August 31, 2009
When people hear the words San Diego, many think of beaches and surfer dudes. What a lot of people don’t know is San Diego is the home to a large Chinese immigrant community. Looking for a better life and working hard to achieve this, the Chinese also brought with them a thriving small business community. They were merchants and well versed in the gold market. How well do you know today’s gold market?
Many know of the influx and shaping of the Chinese Culture in the San Francisco and the surrounding Northern bay area, but many do not know of the contributions and flourishing society that took place with the Chinese who lived in the San Diego area as well. Long removed from their great ancestors who may have even been great warriors who were able to trade cash for gold after taking some during a battle conflict, many Chinese immigrants came to America to work the railroad lines and to work other forms of manual labor. It is not exactly certain if many of the men and also women were working hard just to say they could afford precious gold, but what is for certain is that many of them were indeed in search of a better life. San Diego, California, now home to one of the many Chinese Historical societies through out of the country have taken steps to keep and preserve the gold pack history of Chinese Immigrants living in San Diego.
But before we get into the proponents of the Museum, let’s analyze the influx of the Chinese to the Californian land first. Historians at the University of California Berkeley highlighted that the greatest influx of the Chinese to the California land was from 1850 to 1925. One publishing company in particular during that time was doing some writing on the Chinese Culture in San Diego by the name of H.H. Bancroft. In the writings it was talking about how the size of Chinese immigrants was smaller in San Diego, as compared to San Francisco but none the less important. Many immigrants were the descendants of merchants and traders; many of whom understood the gold market well and some were even able to open up some small shops of their own. If you travel to the lower western part of downtown San Diego today you can still see some of the Chinese influenced style buildings and there are many Chinese wellness centers in the area that I am sure gives credit to the strong Chinese presence in the area. Unfortunately some of the far eastern influenced novelty shops and stores are no longer in the downtown San Diego Area; many of them disappeared in the mid to late 1990′s. Even with all of this the Chinese cultures are still with us in San Diego, in the same way that many of the historic Chinese gold coins are still with us today; they both shine on.
*There are many everyday changes going on the world of gold transactions and purchases. To learn more about the current price of gold in the modern day world visit: http://cashforgoldusa.com