Hidden Histories - The Chinese Legacy in California
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The history of the Chinese people spans over 4,000 years of challenges and contributions.  Their story extends beyond the last chapter in your ancient civilizations textbook, across several continents, and into United States.  Yet much of their history in early California has been lost or erased. 

You and your classmates have an opportunity to recover the hidden histories of the Chinese in your own community. Like San Francisco, both Santa Barbara and Sacramento once had a section of the city known as Chinatown.  What happened to these two Chinatowns?  Why are they no longer a part of the two cities?  Where can you go to find the answers - since they are not in your history textbook?

To answer these questions, you will need to become history detectives and uncover clues from the past.  Just like historians, you will need to research, compare, discuss, and interpret primary sources.

Let's begin the journey with a look at ancient China. 

Activity One - Time Machine: Take an Internet tour of the early dynasties of China.  Use the Internet Field Trip Form to record what you learned from visiting each site.

• Daily Life in Ancient China - http://members.aol.com/Donnclass/Chinalife.html
• World Myths and Legends in Art - http://www.artsmia.org/world-myths/
• Creative Impulse - China - http://history.evansville.net/china.html
• Lost Cities of the Silk Road - http://www.alumni.caltech.edu/%7Epamlogan/silkroad/index.html
• History Timeline - http://www-chaos.umd.edu/history/time_line.html
• Art of China Homepage - http://pasture.ecn.purdue.edu/~agenhtml/agenmc/china/china.html
• Chinese Calligraphy - http://www.newton.mec.edu/Angier/DimSum/Chinese%20Caligraphy%20Lesson.html
• Women and Confucianism - http://www.womeninworldhistory.com/lesson3.html
• The Great Wall of China - http://www.newton.mec.edu/Angier/DimSum/Great%20Wall%20Lesson.html

Activity Two - Gold Mountain: The Chinese in California

• Gold Rush and Anti-Chinese Racism - http://www.sfmuseum.org/hist6/chinhate.html
• Gold Rush: Collision of Cultures - http://www.isu.edu/~trinmich/collision.html
• Oakland Museum of California's Gold Rush Collection - http://www.museumca.org/goldrush/path.html

Activity Three - Putting Together the Pieces of the Puzzle

• Chinatown - Santa Barbara
• Chinatown - Sacramento

Activity Four - Making the Invisible Visible: Highlights from Our Interactive Videoconference