Households of the Overseas Chinese in Aurora, Nevada

Summary

Chinese immigrants in Aurora, Nevada were an integral part of the boomtown community. They thrived from the town’s founding in 1861 until its final mining bust in the 1920s despite the racially charged overtones of the late nineteenth-century. Examination of the Chinese community at the household level, combining historical records and documentation with information gathered during recent archaeological surveys and excavations permits a nuanced understanding of the lives, occupations, consumption habits, and residential patterns of Aurora’s Chinese population. This paper will trace what is known about the town’s earliest Chinese occupants through the study of their households. This research contributes to the knowledge base of Chinese immigrants in mining towns and allows comparisons to be made with other populations across the Western United States.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Tearing Down Walls: The Architecture of Household Archaeology   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2013

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 245