Chinese Immigrant Lyrics

Over 200 folk songs of the Chinese immigrant experience in America are translated in Songs of Gold Mountain: Cantonese Rhymes from San Francisco Chinatown (Marlon K. Hom, University of California Press, 1987)

"In 1849, the news of the discovery of gold in California reached China, and hundreds of Chinese began arriving in the early months of 1850. Thousands followed in subsequent years, as mining, farming, and railroad construction boomed. Then, as now, the Chinese called the United States Gamsaan (Jinshan), or Gold Mountain, a term deriving from the 1849 Gold rush. It was also called Fakei (Huqi), or Flowery Flag, a name inspired by the fancy graphics of the American flag."