the area known today as Grandview-Woodland at 1870 Keefer Street; after 1929, that part of Keefer became Frances Street.

In 1930, the whole family left Vancouver for Hong Kong. Hoo Shee and her sons returned to Vancouver in 1934 (registered to re-enter under Section 24 of the 1923 Chinese Immigration Act; renewed, allowing them to be away for a maximum of four years). The Chan sisters remained in Hong Kong. Prior to the outbreak of WWII, the two eldest, Jessie and Margaret, succumbed to illnesses in Hong Kong; the youngest, Rose, managed to depart on the last ship leaving for Vancouver.

Lillian attended Macdonald School (1924-1930) in Vancouver, then Mui Fong Girls’ Secondary School (1931-37) in Hong Kong, followed by the Institute of Business Administration (1938-39). Upon completing her education, she found employment at Goddard & Douglas, marine surveyors (1940-41).

With the outbreak of war in 1941, Lillian and Mary fled Hong Kong, travelling to their ancestral village, Ging Mui Chuen, Ai Moon township, Xinhui (Sun Wui) county, Guangdong province. While there, they became aware of the US Army’s presence. This led to their employment in the military’s civilian secretarial pool given their bilingual and office skills.

Lillian was employed by the military for 18 months: 12th Service Group, Kweilin (May-June 1944), 69th Composite Wing, Kunming (July 1944-August 1945), and Army Exchange Service, Kunming (September-November 1945). During this latter period of service, her commanding officer, 2nd Lieutenant Jack Clements, Army Exchange Services, recommended that Lillian receive the Medal of Freedom with Gold Palm, specifically for her “exceptionally meritorious services as Stenographer and General Clerk [...] 1 September 1945 to 19 October 1945.”

Lillian returned from the war to Hong Kong to assess her options—stay or return to Vancouver and family. She arrived in Vancouver on August 28, 1946, aboard the S.S. Samflora.

Lillian successfully found employment at the Bank of Nova Scotia on her return, where she worked until her marriage to Wilbert Wong Lim on February 27, 1952. They had two daughters, Wil (Wilberta) Marilyn and Imogene Letitia.

With her children grown, Lillian returned to the workforce, which included Tai-Pan Restaurant (3005 Granville Street) where she mastered the art of mixology (although notable since she did not drink), and ended her work career with Canada Permanent Trust Co.

In retirement, she found community in practicing tai chi, and pleasure in lapidary and the craft of Chinese knotting.

Lillian died on November 15, 1997, in New Westminster, BC, due to complications following a medical procedure.

DERE Hing (zi name: Chew Yip) was born in China in 1902 in the 台山 Toisan / Taishan district of 廣東 Guangdong province. In 1921, he paid the $500 head tax when his father brought him to Montreal, Quebec at the age of 14. His father, DER Tan Suey, had arrived in Canada in 1909 and had also paid the $500 tax.

Hing worked in his father’s hand laundry; father and son toiled together for the next 30 years, first in Verdun, then in Montreal's east end. In 1925, Hing returned to China to marry YEE Dong Sing, but was unable to bring his wife to Canada due to the Exclusion Act. For three decades, Hing was separated from his wife except for the three occasions that he visited China. On those visits, their five children were conceived and born.

Despite being isolated and working six and a half days a week in the laundry in east end Montreal, Hing and his father contributed what they could to the social fabric of the Chinese community. He was active in the Chinese Young Men’s Christian Institute (YMCI). Being able to read and write Chinese, he helped his fellow laundry and restaurant workers in the YMCI with writing letters back to their villages in China. He was also active in the war effort to resist the Japanese invasion of China by raising funds to be sent back to fight the Japanese. Later, he became the president of the Chiu Lun Gong Sol branch in Montreal.

Hing guarded his government identification documents with care; he knew that he would be in trouble with the authorities and feared being subjected to deportation if he couldn't produce the documents. He kept safe his Chinese immigration certificates, the travel documents from the Chinese government for his voyages to China, and later his Canadian citizenship certificate that he finally received in 1950.

DERE Hing died in 1982. His years of community service was exemplified by this legacy he left for his children, “Whatever you do in life, make a contribution.”

The life and times of DERE Hing are preserved by his son, William Ging Wee Dere, in his award-winning book, “Being Chinese in Canada, The Struggle for Identity, Redress and Belonging.”

LEUNG Gang was born in China on October 9, 1890 in Sew Jack village in the [新會 Sunwui / Xinhui] district of [廣東 Guangdong] province.

He arrived in Canada in 1914 at the age of 25, borrowing the money to pay the $500 head tax from his father-in-law, a wine and tofu merchant.

Leung Gang was a farmer in China, so he first worked the fields in Armstrong and Vernon, before moving to Cumberland on Vancouver Island in 1918. On the island, he grew vegetables on small plots around Chinatown and delivered his produce on shoulder poles to his mostly White customers.

By 1923, he had earned enough to travel back to China and repay the loan. He reunited with his first wife and his son, and fathered a daughter during his visit. On a later visit, he fathered another daughter in China, but he never made it back to meet her.

In 1925, he returned to Cumberland and took a job in the coal mines near Comox Lake. However, falling rock crushed his foot, forcing him to go back to working the land. He opened a store selling produce in Cumberland’s Chinatown.

In January 1929, Leung Gang married Annie Lin Oi Low, the daughter of a prominent Chinatown businessman. They married in the Cumberland Holy Trinity Parish.

When he married, his given name became Yick Yee, according to his clan naming chart. But he was still known by many as Leung Gang.

Together, the couple opened a general store called the Leung Gang General Merchandise in the front section of their new home in Cumberland. They became the first Chinese family to live in the town. [His gravestone reads Mr. Leung Yick Yee]

Annie ran the store while her husband continued to do the farming. He sold his produce in the store, making deliveries with a horse and wagon. In 1933, he bought his first motorized delivery truck. Unfortunately, a year later, a large fire in Cumberland’s Chinatown destroyed his initial produce store, along with many other businesses.

Yick Yee and Annie had nine children, seven of whom survived to adulthood: Norman, Cyril, John, Joyce, May, Fred, and Wally. Two infant daughters, Keng Gue and Keng Holl, died the same year from pneumonia. Their surviving children helped on the farm and in their parents’ stores throughout their childhoods.

In 1949, he expanded into the nearby town of Courtenay, where he opened the Lily Gardens Cafe and Restaurant. That was followed in 1951 with the opening of a second Leung’s Grocery store. Also in 1951, shortly after the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act, Leung applied for and received Canadian citizenship, 37 years after coming to Canada.

In 1953, he retired from produce farming and from running the grocery stores.

Leung Yick Yee passed away in July 1960 in Cumberland.

Annie Lin Oi LOW was born LOW Lin Oi in 1905 in the Chinatown of Union, BC before it was renamed Cumberland. She was the eldest child of LOW Hock Shun and his wife Poon Hung (also known as Pon Shee). Annie’s father in fact had two wives; one who briefly came from China but returned there to live out her life; and Annie’s mother.

It was a big family. Annie had eight Canadian brothers from the two wives: George, David, Clifford, Wilbert, Philip, Bill, Charles, and Ken. She also had two older step-sisters.

Annie’s father was a prominent businessman in Cumberland's Chinatown, which at the time was the only place the Chinese were allowed to live and own businesses. Besides a hotel, restaurant, and Cantonese opera theatre, he also owned a general store. It was Annie who ran the store, not her brothers. Her father gave her Chinese lessons.

In 1929, when she was 23, she married a farmer from Guangdong province, LEUNG Gang, in the Cumberland Holy Trinity Parish. As soon as he married her, her husband became known as Leung Yick Yee, although he still used the name Leung Gang. Soon afterwards, the couple opened the Leung Gang General Merchandise store in Cumberland across from the church where they had been married. They were the first Chinese family to move into the village of Cumberland.

Annie, who taught herself bookkeeping and English, ran the store, while her husband sold the vegetables they grew on their farm outside Cumberland. The family lived in the back of the store.

They had nine children. Norman, Cyril, John, Joyce, May, Fred, and Wally all survived to adulthood. Two daughters, Keng Gue and Keng Holl, died in infancy. Annie gave birth with the help of her husband and her mother. Annie somehow kept the store open with occasional help from her brothers.

Throughout their marriage, Annie wrote letters and sent packages to her husband's first family in southern China.

In May 1939, the couple went away together without their children for the first time to Vancouver to see King George VI and Elizabeth during their six-week, coast-to-coast tour of Canada. A reigning British monarch had never visited the country before. By then, they had Norman, Cyril, John, Joyce and Baby May. She left her mother Pong Shee in charge at home.

The trip became one of the couple’s most cherished memories. Their son John, who was seven at the time, remembers the mooncakes they brought back. And Annie started collecting porcelain tea sets featuring the Royal family, including King George and later his daughter who would become Queen Elizabeth II. She displayed them in a glass cabinet in her kitchen for the rest of her life in the house behind the store.

Annie retired in 1946. Leung Gang/Yick Yee died in 1960, and Annie passed away in September 1992.

GIN Wing Den was born in China around 1904 or 1905 in the district of 台山 Toisan/Taishan. He spent his early childhood in China, before traveling to Vancouver, BC.

He arrived in Vancouver in 1919 as a student. It is unknown where he studied, but he learned to speak English fluently with no accent. While he was young, he worked as a houseboy for a family in Shaughnessy, a well-off neighbourhood where Chinese and Jews were banned from owning property. Wing Den’s family believes he may have honed his English there.

Later, as a young man, he worked on the steamship lines travelling the Vancouver to Alaska route, eventually becoming a chief cook.

Wing Den travelled several times back to China during the late 1920s and 1930s. On one of these trips, he married. He had four children, all born in [台山 Toisan / Taishan]—three sons and one daughter.

Under the conditions of the Exclusion Act, his wife and children could not join him to Canada, and he had to return by himself. From 1934 to 1948, he was unable to see his children due to the Japanese invasion of China, WWII, and the Chinese civil war.

The end of the war years coincided with the end of Canada’s Chinese Exclusion Act, which allowed Wing Den to travel back to China after a 14-year absence. During this period, Wing Den had another son with his wife.

He helped his family travel first to Hong Kong. After much paperwork, Wing Den’s wife and his youngest four children were finally allowed to enter Canada. However, his eldest son was unable to emigrate, as Canada’s immigration laws placed strict limits on family reunification for those of Chinese descent. Wing Den’s eldest son began a new life in Hong Kong, and Wing Den never saw him again.

After retiring, he ran a corner convenience store located at 16th and Camosun Street. For this, he was well-liked and well-respected by locals, who knew him as “Don Gin.” Locals would drop in to buy food, soda pop, cigarettes or newspapers, and chat with him about the latest news of the day.

Jack Gin, Wing Den’s grandson, recalled, “I had a lot of time with him as a young child. He never talked about the loneliness and pain of living basically by himself for decades while having a family in China. His wife and children were probably his motivation to keep going and surviving in a place that was difficult to succeed in. After he had a first heart attack around 1969, he and his wife moved into the basement suite of our East Vancouver home, and I got to spend more time with him. We enjoyed playing cribbage, and he'd make me the best lunch on school days, which I would run home for.”

Wing Den passed away in 1971 at the age of 67.

WOU Chow Sha was born in China around 1892 in the [新會 Sunwui / Xinhui] county of [廣東 Guangdong] province.

He arrived in Victoria, BC, in 1913, and paid the $500 head tax. By 1924, he was living in Vancouver at 359 East Pender Street and working as a labourer. He had no family either in Canada or China. However, he made several trips back to China in the 1920s and 1930s.

Joe Shee 周⽒ was born in China in Nam Chun village in Panyu 番禺, in the historic Sam Yup district of 廣東 Guangdong province. Her given name has been lost in time: Joe Shee means “of the Joe clan.” She likely married merchant CHU Chan Wah (1878-1948) in Panyu at an unknown date. She stood 4’10” and had pierced ears. When she was about five years old, her parents began preparing her for a desirable marriage by calling a footbinder. She had the ultimate in feminine refinement and desirability: tiny feet.

Joe Shee was 37 when she stepped aboard the S.S. Awa Maru in Hong Kong with two of her husband’s relatives, ready to emigrate to Canada. The trip in steerage lasted 26 days, stopping in at Kobe and Yokohama before arriving at Victoria. The date was July 28, 1914 and WWI had just begun. She spent six days in the Victoria Chinese immigration shed while her papers were processed. Joe Shee and the boys were exempt from paying the head tax due to Chu’s status as a merchant.

Joe Shee and Chu Chan Wah had two daughters – Iva Hon Chu (1915-1933) and Iva Gaun Chu (1918-1942) – and one son, Harold Dit Young Chu (1916-1994). The family lived and worked at several addresses in Chinatown with their dry goods and tobacco business, the Wing Wah Company. They moved from 41 East Pender Street to 504 Main Street (1926-35), then across the street to No. 509 (1936-38), then to No. 506 (from 1936).

Of the three children, only Harold lived to have a family. He married Leila Soo Hing Young in 1935 and the couple bought their home on East 6th Avenue a few years later. After Chu died in 1948, Joe Shee moved in. She was 71. Leila took care of her mother-in-law for 15 years, often carrying her food and drink up the stairs.

Joe Shee died in 1963 age 86. Chu Chan Wah and Joe Shee are buried together at Ocean View Burial Park in Burnaby.

CHU Chan Wah was the second of four sons of CHU Fock Chuck of the Buk Chan village in Panyu 番禺, in the historic Sam Yup district of 廣東 Guangdong province.

Chan was six years old when he arrived at Victoria, BC, likely with his father, in 1884. In his life, Chan was known by multiple English names, among them Chu Choon Wah, Chu Shou Sing, Wah Chew, and Mr. Wing Wah (the name of his company).

Although Chan arrived in Canada before the Chinese Immigration Act was passed in 1885, his life was shaped by it. When Chan brought his wife Joe Shee 周氏 (1877-1963) and two boys from China in 1914, all were exempt from the head tax because Chan was a merchant. The boys, claimed as sons, were nephews. Ten years later, the family had grown by three: a boy and two girls. Every member of the family was registered under the Chinese Immigration Act on July 27, 1924, immigrant and Canadian-born.

In 1904, a Victoria merchant, Chan was naturalized as a British subject. In 1912, Chan and his brother CHU Lum Wah started the Wing Wah Company 永華煙草公司. The first address was 41 East Pender Street in Vancouver. Originally a grocery, the Wing Wah Co. became a tobacconist and dry goods store by 1924. It supplied dozens of Chinese stores weekly with essentials from cigarettes and cigars to school supplies and penny candies.

The family lived and worked at several addresses in Chinatown. They moved from Pender to 504 Main Street (1926-35), then across the street to No. 509 (1936-38), then to No. 506 (from 1936). Chan, a formal man, was often seen in a three-piece suit and tie.

Chan’s death in 1948 was honoured with a large Chinese funeral. Chu Chan Wah and Joe Shee are buried together at Ocean View Burial Park in Burnaby.

YIP Wing See (aka Cecil Yip) – “Cec” to his many friends – was the 32nd grandchild of Yip Sang 葉生. He was the eldest son of Yip Kew Sheck 葉求鑠 (1900-1963) and Chew Wai Ming 趙慧明 (1902-1972). He was born at 51 East Pender Street and was five when Yip Sang passed away.

Cecil was a good student. Like many other Chinatown kids, he went to Chinese school after regular school, for nine long years. He was a Cub, a Boy Scout, an Army Cadet, and a track and field all-star, graduating from King George High School in 1940. At the Wing Sang compound, he was surrounded by boys who were always ready for an impromptu game. Soccer was a family passion: including Quene Yip (1905-94), at least twenty-one Yips played for the Chinese Athletics over the years, including Cecil in 1946. He dreamed of using his athletic and scholastic skills for college and a career.

He was born the year before the 1923 Chinese Exclusion Act and his life was shaped by it. Canadian born, he was registered as an immigrant on June 11, 1924. He was 27 when he voted for the first time. Not one to take inequities quietly, he enjoyed testing the boundaries of where he was allowed to be and when. He loved telling stories of “breaking curfew”: enjoying Vancouver’s nightlife outside the bounds of Chinatown.

Cecil was a member of the Army Navy Air Force Legion Unit 280 (Chinatown), having served both in WWII and in 1941 with the Merchant Marines. The army judged his education and skills insufficient for promotion, yet he wore the uniform with honour and pride. He marched in every Remembrance Day parade, medals shining and shoes mirror bright. He loved sharing war stories with his friends.

A hard worker, Cecil took the blue-collar jobs he was able to get in canneries, mills, grocery stores and restaurants. He worked all over the province, from Bones Bay to Vancouver. He had exquisite taste: family associations invited him to select menus for multi-course banquets, balancing the colours, flavours, and textures.

From an early age, Cecil loved fishing – even a job at the cannery couldn’t dim his enthusiasm for fish. His happiest days were on the water, the cooler filled with beer and fried chicken. The BC Salmon Derby was an annual highlight, with Cecil twice taking home trophies.

Cecil died in 1989 and is buried at Ocean View Burial Park, Burnaby.

MA Wing Shung was born in China in 1889 in a small coastal village in the [新寧 Sunning / Xinning] county. The area would later be known as [台山 Toisan/Taishan].

He arrived in Canada in 1907 and landed in Victoria aboard the Empress of China at 17 years old. Ma was exempt from paying the head tax as the son of a Nanaimo merchant.

On December 2, 1921, Ma Wing Shung was issued a C.I.36 in replacement for his original photo-less C.I.5 certificate.

According to one of his relatives, he had a wife and three children in China.

By 1923/24, he had settled in Edmonton’s Chinatown and worked as labourer living at 9713 101st Avenue.

Some time after, he was joined in Edmonton by his brother Mah Wing Him 馬榮添, who in 1924 was working as a clerk in Nanaimo’s Chinatown on Pine Street.

Ma Wing Shung died on May 15, 1960 in Edmonton, AB.

John Lee was born in China in October 1866 to Lee Yook Nai and Lee Ing Shee in the [新寧 Sunning / Xinning] county of [廣東 Guangdong] province in a village a few kilometers from the ocean. The area would later be known as [台山 Toisan / Taishan]. John arrived in Victoria, BC in April 1882, before the Chinese Immigration Act was passed in 1885.

Around 1900, he moved to Cranbrook, BC, working as an interpreter and foreman for Kettle Valley CPR Branch Line. This was one of the most dangerous and expensive railway projects in North American history. By at least 1913, John was the proprietor of the Sam Yick and Co. General Store and Boarding House, listed alongside Cranbrook’s other Chinese establishments in the International Chinese Business Directory of the World.

He brought over his 2nd wife, Lee Lum Shee, another Toisanese, in Spring 1913. As a merchant's wife, she was exempt from paying the head tax. By then, John Lee was a joint owner of the Lee Company, partnering with other Lee family members that owned and operated various groceries and restaurants in the vicinity of Cranbrook. Additionally, he was the head of the Chinese Freemasons branch [洪門/致公黨 Hongmen/Cheekungtong], and a member of the Dart Coon Club [達權總社], respected by many across BC.

By 1923, John was living above his business with his wife, his son Lee Look (b.1890), as well as three of his daughters: Alice Mee Wo Lee (b.1920), Annie May Young Lee (b. 1916), Mary May Tew John Lee (b.1914).

Two of his daughters lived in Alberta at the time, one in Pincher Creek, AB and another named Chin Chow Chung (b. 1904, China, nee Lee) in Canmore.

As John arrived in Canada before the 1885 Chinese Immigration Act, he only registered as a Chinese person in Canada upon the passing of the 1923 Chinese Immigration Act. Around this time, he began attending the Chinese Mission in Cranbrook and converted to Christianity.

About 10 months after his C.I.28 certificate was issued, he passed away of pneumonia on May 2, 1925 in Cranbrook BC. His funeral was delayed in order to bring together Freemason and family members from across Western Canada. The funeral was covered in newspapers as far away as Calgary and Lethbridge, AB. Over sixty cars and a full brass band formed the funeral procession, while Chinatown businesses flew flags at half mast. After his death, his wife sailed back to China without the paperwork allowing for her return to Canada.

Huey Shee was born in China on August 15, 1894 in the [新寧 Sunning / Xinning] county of [廣東 Guangdong] province. The area would later be known as [台山 Toisan/Taishan]. In her youth, she worked in the rice fields and watched the water buffalos. Though she did not have a formal education, she attended the village school for two years and dreamed of working in health care.

According to her son, Henry, her family cut her plans short when it was arranged she would be married to a “gold mountain man.”

She arrived in Vancouver on April 17, 1918, one year after her marriage. She claimed exemption as the wife of merchant, LEE Look, of Cranbrook, BC.

She already had one adopted China-born daughter, LEE Ngok (Gook) Ying, whom she brought with her illegally as an infant. Huey Shee would go on to have ten more children, all without the help of a doctor. In Canada, she settled into family life managing her growing family and assisting her husband and father-in-law, LEE John, run their boarding house in Cranbrook. Her young nieces lived with them as well.

With the passing of the 1923 Chinese Immigration Act, she registered alongside her entire family only weeks before the final deadline.

After the end of the CPR line, there were only two Chinese families in Cranbrook, neighbours to a multitude of lonely bachelors: the Chows, and the Lees.

Huey Shee was both frugal and generous. She grew her own vegetables, fertilized with night soil, and raised her own chickens. She also used her medical knowledge to prepare herbal medicines for her family and neighbours, alongside sharing the bounty of home-preserved meats and vegetables.

Her children were known for running around Cranbrook with pants made of cotton rice bags, decorated with the China Rice logo. After the tragic death of her husband in 1940, she had to manage family affairs alone. Her children worked in the family’s Kimberley and Cranbrook restaurants until 1949, with Huey Shee managing the businesses by travelling between the two towns by bus.

For the rest of her life, she looked after her family and was much beloved by her children, who in turn cared for her in her elderly years, first in Cranbrook, then in Lethbridge, and finally Edmonton. She visited Hong Kong in 1963 but was barred at the border from visiting [台山 Toisan / Taishan].

Her children and grandchildren were very prominent in diverse fields; daughter Jean was the only Chinese Canadian in the Royal Air Force during WWII and a citizenship recipient during the first ceremony for Chinese Canadians. Her grandson, Arthur (Art) Lee was Member of Parliament for Vancouver East from 1974-1979, the first Chinese Canadian in parliament since Douglas Jung.

Lee Huey Shee died of dementia on May 30, 1984 in Edmonton AB.