Chinatown Handy Guide

The Chinatown Handy Guide was one of the early Chinatown tour books published by a Chinese American author and recorded in the World Catalog. It was published in four different geographic editions tailored to the largest established Chinatowns in America's biggest cities: Chinatown Handy Guide New York, Chinatown Handy Guide Chicago, Chinatown Handy Guide San Francisco and Chinatown Handy Guide Los Angeles (in order of publication). In addition, there were four sister books that promoted tourism for the Chinatown's in Cleveland, Sacramento, Seattle, and Stockton

Pioneering newspaperman John T.C. Fang published all the Chinatown Handy Guides through his company Chinese Publishing House, and he served as Editor and Publisher for each of the books. Fang went on to start AsianWeek, the first and largest English language newsweekly for the Asian American community, and the Fang Family became the first Asian Americans to own major American newspapers including the Independent Newspaper Group and The San Francisco Examiner.

“Capitalizing on the fact that Chinatowns were becoming tourist attractions” across America, Fang's Chinatown Handy Guides took a unique approach of not only promoting Chinatowns as a tourist destination, but also as a place of interaction between Chinese Americans and white Americans. The San Francisco edition featured an “international group of businessmen and pastors” gathering for “bible class conducted each week in a local pharmacy.” The New York City edition included photos of Chinese children as part of a fundraising drive for the Red Cross, and another photo of “visiting Congressmen” being welcomed in Chinatown.

Later academics described the books as “intended to boost (Chinatown’s) flagging tourist economy”, and as luring “sightseers with a predictable dim sum glossary, the origin story of chop suey, and a tutorial on how to hold chopsticks.”

But the Chinatown Handy Guides also sought to characterize the development of the nation's Chinatowns as important contributors to America's economy. Each edition included a history of the specific Chinatown in that city, and quantified the economic contributions of the Chinese community, claiming for example, that in 1958 it was “safe to estimate that in Greater New York there (were) over 2,000 restaurants representing a total investment of over $100 million dollars, 500 stores, markets and curio shops and 5,000 laundries owned by Chinese.” Each guidebook also included “Points of Interest” and advertisements from local Chinatown establishments.

The tourist booklets featured photos of many prominent Americans in Chinatown from President Richard Nixon to U.S. Congressmen and Senators. Republican Mayor George Christopher of San Francisco offered a welcome letter for the SF edition, while New York's Democratic Mayor Robert F. Wagner Jr. demonstrated how to use chopsticks in the NYC edition. Hollywood stars pictured visiting Chinatown ranged from Lucille Ball to Danny Kaye. The only African American pictured in Chinatown was Nat King Cole in San Francisco.