The Phoenix Crown: A Novel

The 1906 San Francisco Earthquake has been estimated at approximately 7.9 on the Richter scale. While this is lower than many famously destructive earthquakes, geologists note that the location of San Francisco, as well as the local geology, contributed to much greater destruction than comparable quakes. While the earthquake itself caused a great deal of destruction, most of the damage resulted from the fire that followed. San Francisco’s fire response was, in fact, relatively robust and modern, but the earthquake’s damage to water mains and infrastructure left firefighters without sufficient resources to combat the blaze. All of Chinatown and Nob Hill were destroyed, as was the Opera House, where the Gemma performs in the novel. The displacement of San Francisco’s Chinese population contributed to the development of Oakland’s Chinatown, as well as the East Bay in general, as refugees established new lives and communities outside San Francisco.

Before the earthquake, San Francisco’s Chinatown arose as a means for Chinese Americans to support each other in the face of oppressive laws and racist housing policy. The Page Act, signed into law in 1875—seven years before the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act—effectively prevented the legal immigration of Chinese women, resulting in a community with a severe gender imbalance (>80% male). The San Francisco police did not investigate crimes against Chinese people, which further encouraged people to live in close proximity for mutual defense. At the same time, the police only irregularly enforced any laws, and the combination of lax enforcement and scarce opportunity for legal employment resulted in a concentration of criminal activity in those areas. Despite these obstacles, even explicitly racist maps calling for the destruction of Chinatown noted a myriad of legal businesses, churches, and schools.

Historic Chinatown, where the character Suling lives, differs from modern Chinatown. In the early 1900s, tourism and tourist goods were relatively scarce, and the boundaries of Chinatown were less concrete. Furthermore, elements like Dragon Gates, now ubiquitous in many cities’ Chinatowns, were absent, and Lunar New Year celebrations did not cater to tourism. These elements would come to be associated with SF Chinatown in the 1950s, as Chinese American communities sought to combat a new wave of anti-Chinese racism fueled by Cold War fears of communist infiltration.