Abstract
Social history focuses on understanding the everyday lives of ordinary people (Richardson 2011, Social history, local history, and historiography: collected essays). The ethnic minorities that made up immigrant communities in North American towns and cities during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries have been of particular interest to social historians (Tosh 2017, From the ‘cape of despair’ to the Cape of Good Hope: letters of the emigrant poor in early nineteenth-century England. Social History 42:480–500). However, language barriers and low rates of literacy often limit the number of first person accounts written by people who belonged to such communities. This paper explores how terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) and 3D reconstructive modeling of heritage buildings can provide new insights into the social history of Chinese immigrants in Alberta during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These technologies were used to rapidly and accurately document the Quon Sang Lung Laundry shop in Fort Macleod, Alberta, prior to its scheduled demolition. The resulting digital data sets were used to construct detailed architectural plans of the building, as well as photorealistic 3D reconstructions of the shop, as it would have appeared at different points in history. The resulting point clouds were further explored to detect and extract evidence of the lived experiences of its occupants. For example, the conflicts and tensions surrounding Chinese laundries, and the discriminatory bylaws that resulted, may be subtly reflected in specific architectural details of the laundry shop, such as evidence for the presence of walls no longer standing. The ability to return to accurate digital models, over and over again, provides unique opportunities to construct social histories of buildings long after they are gone.
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Notes
The community was originally known as Fort Macleod due to its association with the North West Mounted Police (NWMP) post. It was incorporated in 1892 as the Town of Macleod and remained so for 60 years, adding “Fort” back to its name in 1952. For the sake of clarity, the town will be referred to as “Fort Macleod” throughout the text. Thanks to Ron Kelland for his insights into the history of the town’s name.
Although the Province of Alberta was not established until 1905, for the sake of clarity, Alberta here refers to the territory of the future province as Alberta.
Based on a keyword search (“Chinese”) of the Alberta Heritage Survey, which is an online database of historic structures in Alberta. The search returned 70 results, but structures that post-date 1914 or are known to have been demolished are excluded. Count accurate as of 12 January 2018. The Alberta Heritage Survey can be accessed at https://hermis.alberta.ca/arhp/default.aspx?DeptID=2.
The four structures are the Chinese Freemasons Building (Lethbridge, Provincial Historic Resource); the Puffer-Chung Block (Lacombe, Municipal Historic Resource); the Bow On Tong Building (Lethbridge, Municipal Historic Resource); and the Manie Opera Society Building (Lethbridge, Municipal Historic Resource).
The Historic Resources Management Branch of Alberta Culture and Tourism is charged with the responsibility of protecting, preserving and documenting historic resources that reflect the rich and diverse history of the province. Branch staff work with property owners to encourage the long-term conservation of historic structures in alignment with best practices in the heritage field.
Alberta Heritage Survey, Form HS 9643. According to the Heritage Survey form (completed in 2003), Quon Sang Lung was granted a construction permit in December 1907. The Canadian Inventory of Historic Buildings (1973) recorded the date of construction as 1895, but it is not clear on what basis that date was chosen. Similarly, the Town of Fort Macleod accepted 1895 as the construction date when evaluating buildings for the town’s Provincial Historic Area (established in 1984). It is possible that the structure was built in 1895—which would elevate its significance considerably—but the strongest evidence points to late 1907 or early 1908.
Quon Sang Lung was granted a permit to add a washroom to his building in 1913.
The opening of the business was announced in the Macleod Advertiser on 30 March 1911; advertisements for the B.C. Café appeared in the Macleod Advertiser on 22 June 1911; 20 August 1912; and 25 December 1913; and the Quon Sang Lung Co. was listed in the Henderson’s Alberta Gazetteer and Directory for 1911 (p. 644) and 1914 (p. 801).
Macleod Spectator, 7 September 1916. Though spelled differently, “Quon Sang Lung” and “Quong Sang Lung” is certainly the same person. There was no standardized system for romanizing Cantonese names in the early twentieth century, which often resulted in multiple renderings of the same name. It was also not unknown for Chinese immigrants to slightly alter their names after arrival in Canada. Finally, Anglophones who were responsible for transcribing Chinese names into official government documents like the census often made errors due to their lack of understanding of Chinese naming conventions. For an outstanding summary and explanation of this issue, see the Vancouver Public Library’s Chinese-Canadian Genealogy Guide at http://guides.vpl.ca/ccg/chinese_names (accessed 11 January 2018).
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Archival Sources:
Census of Canada (1901, 1911, 1921, 1941, 1971)
Henderson’s Alberta Gazetteer and Directory (1911, 1914)
Macleod Advertiser (1911–1913)
Macleod Gazette (1897–1901)
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Dawson, P., Farrokhi, A., Rowe, A. et al. Digital preservation, social history, and the Quon Sang Lung Laundry building: a case study from Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada. Appl Geomat 10, 361–375 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12518-018-0232-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12518-018-0232-4