09/21/2026
CHINESE PIONEERING ROLE IN DELTA AGRICULTURE
Until World War I, 60% of the immigrants to American came from Taishan (Toisan) county. One of 98 counties in Guangdong Province, it was economically impoverished. Its residents worked as peddlers, shopkeepers and merchants; they did odd jobs as carpenters and fish farmers; they grew rice, vegetables, potatoes and raised chickens and pigs.
Once in the US, they owned and operated laundries, restaurants and mall retail shops and grocery stores. Another area that contributed immigrants was Heungshan District which means “fragrant mountain” , a lowland area supported by the fertile soil of the Pearl River delta region. Heungshan people lived in relative strong economic area growing mulberries, silkworms, fishponds and fruit trees.
While waves of Chinese from Toishan district came to California for gold, it was the Chinese from Heungshan District who entered agriculture, growing primarily Bartlett pears in the rich earth of the Sacramento River Delta and later in other places as Lake County, San Joaquin, Santa Clara and Solano Counties where the proper growing conditions would support plantings of various fruit trees brought from China.
The Heungshan Chinese, who had thousands of years of experience in growing fruits, were a natural here in California. Bartlett pears was the primary fruit tree crop in each of these counties. Before his passing in 2007, Lincoln Chan represented the epitome of the Chinese farmer who made his fortune in pears. He was born to pear farmers on Abraham Lincoln's birthday in 1919, thus his first name Lincoln. He had the depth of knowledge and expertise to act as an adviser to growers here and abroad. He once was asked by the Chinese government to advise them on pear production. Lincoln had the knowledge to grow, harvest, size and pack pears, as well as, transport and warehouse pears. Bartletts are picked green and firm so they survive packing and shipping without bruising.
The land in the Pearl River delta was bountiful with rich soil and various fruits and nuts. Hot days and cool nights along the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers give Delta Bartletts their sweet and juicy flavor. Persimmon, lychee, loquat, and kumquat along with pears would were the natural domain of Chinese of this southern China locale.
The development of the levee system created the Sacramento River delta which approximates closely many similarities of the Pearl River delta; these same fruits were grown, nurtured, and raised by Heungshan Chinese. All along the delta, towns such as Hood, Courtland, Vorden, Walnut Grove, Isleton, and the last town Locke in 1912, became enclaves for Chinese from Heungshan, as well as Toishan.
Locke was the only fully populated Chinese town in America. In each of the towns the Chinese of the two districts Toishan and Heungshan had the proclivity to separate. They tended to settle where there were compatriots, united by a common dialect. District and clan associations were vital to help assimilate these reluctant sojourners in a new world.
Wary of being able to survive thousands of miles away from their home village, they relied on the aid of fellow villagers abroad. Lucille Chan Searle, a native of Isleton, said that along Main Street, the Toishan and Heungshan Chinese lived in buildings holding businesses and residences on separates sides of the street.
The division in lifestyle in Walnut Grove resulted in the Huengshan Chinese relocating to Lockeport after the fire in Chinatown on October 7th, 1915, and creation of a new subdivision along Main Street, adding to the eight buildings already there on Levee Street in Lockeport. Later the name was shortened to Locke or “Lockee” as spoken by Heungshan Chinese. Many Heungshan were tenant farmers on ranches throughout the Delta, and Bartlett pear production was a very tangible asset. They understood the nature of fruit trees, the procedures in tending them, and the meaning, in the case of pear trees, of having to spend a lifetime nurturing a young pear sapling to full maturity when it produces its best fruit.
The Chinese have played a pioneering role in the development of the pear industry in California. The most famous native son, Dr. Sun Yat-sen, father of modern China and a trained physician, was born in Heungshan District. Educated in China, Hong Kong and Hawaii, he came to the Sacramento Delta in 1900’s to raise funds from his compatriots for the revolution to overthrow the Qing monarchy. Heungshan was changed to Zhongshan in 1925 after Dr. Sun’s death. Others include Yung Wing, first Chinese to graduate from Yale in 1854 and Joe Shoong, founder of National Dollar Stores and namesake of the Joe Shoong Chinese School, located on Main Street Locke
Reprinted from the Locke Foundation Newsletter
https://www.locke-foundation.org/
