Sidney Y. Chan
Sidney Y. Chan passed away peacefully at age 81 on October 2, 2017, in San Francisco, CA, after a brief illness.
Sidney was born in Guangzhou, China on December 30, 1935, the first of nine children born to Stanley and Darm Hor Chan. He and his mother left China to live in Hong Kong during the Japanese occupation during World War II until their immigration to the U.S. in 1947, when they reunited with Sidney’s father who had come to San Francisco in 1930 to establish a Chinese imports and real estate business.
A graduate of San Francisco’s Francisco Middle School and Polytechnic High School, Sidney spent his childhood and young adult years working in the family business; reading comic books; acting in productions of the Chung Lau Drama Club, of which he was the founder; honing his lifelong interests in Chinese and American history and politics; and following his favorite sports teams, the San Francisco Giants and San Francisco 49ers. He attended the University of California at Berkeley for three and a half years, ultimately completing his Bachelor of Arts degree in Business at the University of Maryland in 1962. Sidney worked as an accountant for the Internal Revenue Service and firms Richard Bibero & Associates and Miller Fleming & Associates. After earning his license as a Certified Public Accountant, he operated his private accounting practice for 36 years. He continued to practice part-time up to the time of his death.
Sidney was a proud American who believed in giving back to the country, city, and Chinese community that he loved so much. He became a naturalized United States citizen in 1959 and served in the U.S. Army from 1960 to 1963, training at Fort Ord in Monterey and serving in the Army Chemical Corps while stationed in Maryland and in the Eighth United States Army in Seoul, Korea. He was active in San Francisco City government during the administrations of Mayors Art Agnos, Frank Jordan, and Willie Brown, serving terms as a Recreation and Park Department Commissioner and San Francisco Police Commissioner. He served for seven years on the Police Commission and is the longest-serving police commissioner of Chinese descent in City history. He was selected as a delegate to the 1988 Republican National Convention in New Orleans and was also a member of the Advisory Committee for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., during the George H.W. Bush administration.
A leader in the San Francisco Chinese community for more than 40 years, Sidney served as president of the San Francisco Chinese Chamber of Commerce over multiple terms, as president of the Sam Yup Benevolent Association, and as president of the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association. For decades, he was an active volunteer on the Miss Chinatown USA Pageant committee, including serving as chairperson of the pageant and as pageant master of ceremony. He also led goodwill delegations of pageant winners to Asia.
As he got older, Sidney’s intellect and creativity didn’t slow down, rather they continued to sharpen and bloom. In 2015, he published his first Chinese historical fiction book, Lord of Ten Thousand Years: The Paper Dragon. He published his second book, Song of Yuan Yuan: Drama of 1644, this year and was writing his third book at the time of his death.
Sidney will be best remembered by friends and family for his ready smile, generosity, dapper dress, and as a loving and fun-loving husband, father, grandfather, brother, and friend. In 1959, Sidney married Tamara Lee, whom he met in middle school. Together they raised two daughters, Dorena and Cristina. Sidney loved spending time with his family, especially his grandchildren, his large extended family, and his always expanding circle of friends. To know Sidney – whether you knew him as Sidney, Sid, Uncle Sidney, or Mr. Chan – was to be his friend.
Sidney is survived by his wife of 57 years, Tamara; his daughters and sons-in-law, Dorena Chan and Michael Chin, and Cristina Chan and Marc Infield; grandsons Alexander and Julian Infield; siblings Corinne Dare (Bert), Serene Chan Chua, Elaine Chan, Paul Chan (Patricia), Dickson Chan (Chitra), Noreen (Harlan), Eison Chan (Iris), and Maylene Chan; sisters-in-law Rose Chan (Albert), Jane Leong, Marion Chan (Robert), Elizabeth Lew (David); aunt Tam Ping Chang; and numerous cousins, nieces and nephews, and grandnieces and grandnephews.
A memorial for Sidney will take place on Thursday, October 19, at 11 a.m. at Grace Cathedral, 1100 California Street at Taylor Street. Donations in his memory may be made to Cathedral School for Boys or the Grace Cathedral Choir of Men and Boys. (Donations to the choir should be made out to Grace Cathedral with “Choir of Men and Boys” in the notes section.)