19th century Asian-American scientists?
April 12, 2017 7:40 PM   Subscribe

Were there well-known Asian American professionals - doctors, engineers, lawyers, particularly scientists - in the 19th century? I'm seeing a lot of historical sources about Asian American immigrants who were blue collar workers and the like, but how about scientists? Any specifically important/groundbreaking ones in particular?
posted by lewedswiver to Society & Culture (3 answers total) 4 users marked this as a favorite
 
Yung Wing came to the US around 1840 to enroll in Yale after being sponsored for immigration by a missionary group. He wound up serving as a diplomat between the US and China during the latter half of the 19th century, became a citizen and then had the citizenship revoked by the Chinese Exclusion Acts and died in poverty.

You can probably search for other immigrants who followed in his footsteps by enrolling in Yale via the Chinese Educational Mission, which Yung Wing established. A lot of those students returned to China but some stayed, like Hong Yen Chang, who went on to become the first Chinese American lawyer.
posted by bl1nk at 8:46 PM on April 12, 2017 [3 favorites]


My blog (in my profile) deals with early 20th century Chinese academics in the US, but I do know from incidental comments in my research that there were those who came before. Yung Wing and Yale are a great place to start. Oberlin also taught a lot of Chinese academics due to their missionary work in Shaanxi.
posted by chainsofreedom at 6:07 AM on April 13, 2017 [1 favorite]


Here is a research project on early Chinese students at MIT.
posted by nonane at 8:01 AM on April 13, 2017 [2 favorites]


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