{"id":9030,"date":"2015-05-28T15:08:05","date_gmt":"2015-05-28T15:08:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/?p=9030"},"modified":"2015-06-11T19:01:29","modified_gmt":"2015-06-11T19:01:29","slug":"apaeverywhere-preserving-asian-and-pacific-islander-american-places-that-matter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/apaeverywhere-preserving-asian-and-pacific-islander-american-places-that-matter\/","title":{"rendered":"#APAEverywhere: Preserving Asian and Pacific Islander American Places That Matter"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is a guest post by Michelle Magalong, Chair of Asian and Pacific Islander Americans in Historic Preservation<\/a>, in honor of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. One of the #APAEverywhere challenges is to create a “tour” of Asian Pacific American sites and here Michelle shares a tour of some Asian Pacific American Heritage Sites that influenced her. You can create your own tour and share it here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

At the National Preservation Conference in 2007, three Asian and Pacific Islander Americans (APIAs) realized that, though there was much APIA community-based preservation work across the nation, they were the only APIAs in the room. They convened a steering committee of preservationists to develop the National APIA Historic Preservation Forum and\u00a0Asian and Pacific Islander Americans in Historic Preservation (APIAHiP)<\/span><\/a>\u00a0was born. In 2012, I became involved with the local planning committee for the APIAHiP National Forum, and became chair in 2012. In 2014, we launched\u00a0East at Main Street<\/span><\/a>, a collaboration with\u00a0Historypin<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>to\u00a0<\/span>gather \u201cpins\u201d of sites reflecting the historical and cultural contributions of APIAs.<\/span><\/p>\n

May is a particularly busy time for us at APIAHiP as it is both Asian Pacific American Heritage Month\u00a0and\u00a0<\/i>Preservation month. In commemoration of both, we launched \u201c31 Days of 31 APIA Historic Sites.<\/span><\/a>\u201d Every day, we share a place pinned in East at Main Street representing APIA communities across the nation and in US territories.<\/span><\/p>\n

Every pin has a story. I would like to highlight a few \u201cpins\u201d that have shaped my work and commitment in advocating and preserving historic sites and resources in APIA communities.<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Historic Filipinotown, Los Angeles<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"(Michelle<\/a>

Michelle Magalong holds a photo of herself and Royal “Uncle Roy” Morales” in Historic Filipinotown. (Michelle Magalong)<\/p><\/div>\n

As a college student, I interned at Search to Involve Pilipino Americans (SIPA) in Los Angeles. One day,\u00a0Royal \u201cUncle Roy\u201d Morales took us on a tour of the neighborhood<\/span>, sharing his story of immigration, family, and community. Uncle Roy dreamed of building a sign recognizing the historical and cultural contributions of Filipino Americans in the Temple-Beverly neighborhood near downtown Los Angeles. Since the 1960s, the neighborhood has served as a major port of entry for Filipino immigrants and houses Filipino American cultural institutions.<\/p>\n

By the time I returned to Los Angeles to attend graduate school at UCLA, Uncle Roy had passed away, his dream unfulfilled. Several community stakeholders, including myself, advocated to make his dream a reality and \u201cHistoric Filipinotown\u201d was designated in 2002.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Little Manila, Stockton<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Soon after the successful designation of \u201cHistoric Filipinotown\u201d in Los Angeles, I was invited by\u00a0Little Manila Foundation<\/span><\/a>\u00a0to help save the last three remaining buildings of\u00a0Little Manila in Stockton<\/span>, California. In the 1920s and 30s, downtown Stockton\u2019s Little Manila was the heart of Filipino America. These buildings were threatened with demolition for a large-scale development project. We created a grassroots action plan to engage local stakeholders while developing a national advocacy campaign to save these buildings. Overwhelming support came from Filipino Americans (and APIAs) across the nation, as well as preservation organizations (including the\u00a0National Trust for Historic Preservation<\/span><\/a>).<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Little Tokyo, Los Angeles<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"(Library<\/a>

In the early 1900s, Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo became home to many Japanese immigrants. Before World War II and the forced removal of people of Japanese ancestry,\u00a030,000 Japanese Americans were living in Little Tokyo.\u00a0(Library of Congress\/Russell Lee)<\/p><\/div>\n

Soon after the success in Little Manila, I was back in Los Angeles working with stakeholders in Little Tokyo. Through California Senate Bill 307, I assisted the\u00a0Little Tokyo Community Council<\/span><\/a>\u00a0in the California Japantown Preservation Pilot Program to identify challenges to historic preservation in Japanese American neighborhoods. As a result of this yearlong process, we redefined cultural preservation for Little Tokyo, broadening the scope of preservation to be more inclusive of the various factors that shape the physical and cultural landscape of ethnic neighborhoods.<\/span><\/p>\n

4. Lujan House, Guam<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Lugan<\/a>

The Lujan House is one of the few houses in Agana, Guam, surviving from before World War II. (CC BY 2.0<\/a> Guampedia\/Nathalie Pereda<\/a>)<\/p><\/div>\n

Five years ago, I traveled to Guam for the first time and fell in love. It wasn\u2019t just the warm hospitality and great food that sold me \u2013 it was the extensive educational and interpretation resources I found about the history of Guam from the indigenous contributions to the legacy of U.S. military. On a following trip, I met preservation leaders integral to this work at the\u00a0Guam Preservation Trust<\/span><\/a>. Their offices are located at the\u00a0historic Lujan House<\/span>, one of few houses in Agana surviving from before World War II. I was inspired by their commitment to preserving and advocating the Chamorro history and culture.<\/span><\/p>\n

5. Iosepa, Utah<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

A marker for Iosepa Settlement Cemetery in Utah commemorates the Mormon Native Hawaiians who came to Utah. (HMdb.org<\/a>\/Dawn Bowen<\/a>)<\/p><\/div>\n

Earlier this month, I attended the\u00a0White House Summit on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders<\/span><\/a>. It was a packed house \u2013 we were walking shoulder to shoulder through the aisles to get to our seats. I was standing next to a gentleman in traditional Samoan attire who told me his name was Jacob Fitisemanu, Jr. and he was from Utah. He had been newly appointed to the President\u2019s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Jake is working to preserve the\u00a0Iosepa Polynesian Archaelogical District<\/span><\/a>. Iosepa was established in Tooele County’s Skull Valley in 1889 as a community for Hawaiian members of the Mormon faith who wished to immigrate to Utah to be close to the temples and headquarters of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Iosepa exemplifies the diversity of our APIA histories and communities.<\/span><\/p>\n

What places inspire you? I challenge you to pin your story on our \u201cEast at Main Street\u201d project! Complete the #APAEverywhere challenge here<\/a>.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Michelle Magalong of APIAHiP writes about heritage sites that have influenced her for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month and Preservation Month. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9082,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[267,265,140,270,264,263,268,266,269,254],"class_list":["post-9030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-apa-everywhere","tag-guam","tag-historic-filipinotown","tag-historic-preservation","tag-iosepa","tag-little-manila","tag-little-tokyo","tag-los-angeles","tag-lujan-house","tag-stockton","tag-utah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9030"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9030"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9030\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9087,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9030\/revisions\/9087"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/now\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}