Kam Wah Chung & Co. Museum
Encyclopedia
The Kam Wah Chung & Co. Museum, also known as Kam Wah Chung Company Building, is a state park and National Historic Landmark in John Day, Oregon
that preserves early Chinese culture in Oregon. First built in 1876 as a trading post along the Dalles Military Road it later became the center of the Chinese community in John Day as a store and apothecary run by Ing Hay (known also as "Doc Hay") and Lung On, Chinese immigrants from Guangdong
.
The building remained abandoned after Ing Hay died in 1952. He asked that the building be deeded to the city of John Day with the provision it be turned into a museum. His wish, and the ownership of the building, were forgotten until 1967. While surveying for a new park the city discovered its ownership of the building and began to restore it as it was in the 1940s.
Today the Kam Wah Chung & Co. Museum contains one of the most extensive collections of materials from the century-long influx of Chinese immigrants in the American West. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 and designated a National Historic Landmark by the Secretary of the Interior in 2005.
John Day, Oregon
John Day is a city located about north of Canyon City in Grant County, Oregon, at the intersection of U.S. Routes 26 and 395. The city was named for the nearby John Day River, which had been named for a Virginian member of the 1811 Astor Expedition, John Day...
that preserves early Chinese culture in Oregon. First built in 1876 as a trading post along the Dalles Military Road it later became the center of the Chinese community in John Day as a store and apothecary run by Ing Hay (known also as "Doc Hay") and Lung On, Chinese immigrants from Guangdong
Guangdong
Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...
.
The building remained abandoned after Ing Hay died in 1952. He asked that the building be deeded to the city of John Day with the provision it be turned into a museum. His wish, and the ownership of the building, were forgotten until 1967. While surveying for a new park the city discovered its ownership of the building and began to restore it as it was in the 1940s.
Today the Kam Wah Chung & Co. Museum contains one of the most extensive collections of materials from the century-long influx of Chinese immigrants in the American West. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 and designated a National Historic Landmark by the Secretary of the Interior in 2005.
See also
- List of Oregon state parks
- List of National Historic Landmarks in Oregon
- List of Registered Historic Places in Oregon