Images of Patrons in New York’s Chinese Restaurants

In 1909, the popular Munsey’s Magazine ran a long article titled “Slumming in New York’s Chinatown.” The essay and accompanying photographs depicted the attitudes and experiences of non-Chinese visitors to the primary neighborhood in which Chinese immigrants lived and worked. “Slumming” turned these areas, and the businesses and people within them, into spectacles. Chinese restaurants may have benefited from expanding their customer base, but the photos and captions featured in Munsey’s captured prevalent stereotypes about Chinese immigrants and their businesses.

Source: Caption: One of the small chop-suey restaurants of Chinatown, which are kept open all night for the benefit of slumming-parties. These places have multiplied greatly during the last few years, and there are now scores of them in many parts of New York. Source: William Brown Meloney, “Slumming in New York’s Chinatown,” Munsey Magazine, September 1909, pp. 818 and 825, https://hdl.handle.net/2027/hvd.32044092643162?urlappend=%3Bseq=835%3Bownerid=27021597764234864-833.