The state of Texas is known for its diverse population, and one of the largest communities within it is the Asian American population. According to the U.S. census, Texas has the third-largest Asian American population in the country, with Chinese Americans making up the largest group. Many Chinese Americans have been living in Texas for generations, and their stories are just as intertwined with America’s history as their counterparts in California or New York City. While their stories may not be as well known, the Houston Asian American Archive (HAAA) at Rice University is working to preserve and share them with new generations.
Founded in 2009, the HAAA is a crucial window to the past, containing the oral histories of over 500 people in its database. Co-founder and program manager, Anne Chao, believes that oral history provides a sense of immediacy and informality, making it a valuable tool for understanding the past. The archive also houses memorabilia and artifacts from Asian Americans in Houston, a city known for its oil and gas industry and NASA’s Johnson Space Center.
One prominent Chinese American who found success in Houston during the 1960s and ’70s was Albert Gee. He was considered the unofficial mayor of the Chinese community and often appeared in society pages alongside Hollywood celebrities. Gee’s daughter, Linda Wu, shares that her father’s journey to success was not an easy one. Born in Detroit, Michigan, in 1920, Gee’s family moved to New Orleans, where they operated a laundry business. After his father’s death, Gee’s mother, who did not speak English, took her children back to China, hoping they would return to the U.S. one by one. Gee found himself back in the U.S. at the age of 11, working hard to send money back to his mother. Eventually, he ended up in Houston, where he opened grocery stores and restaurants that became popular among Hollywood celebrities.
Wu also shares that her parents never forgot their roots and always saw themselves as Americans. Her mother, Jane Eng, was born and raised in Texas, and the family often welcomed newcomers, helping them establish their roots in the city. This assistance from established Chinese Americans helped fuel the growth of the Gee family surname in Houston. However, not all the Gees in Houston were related, as stories about some of the city’s Gees can be found in the HAAA database and the 1998 anthology, “The Gees in Houston, Texas.”
Rogene Gee Calvert, who contributed stories about her father, David Gee, to the anthology, shares that the Gee family can trace their roots back to three to four villages in China. David Gee migrated to the U.S. in the late 1920s during the Chinese Exclusion Act, which allowed Chinese merchants, diplomats, and students into the country but banned laborers. He was a “paper son,” a term used for people who bought false papers to enter the U.S. during this time. Casey Dexter-Lee, an educator at Angel Island State Park, explains that these false papers cost around $100 for each year of life claimed, making it a costly and risky process. After arriving in the U.S., David Gee was detained at the Angel Island Immigration Station for almost a year before receiving permission to stay. He eventually settled in Houston, where he worked in the grocery business.
Calvert also shares that the Chinese Texans occupied a gray area under the Jim Crow laws, which were in place in Texas and other Southern states during this time. Being neither Black nor white, they were often dependent on how well the neighborhood or people accepted them. Ted Gong, senior adviser to the Chinese American Museum in Washington, explains that the Chinese Americans in Houston were just in between and relied on the support of elders who were well-respected in the mainstream community. Albert Gee, as the president of the Houston Restaurant Association, played a crucial role in the desegregation of the city’s restaurants in the early 1960s.
Decades later, Gee’s work in the community was immortalized in a web comic for Texas students in 2023. The comic is part of a free website called Adventures of Asia, developed by Asia Society Texas, in collaboration with HAAA. The website also includes lesson guides for teachers called Asia in the Classroom. Jennifer Kapral, director of education and outreach at Asia Society Texas Center, shares that their Asian American students expressed a desire to see themselves represented in
