LAKE TEMESCAL WALKING WATERHOODS TOUR

When: Saturday, February 24th, 2024

Time: 11:00AM - 12:30PM

Where: Lake Temescal, North Parking Lot, 6500 Broadway, Oakland, CA, 94618

Join us for a one-mile natural and cultural history walking tour of Lake Temescal on Saturday, Feb 24th from 11 am -12:30 pm. The tour, with its 45 points of interest, can be found on the PocketSights app. During our in-person tour, you can expect to learn about the East Bay water supply, East Bay creeks, Ohlone history, nearby transportation infrastructure, important geological features, and local flora and fauna.



If you are in need of free tickets, contact: info@whollyh2o.org

To sign up for this event, use this link or the "register" button above.

A Roaring New Year: Chinese American History in the Bay Area

Happy Year of the Dragon!

Each February, millions across the globe look forward to celebrating love. Red, pink, and white flood store shelves and social media feeds, coloring the world in Valentine’s Day anticipation. But this month, we want to focus on another February holiday painting the town red: Lunar New Year. To celebrate the start of the Year of the Dragon, we will be discussing Chinese American history in the Bay Area. 

Chinese New Year Parade 2020 / Santiago Mejia, SF Chronicle

Lunar New Year (新年) marks the beginning of both the new year and spring, according to the Chinese lunisolar calendar. It typically falls in late January or early February. This year, it was observed on February 10th. Often referred to as Chinese New Year, this holiday is most commonly associated with Chinese culture. However, many other Asian countries celebrate it too, such as in Vietnam, where the holiday is called Tết, and South Korea, where it is known as Seollal (설날). 

The Bay Area is no stranger to Lunar New Year celebrations. San Francisco’s iconic annual Chinese New Year parade (taking place Saturday, February 24th) is one of the biggest outside of Asia, while Oakland, Berkeley, and various suburban Bay Area towns have a plethora of Lunar New Year related activities, too. 

SF Chinatown October 2023 / Meghan Boyle, Wholly H2O

Asian history in the Bay Area is longstanding, and dates back almost 200 years to the 1840s, when Chinese Americans first began arriving in California. Many immigrants from China and Hong Kong came to California in search of work, often settling into mining and railroad jobs due to restrictive policies that prevented Chinese immigrants from obtaining other work.

San Francisco was one of the main destinations for Chinese immigrant workers and families because of its proximity to Angel Island, the largest immigration station closest to China’s eastern shoreline. However, growing xenophobia and racist policies pushed Chinese workers and families into the corners of San Franciscan society, and as a result, Chinatown was born. Later, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 limited Chinese immigration into the U.S., but the Bay Area still continued to see the prevalence of Chinese communities. 

Interestingly, it was not until the 1906 earthquake — which destroyed the majority of Chinatown area buildings — that Chinatown began to resemble the one San Francisco knows today. After the earthquake, officials decided to rebuild Chinatown with structures reminiscent of Chinese architecture to distinguish it from the rest of the city. During the construction of these new buildings, architects (who were not Chinese) crafted edifices modeled after Chinese pagodas. These pagodas were built all over Chinatown, alongside other iconic stylized architecture (banks, lamp posts, signage), which soon became idiosyncratic emblems of the neighborhood that can still be seen. 

Oakland Chinatown / VisitOakland

Perhaps a little lesser known, though, is the history of Chinese populations in Oakland. Oakland’s Chinatown, the fourth biggest, and one of the oldest in the U.S., was settled in the 1850s by Chinese laborers. Many associate historical Chinese workers with railroad or mining jobs, but Chinese immigrants also played an instrumental role in the development of the East Bay Area’s dams and water systems. In the late 1800s, Chinese laborers were recruited to work on both the Temescal Dam and the Lake Chabot Dam, clearing hillsides, boring tunnels, building roads, and constructing the dams. These incredibly arduous efforts made by Chinese workers permanently shaped the Bay Area’s water supply methods, helping the region to grow and flourish. 

Currently, Oakland’s Chinatown boasts a sizable population, various restaurants, and cultural landmarks. It is not considered much of a tourist area in the way that San Francisco’s Chinatown is, but is still home to a robust scene of Asian history, art, food, and culture. 

Even with the Chinese community’s significant contributions to East Bay history and development, there are not many records on individuals who lived and worked in the area. So, we encourage you to uplift Asian American voices and learn about the incredible legacies that Bay Area Asian communities are continuing to create and have already left behind. 

To discover more of this fascinating history, you can visit the Oakland Public Library Asian Branch or Oakland Asian Cultural Center. For a unique literary perspective, you can read various works by Asian authors that center on the Asian American experience in the Bay Area, including Sui Sin Far’s short story collection Mrs. Spring Fragrance (1912), C Pam Zhang’s novel How Much of These Hills is Gold (2020), and Amy Tan’s modern classic The Joy Luck Club (1989). 

Wholly H2O also discusses more Chinese history in our Walking Waterhoods tours, particularly the Lake Temescal tour, coming up this Saturday. 

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