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TRANSLATION BY DIANA HONG
INTRODUCTORY NOTE BY HIM MARK LAI
Extracts from "Yige ren chuangban liao Shidai Bao" ...[Single-handedly founded San Francisco Journal], chapter 6 of Xiong Guohua, Meiji Huaren Huang Yunji zhuanqi: Meiguo meng [An American dream: The life and times of Huang Yunji (Maurice H. Chuck), Chinese American] (Guangzhou: Huacheng Chubanshe, 2002) ...
Huang Yunji (Maurice H. Chuck) was born in 1932 in Doumen in Guangdong's Pearl River Delta. His father emigrated to California, leaving his family in the village. The year the Sino-Japanese War began, his wife passed away, leaving young Huang Yunji and his sister in the care of their uncle, who was a poor peasant. Huang Yunji's father returned to China after the war and in 1948 brought his sixteen-year-old son to California.1
Due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, which from 1882 to 1943 allowed only certain categories of Chinese immigrants to enter the United States, Huang Yunji?fs father had entered the country by assuming the identity of a Chinese American surnamed Chuck. Thus in America Huang Yunji became Chuck Joong Mun ..., or Maurice H. Chuck, son of an American citizen.2
Shortly after young Chuck landed, he became a frequent visitor to the Oasis Bookstore ..., which sold Chinese literature, including many works of a progressive nature. The proprietor allowed Chuck, who had had only four years of formal education in China, to browse in the store. New friends he met there induced introduced him to join the Chinese American Democratic Youth League ..., a progressive cultural youth group. These contacts inspired Chuck to become interested in progressive Chinese culture, especially in literature. Chuck soon also began his long association with Chinese American journalism, working as Chinese typesetter at the Chinese Pacific Weekly ... and then Chung Sai Yat Po .... Through these contacts and self-study Chuck expanded his knowledge of Chinese history and culture and improved his literary writing style. He also began to submit his writings to publications such as China Daily News ... of New York.3
Soon after he was inducted into the army in 1953, army intelligence discovered his writings, which were sympathetic to the PRC and expressed opposition to the Korean conflict. In 1955 he was given an...