Chinatown (San Francisco)

Le Chinatown de San Francisco est le plus ancien quartier chinois d'Amérique du Nord, il compte la plus grande communauté chinoise hors d'Asie. Le quartier a été fondé vers les années 1848.

1. Géographie

Le Chinatown se trouve dans le centre-ville de San Francisco. Il est délimité par Taylor Street et le quartier de Nob Hill à l'ouest ; Montgomery Street et le Financial District le bordent à l'est. Au nord se trouvent North Beach, Green Street et Columbus Avenue. Bush Street et Union Square bordent le sud du quartier. Le chinatown de San Francisco s'est agrandi vers le nord en gagnant sur le quartier de North Beach au nord de Green Street et de Columbus Street. Deux voies principales traversent le quartier chinois : d'une part Grant Avenue, où se trouve l'entrée du Chinatown au carrefour de Bush Street : elle est marquée par une porte d'architecture chinoise (porte du dragon) et deux statues de lions sur les trottoirs. L'autre axe est Stockton Street, qui est moins fréquentée par les touristes : les marchés aux poissons, les boutiques et les restaurants lui donnent un caractère authentique.

1. Lieux remarquables

St. Mary's Park possède une statue du Dr Sun Yat-sen, un mémorial pour les vétérans de guerre chinois. Portsmouth Square où les habitants du quartier viennent pratiquer le Tai-chi-chuan et jouer aux échecs chinois. Une réplique de la Déesse de la Démocratie utilisée pendant les manifestations de la place Tian'anmen en 1989 a été construite en 1999 par Thomas Marsh. Elle est faite de bronze et pèse quelque 280 kg.

1. Galerie


1. Dans la culture

Le Chinatown de San Francisco a servi d'inspiration à des films et séries télévisées tels que Les Aventures de Jack Burton dans les griffes du Mandarin ou Warrior.

1. Personnalités liées au quartier

Margaret Chung, première femme sino-américaine diplômée d'une faculté de médecine ouvre un cabinet médical en 1920 dans le quartier. Elle s'illustre également comme marraine de guerre lors du conflit contre les japonais.

1. Notes et références


1. Annexes


1. = Articles connexes =

Chinatown (Manhattan) Chinatown (Los Angeles)

1. = Liens externes =

(en) SanFranciscoChinatown.com (en) Guide de Chinatown à San Francisco - SFGate

Portail du monde chinois Portail de San Francisco

Nearby Places View Menu

Great Star Theater

The Great Star Theater, formerly known as Great China Theater, is a 410-seat theater located at 636 Jackson Street in San Francisco's Chinatown. It was built in 1925 for the Chinese opera and is the last Chinese theater in any Chinatown in the United States.

Theater

Ma-Tsu Temple (San Francisco)

The Ma-Tsu Temple is a Taoist temple in San Francisco's Chinatown. Founded in 1986, it is dedicated to Matsu and has foundational ties to the Chaotian Temple in Beigang, Yunlin, Taiwan. Its founding has been described as reflective of both a change in Chinese American demographics following the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 and the rise of a transnational Taiwanese-American community economically enabled by the Taiwan Miracle of the 1980s. The temple was originally located on Grant Avenue before moving to its present location on Becket Street in 1996. It is not to be confused with the Tin How Temple two blocks to the south, which is likewise dedicated to Matsu (carrying one of her popular names in Cantonese), but was founded in 1910 and is the oldest extant Taoist temple in Chinatown.

Landmark Temple

Barbary Coast, San Francisco

The Barbary Coast was a red-light district during the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries in San Francisco that featured dance halls, concert saloons, bars, jazz clubs, variety shows, and brothels. Its nine block area was centered on a three block stretch of Pacific Street, now Pacific Avenue, between Montgomery and Stockton Streets. Pacific Street was the first street to cut through the hills of San Francisco, starting near Portsmouth Square and continuing east to the first shipping docks at Buena Vista Cove. The Barbary Coast was born during the California gold rush, when the population of San Francisco was growing at an exponential rate due to the rapid influx of tens of thousands of miners trying to find gold. The early decades of the Barbary Coast were marred by persistent lawlessness, gambling, administrative graft, vigilante justice, and prostitution; however with the passage of time, the city's government gained strength and competence, and the Barbary Coast's maturing entertainment scene of dance halls and jazz clubs influenced American culture. The Barbary Coast's century-long evolution passed through many substantial incarnations due to the city's rapid cultural development during the transition to the 20th century. Its former location now is overlapped by Chinatown, North Beach, and Jackson Square.

Historic Site Landmark

Ping Yuen

Ping Yuen and North Ping Yuen (sometimes collectively called The Pings) form a four-building public housing complex in the north end of Chinatown, San Francisco along Pacific Avenue. In total, there are 434 apartments. The three Pings on the south side of Pacific (West, Central, and East Ping Yuen) were dedicated in 1951, and the North Ping Yuen building followed a decade later in 1961. Some of the largest murals in Chinatown are painted on Ping Yuen, which are prominent landmark buildings taller than the typical two- or three-story Chinatown buildings that date back to the early 1900s. The formal effort to build Ping Yuen started in 1939 after Chinatown was called "the worst [slum] in the world"; it was the first public housing project completed in the neighborhood, and unlike the typical single room occupancy housing of Chinatown, featured private bathrooms and kitchens for each apartment when the first building opened in 1951. Like most buildings in Chinatown, it was designed by western architects with Chinese thematic elements. Although it was touted as potentially drawing more tourists to the area, it soon became known as a dangerous place, with the July 4 shooting over fireworks sales that occurred at Ping Yuen leading to the Golden Dragon massacre of 1977. The murder of Julia Wong in 1978 inspired residents to go on a rent strike, led by future mayor Ed Lee, for improvements to building maintenance and security. Ownership of Ping Yuen passed from the city to the Chinatown Community Development Center in 2016, which is continuing to work with residents' associations to improve conditions.

Landmark Neighbourhood

250 m

Hungry I

The Hungry I (stylized as hungry i) was a nightclub in San Francisco, California, originally located in the North Beach neighborhood. It played a major role in the history of stand-up comedy in the United States. It was launched by Eric "Big Daddy" Nord, who sold it to Enrico Banducci in 1951. The club moved to Ghirardelli Square in 1967 and operated mostly as a rock music venue until it closed in 1970. The name of the nightclub was reused later as a strip club in San Francisco, from the late 1960s until 2019.

Music Nightlife