Person

Wong, Archie Ng Chee

• 黃昂䴡

• Wong, Ng Chee
• Wong, Archie

1910-1993

WONG Ng Chee (known in Canada as Archie Wong) arrived in Vancouver on July 30, 1923, a few weeks after the 1923 Chinese Exclusion Act was in force. The Act allowed those already in transit to enter Canada.

Archie was 12 years old. He lived with his father and four of his uncles who intended to open an import-export business together.

For a few years, Archie attended Strathcona Public School in Vancouver. But when he was a young adult his father died, and that led him to move to Toronto.

In Toronto, Archive worked as a grocer, then a restaurateur, and finally as a produce clerk.

He also loved to gamble. On Sundays, he would go to Chinatown with 2 or 3 kids in tow (all under the age of 7). He would set up the children at a table in a restaurant and buy each of them a bottle of the soft drink Orange Crush and a straw. He would then slip into the back room and the children would hear loud voices and excitement from behind the door.

In 1985, Archie visited his village in China for the first time in about 50 years. He didn't recognize the drive to the village; when he left for Canada, no roads had been built yet. Archie was delighted to see the huge banyan tree that he climbed on and played under as a boy. However, he was deeply saddened by the sight of his family’s original house; abandoned and neglected. That memory depressed him for some time upon his return to Canada.

Archie and his Canadian-born wife Marjorie had six children: Kathy, David, Frances, Carol, Richard, and Michael.

He passed away in Toronto on June 8, 1993.

Sam, Marjorie (1921-2015)

Description supplied by collector/curator