YUCHO CHOW CHINATOWN THROUGH A WIDE LENS

Sometimes a photo can change the course of your life. This story of family photo albums launched me into an eight-year journey to uncover the story of one man. In searching for the story of one, I found the story of many.

I FIRST SET EYES

on a Yucho Chow Studio portrait in 2011 while interviewing aging Chinese-canadian World War II veterans. As we flipped through their old photo albums and talked about their memories, my eyes were drawn to remarkable studio portraits appearing in various family collections, covering several decades and often bearing a beautiful silver seal with the name “Yucho Chow.”

An online search yielded little information on the photographer. There were only a smattering of his works identified in public archives. There were certainly no images of him to be found.

I discovered that Yucho Chow was Vancouver’s first and most prolific Chinese photographer. He operated a studio in the heart of Chinatown from 1907 to 1949 and chronicled life during a tumultuous and transformative period in the city’s, and country’s, history. His studio survived World War I, the Spanish Flu, the Great Depression, and World War II. His business flourished despite attitudes and legislation that targeted and discriminated against Chinese residents.

When Yucho died in late 1949, his two sons took over the business until they retired in 1986. As they closed the studio doors for the last time, neither imagined there was any interest in the thousands of negatives that filled their shelves. Five truckloads of history were carted off to the dump.

It dawned on me that the photos that still existed, were squirrelled away in hundreds of dusty boxes and aging family albums. Yucho’s work was everywhere, yet nowhere.

I felt sad knowing that this man recorded so many people and so much history, and yet his own story was fading and largely forgotten. I wanted to find Yucho’s “hidden” photos and piece together his story. I had no idea how big and remarkable his story would be.

Initially, I believed Yucho photographed only Chinese people. But over the years of locating his images — one photo at a time, one family at a time — I discovered that Yucho Chow Studio was the place where many

early, marginalized communities in Vancouver went for their photos. It was the one studio that opened its doors to everyone, regardless of their skin colour, religion, language, or income.

For many immigrant communities living in Vancouver in the first half of the 1900s, it was a struggle to find businesses willing to serve them. Early Sikh immigrants, for example, could not find a white tailor to make them a suit, nor a white barber to cut their hair. And no white photographer was willing to take their photos. They became regular customers of Yucho Chow Studio, whose slogan was “Rain or Shine. Anything. Anywhere. Anytime.” The relationship grew and Yucho became the chief visual chronicler of the early Sikh community. He was even invited into their temples to photograph.

The Black community in Vancouver, comprised mainly of African-americans who had immigrated to Canada, also found a welcoming place in Yucho’s studio. As did Indigenous residents, mixed-race families, and Eastern European immigrants.

Sadly, photos from these first immigrant communities are still rare in public archives: their histories hidden away and mostly forgotten. Consequently, each photo I found was something to celebrate, as these images started to fill in gaps in the public record.

The photographs offered more than simply a visual record of the past. What brought each image to life, what made it intriguing, was the story connected to it. When families showed me a photo, frequently they would recall some memorable detail about someone in the image. Each photo became a conduit for the story of a life.

It took me over eight years to identify 200 of Yucho’s photos. I began to recognize the distinctive painted canvas backdrops he used during different periods, as well as the various chairs, rugs, and props that came and went over the years.

In May 2019, I curated the first solo retrospective exhibition of Yucho’s work. The publicity from the show generated more photos and stories, and today the collection stands at almost 500 images. A selection of these photos was published in a book, and all the scanned images are being catalogued to become part of a comprehensive, publicly available Yucho Chow Digital Community Archive.

Searching for Yucho’s hidden photos was like pulling on a single thread attached to a beautiful and complex tapestry of images of diverse communities. His images have unlocked stories of hundreds of people who struggled and made Canada their home. The photos are witnesses to a larger story of acceptance, openness, and mutual support among those who were once treated as second-class citizens.

What becomes most evident when seeing these images together is that no matter what part of the world someone came from, what language they spoke, what religion they practiced, how much money they earned, or the colour of their skin, all shared, essentially, the same aspirations, needs, and fears … and the desire to record their lives for posterity in a photograph.

Catherine Clement is a community history curator and designer based in Vancouver’s Chinatown.

ABOVE: Ishar Singh Gill, a Sikh, was known by several names, but in government documents, he was simply referred to as Hindo #10. He ran a wood delivery business and was accompanied everywhere by his beloved dog King. Ever since then, every dog owned by the Gill family has been named King. (c. 1918)

LEFT: Yucho Chow, enjoying his customary cigar, in front of his most recognized art deco backdrop. The photographer immigrated to Canada in 1902 and opened his first commercial studio in 1907. He died suddenly in late 1949, around the time that small, inexpensive consumer cameras became popular. (c. 1945)

Janki Shori was one of a small number of South Asian (Hindu) women living in Vancouver. Although she endured a tumultuous marriage to a nightclub owner with a gambling problem, her spirits were never broken. Later in life, she helped introduce North American audiences to Bollywood films. She paid extra to have this photo hand painted. (c. 1934)

ABOVE: Even during the Great Depression, when money was scarce, photographs were important. Sometimes, as with this photo of Tommy Ming Lum, they were used to show relatives back home that all was well in the new country. In reality, it was common for the sitter to borrow a suit from a friend and accessories, such as a pocket watch or fountain pen from Yucho Chow, to help to create the perception of success. (c. 1930) RIGHT: The Mcfadden family derived their surname from their former American slave owner. Their son Charles (right), recalled he always felt welcome in Vancouver’s Chinatown, but struggled in other parts of the city to rent an apartment due to his skin colour. (c. 1937)

LEFT: Canada’s 1923 Chinese Exclusion Act essentially blocked all immigration from China for almost 25 years. Consequently, Chinese families were separated and turned to photographs to bridge the physical distance between themselves and their loved ones. In this photo, Yucho Chow deployed pre-photoshop techniques to combine into one image the father and son (photographed in Vancouver) with a picture of mother and child, shot in China. At last, this family was reunited … if only in a photograph. (c. 1925)

A limited-edition, coffee table book features 344-pages of long-hidden photographs by Yucho Chow Studio. These private images showcase the people Yucho Chow chronicled in his lifetime, and the remarkable stories that accompany these photographs. (Available in English and Chinese.)