Primary Name: Choy, Joe Ching
Filed as: choy_joe_ching
Also known as: China Joe; Joe the Baker; As Hie; Chew Chung Thui; Hi Chung; Lee Hing; Ting Tu Wee; Chung Thui
Occupation / Association: Baker; Merchant; Charter Member, Juneau Men's Igloo; Member, '87 Alaska Pioneers Association
Born: 1834, China
Died: 1917, Juneau, Alaska
Parents:
Spouse:
Children:
Associated places: China; Victoria, British Columbia; Boise, Idaho; Dease Lake, British Columbia; Wrangell, Alaska; Sitka, Alaska; Juneau, Alaska
Keywords: Joe Ching Choy, China Joe, Joe the Baker, Choy Joe Ching, Juneau bakery pioneer
Biography
Joe Ching Choy (1834–1917), known to most as “China Joe” or “Joe the Baker,” was a charter member of the Juneau Men's Igloo.
His Chinese name is not recorded consistently and appears in various historical sources as As Hie in Juneau in 1881, Chew Chung Thui, Hi Chung in Juneau newspapers of 1892 and 1894, and Lee Hing upon joining the “87” Alaska Pioneers Association. He also appears as Ting Tu Wee or Chung Thui when registering under the Chinese Registration Act of 1899, and as Joe Ching Choy when joining the Pioneers of Alaska Men’s Igloo No. 6.
Joe immigrated from China to Victoria, British Columbia, in 1864. Later that same year, he moved to a mining camp in Boise, Idaho.
In 1874, he followed the gold rush back to British Columbia and established a bakery and general store around Dease Lake. He became known for fair prices, particularly around 1875 when the Stikine River froze and created a severe food shortage in the Yukon. Joe possessed the only supply of flour.
Rather than take advantage of the situation for profit, he rationed his flour to the miners according to their needs, asking only that he be repaid when the shortage ended.
In 1879, Joe moved to Wrangell, where he purchased the abandoned steam liner Hope and converted its hull into a restaurant and bakery while renting out the staterooms. The business prospered for about a year until Wrangell began to decline. Joe then moved to Sitka, where he operated another bakery.
He arrived in Juneau, then known as Rockwell, in 1881. There, he purchased half of a town lot at the corner of Third Street and Main Street for $60 and opened a bakery where he lived and worked for the next thirty-six years.
In May 1882, the United States government passed the Chinese Exclusion Act. The persecution and violence that followed drove many Chinese people from towns and cities across America.
Anti-Chinese sentiment reached a boiling point in Juneau on August 6, 1886. On that day, all Chinese residents were rounded up at gunpoint and placed aboard two schooners to be sent south. When the mob came for Joe, however, they found his bakery surrounded by armed men whose lives he had saved during the Cassiar food shortage. Those men stood guard with loaded rifles, and Joe remained.
He became the only person of Chinese descent allowed to remain in Juneau and eventually one of the town’s leading citizens. Joe later became a charter member of the “87” Alaska Pioneers Association and the Pioneers of Alaska Men’s Igloo No. 6.
Joe Ching Choy died of heart failure in 1917 and was buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Juneau, Alaska.
Sources
Wikipedia; Mark Whitman, 2011; Alaska Digital Archives ASL-P297-118
Tags: Joe Ching Choy, China Joe, Joe the Baker, Juneau Men's Igloo, Alaska Chinese pioneers, Juneau Alaska pioneers