Children’s Book Review: “Angel Island: Gateway to Gold Mountain,” the Story of Chinese Emigration to America

In Angel Island: Gateway to Gold Mountain (juvenile non-fiction), Russell Freedman illuminates the troubled history of Chinese emigration to America. Between 1910 and 1940, more than half a million people from eighty different countries, but mostly from China, arrived at Angel Island in San Francisco Bay.

The first migration began in 1848, when news of the California Gold Rush reached China. Thousands of Chinese men set out for Gam Saan, or “Gold Mountain” as California was called. Because of racial prejudice, these new immigrants had to pay a special tax and were restricted in where they could live and work, having already been kept in detention for weeks or months awaiting word about whether they could remain in California or have to be deported back to China. They expressed their misery in poetry, translated by Evans Chan.

It’s been seven weeks since my imprisonment on this island,
And still I do not know when I can land,
Due to the twists and turns of fate,
I have to endure bitterness and sorrow.

Freedman has written an informative account of how the Chinese came to this country and how they fared. He includes accounts of the bigotry and violence Chinese immigrants faced, as well as the contributions they went on to make to the United States. Pictures of the immigrants, their calligraphy, source notes, and a bibliography make this an outstanding reference for children.

Boston: Clarion Books (2013). Reviewed by Lillian Hecker, Children’s Services Librarian. For ages ten and up.