Introduction
Imagine a “Forty Niner.” If you pictured a football player, congratulations, you are like my students. The name of the football team is derived from the term for the first immigrants to arrive in California for the Gold Rush in 1849. Like early adopters of the latest tech fad in Silicon Valley today, people seem to always be in a hurry to be on the “cutting edge.” Now that you are oriented historically, you might be envisioning a 19th century gold miner. A white US American from the eastern states, who arrived on a Conestoga wagon. He wears a red flannel shirt and brand-new Denim Levi’s. He sets out into the Sierra Nevada with his shovel and a “can-do” attitude. We all know the real story is far more complex than this stereotype. This unit examines two variations on this narrative. For one thing, thousands of the Forty-Niners were from China. And for another, most of the mining that took place was done by corporations not individuals going it alone. This unit will use visual primary sources to teach the California Gold Rush in a more complete, and diverse manner.
This topic is important because California has a longer history of AAPI (Asian American and Pacific Islander) immigration--and discrimination--than many people think. Chinese immigrants were among the first populations to make California the multicultural multiethnic place it is today1. They were involved in nearly every trade and industry in the early days of statehood. And they were among the first to encounter violence and legal restrictions based on their racial identity.2
My school is in San Jose, California. It is geographically between the Oldest Chinatown in the USA, in San Francisco, and one of the largest quicksilver mines in the world-the New Almaden Mines. The proximity of these two sites impacted the history of our city and continue to impact the lives of my students today. This unit will integrate the stories of the Gold Rush, Chinese immigrant labor, industrial scale mining and the environmental consequences we live with today.
Comments: