Sunken ship discovery in SF Bay revives memories of xenophobia
A sunken steamship involved in one of San Francisco's worst maritime disasters was discovered at the bottom of San Francisco Bay, a silent reminder of a historic calamity that rocked a city steeped in xenophobia and racial hatred.
The calamity was notorious not just because of the deaths, but also because the ship that hit the City of Chester had 74 Chinese crewmen and 1,062 Chinese steerage passengers. The accident happened at a time when xenophobic fears of a "yellow peril" were at a peak in San Francisco, and five years after President Chester Arthur signed the Chinese Exclusion Act.
The disaster occurred on a foggy September morning. The Chester, with 106 aboard, was heading out on its usual run to Eureka just as the Oceanic was arriving in San Francisco after 25 days at sea from Hong Kong. It took only six minutes for the steamer to sink, but passengers and crew on the Oceanic pulled dozens of survivors out of the water and Chinese sailors jumped into the water to rescue others. One sailor, named Ah Lung, dived into the water and heroically saved the life of a young boy, wrote Schwendinger in his book, which details America's troubled maritime relations with the Chinese.
"When this happened, it happened in an atmosphere in which the population was dead set against the Chinese," said James Delgado, the director of NOAA's maritime heritage program. "They accused the Chinese of standing there impassively and watching these white people drown." Subsequent reports of heroism among the Chinese crew not only proved the accusations wrong, but also may have helped change some people's racist attitudes, Delgado said.
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Sunken-ship-discovery-in-SF-Bay-revives-memories-5425465.php
The Chinese Exclusion Act was signed by Chester Arthur - a republican, of course. It was repealed under FDR.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Exclusion_Act