Chinese Community
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The Chinese community is the largest Asian ethnic community in Colorado, with over 41,000 based on recent census information. Chinese are the oldest established Asian group to immigrate to Colorado; brought to work the mines and build the railroads.
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First incidence of racism in 1874 when white miners physically forced 160 Chinese miners from their claims and out of Nederland.
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Denver’s Anti-Chinese riot on Halloween 1880 destroyed Hop Alley businesses and residences, attacked Chinese and hanged Look Young, one of the 238 Chinese living in Denver. Not one of the 3,000 rioters were punished. This is one of 153 Anti-Chinese riots that occurred in the West in the 1870s and 1880s.
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Anti-Chinese sentiment in the West resulted in easy passage of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, the first immigration law targeting Asians.
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A stained-glass portrait of the first Mayor of Chinatown, Chin Lin Sou, hangs in the Colorado State Capitol.
