Proud Woke History. 1887. The First Chinese Woman in San Antonio. Sue Lee may have been San Antonio's first Chinese female resident but that was a secret which she desperately wanted to keep. This unusual Asian/American tale comes from an August, 1887 newspaper story under the droll heading "IN BREECHES AND BOOTS". The colorful account informed its curious readers that in a certain Chinese cafe "very popular with the local Celestials, one of the waiters is certainly a woman, dressed as a man." Loyal patrons of the "chop shop" on W. Commerce St. near City Hall helped Sue Lee maintain her subterfuge. Many of them adamantly swore that she was a "real man", in spite of her obvious feminine features and girlish mannerisms. Maybe the poorly fitting trousers and brogans gave her away. An apparently beguiled newspaperman wrote that at times she affected "...a bewitching look through the long black lashes of her almond eyes." We trust that Sue Lee did not let her guard down as consequences could be terrible. Readers were informed that this "celestial masquerade" was necessary because Sue was a runaway slave. The article explained that Cantonese girls were regularly indentured to rich Chinese masters by a syndicate in San Francisco. This fugitive woman had escaped a keeper who might have paid as much as $3,000 for her, depending upon her age and physical appearance. " Poor Sue, doubtless to gain her liberty, has broken away from her masters and in the garb of a man is keeping her identity and whereabouts concealed from her owners." The ardent reporter ended by adding that her charade might be undone by the police, if they enforced a local ban on women appearing publicly in men's garb. Sue Lee's uncertain fate remains concealed to those of us looking back to her day; hopefully, she lived her life as a free woman, one way or another. Thousands of long suffering Chinese girls and women were exploited and abused during this period of legal prostitution while many others died as a result of disease and neglect. Sexual slavery was the frontier reality of nineteenth century America due in part to the bigoted strictures on immigration of Chinese women." (The Chinese Heart of Texas, Mel Brown, 2005) #ProudBlue
@ProgressiveTex Sadly, things have not changed as much as we had hoped they would.
@ProgressiveTex I hope that newspaper story didn’t expose enough of her story & location…. I hope she remained free and able to live her life.
@ProgressiveTex What an interesting piece of history, Tex! Thanks for sharing!
@ProgressiveTex I’m guessing you’ve read Forget the Alamo.