Chinese Sunday School in Birmingham, Alabama, 1903

 

   This 1903 newspaper account of the Chinese in Birmingham, Alabama, caught my attention for several reasons. It showed that despite the harsh and discriminatory treatment of Chinese across the country in 1903 that began decades earlier and continued for many subsequent decades, there were efforts by Christian churches, even in the Deep South, to convert these "heathens" to Christianity through Sunday School classes.

    The Second Presbyterian Church provided 15 teachers for  15 Chinese students of unspecified ages.  It was felt that the 1:1 ratio would expedite their acquisition of English.  That might be a valid point but, I was surprised that there were as many as 15 Chinese children in Birmingham at all!  The 1900 census showed only 5 Chinese, all adult males, and the 1910 census showed only 10 Chinese adult males. No women or children were listed in either census. This discrepancy probably is due to poor enumeration that failed to record any Chinese children, or women, if there were any.

   The pastor cited the importance of this outreach "because the Chinese are subject to many temptations peculiar to American cities." He did not cite specific temptations but implied that Sunday School experiences would protect them. As an aside, he did not seem to recognize how effectively Chinese parents discipline their children to behave.

    A final argument by the pastor for the value of Sunday School experiences for Chinese children was that when they retire and return to China, they may play a role in the evangelical goal of spreading the Gospel in China. 

     The evangelical mission in Birmingham was by no means an isolated one, but one that could be found increasingly in towns, large and small, across the country by 1900.