A guided walk through Old Pasadena on February 8 will confront stories long sanitized from the city’s history, including a racist mob attack that led to the expulsion of all Chinese residents from Pasadena’s commercial district.
On November 6, 1885, white itinerant workers threw stones through the windows of Yuen Kee’s laundry at Fair Oaks and Green Street, upending a kerosene lamp and igniting a fire.
“There was violence committed, people were assaulted, Chinese were assaulted with bricks, with sticks and branches and other objects,” historian Matt Hormann explained in a January 9, 2024 statement.
“And finally the local sheriff had to come and intervene by drawing his pistol on the crowd.”
The mob chanted “Lynch the Chinks!” and demanded every Chinese resident leave that night.
The next morning, Hormann discovered, “the city fathers met in a notary public office and they drafted an ordinance banishing the Chinese from the central part of the City.”
Until recently, the historical plaque at Mills Place Alley made no mention of the mob attack.
On January 9, 2024, exactly 138 years later, the city unveiled new plaques acknowledging the violence.
Pasadena City Councilmember Gene Masuda stated: “The mistreatment of Chinese Americans that led people to burn down the Yuen Kee laundry and to run the Chinese out of Pasadena is a disgraceful truth.”
The Historic Old Pasadena Walking Tour will also explore Dayton Street’s Black business community, including the Francisca Building and Friendship Pasadena Church, the first African American Baptist Church in Pasadena, founded in 1893.
The Historic Old Pasadena Walking Tour is scheduled for the morning of Feb. 8 in Central Park at the corner of Dayton Street and Raymond Avenue in Pasadena; attendees are advised to check pasadenaheritage.org for the exact time.
Historic Old Pasadena Walking Tour will run on Sunday, Feb. 8 at 10 a.m.-11:30 a.m. Central Park at the corner of Dayton Street and Raymond Avenue, Pasadena. For more information, call (626) 441-6333 or visit https://www.pasadenaheritage.org/events-tours/historic-old-pasadena-walking-tour. Ticket prices: $25; $20 members.
