AANHPI History Calendar

· San Pedro, California

Yuri Kochiyama Born

resistance

Yuri Kochiyama, born this day, survived WWII incarceration and became a leading advocate of Black-Asian solidarity and human rights-working alongside Malcolm X and helping found Asian Americans for Action. (Anchored on her birth anniversary; shares May 19 with the California Alien Land Law.)

Communities
  • Japanese American
Topics
  • solidarity
  • incarceration
Event type
  • birth
Identity lens
  • women

Sources

Also on May 19

achievement

Tye Leung Schulze, First Chinese American Woman to Vote

Tye Leung Schulze cast a ballot in San Francisco as the first Chinese American woman to vote in the United States, months after California granted women suffrage; she was also the first Chinese American woman to hold a US civil-service job. (Shares May 19 with the California Alien Land Law and Yuri Kochiyama's birth.)

injustice

California Alien Land Law Signed

Gov. Hiram Johnson signed the Webb-Haney Act, barring 'aliens ineligible for citizenship'-chiefly Asian immigrants-from owning agricultural land. (Assembly passed it May 3, the date EJI uses; sources give the signing as May 19 or May 20.)