CHINATOWN

San Francisco, CA

San Francisco's Chinatown is the oldest Chinatown in North America and the largest Chinese community outside Asia. It is the oldest of the four notable Chinatowns in the city. Since its establishment in 1848, it has been highly important and influential in the history and culture of ethnic Chinese immigrants in North America. Chinatown is an enclave that continues to retain its own customs, languages, places of worship, social clubs, and identity. By the end of the 19th century, Chinatown's reputation as a place of prostitution caused it to become a tourist destination, attracting crowds of working class white people, who sought the oriental mystery of Chinese culture, and sought to fulfill their expectations and fantasies about the filth and depravity. The white customers' patronization of Chinatown prostitutes was more extensive than gambling. The Chinatown neighborhood was completely destroyed in the 1906 earthquake, which leveled most of the city. The occasion of this sketch was the annual Population Institute's board meeting, held at the Ritz Carlton, a few blocks from this busy intersection of Grant and Clay Streets. The visual anchor at the end of the street is the Ching Chung Taoist Association. As evidenced by the architecture and detail of decoration, you are almost transported to China