Museum of Chinese in America

The Museum of Chinese in America began in nineteen eighty not as a grand institution, but as a grassroots effort called the New York Chinatown History Project. Founders John Kuo Wei Tchen and Charles Lai recognized that the history of Chinese immigrants was being lost as older generations passed away and family artifacts were discarded. They conducted what they called salvage expeditions, searching through basements and dumpsters in Chinatown to rescue documents, photographs, and personal memorabilia that would otherwise have vanished forever.