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PAPER SON ONE MAN ‘S STORY BY TUNG POK CHIN WITH WINIFRED C.CHIN
BOOK REVIEW
AAMS2300-Introduction to Asian American Studies
September 19, 2020
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I have read and understood the life events that Tung Pok Chin with Winifred C. Chin goes over
in Paper Son: One Man’s story. I will summarize the sections of this book as it goes over Tung
Pok’s story about adopting a new identity by migrating to the United States of America. The
memoirs were written to commemorate Tung Chin’s past and how he had to falsify his identity,
so it would not lead to a paper trail of his past. His life went from being in an eastern cultural
standpoint, to a western way of living and having a sense of American Pride
The book is composed into Tung Chin’s life by three sections: The Early Years, the Gold
Mountain Dreams, and Becoming American. The early years is the section where it shows the
environment he was in and how he got to coming to the Golden Mountain also known as “The
United States of America.” Chin escaped the unsafe conditions and poverty of his village. He
was able to leave China and come to the United States with falsifying documents. His father
assisted by borrowing funds from a family member to cover the expense. He had to completely
erase what he knew of himself and memorize what his fake documents said. He was able to find
multiple jobs to work in Boston and to make an honest living. He had debt under his belt to be
paid from getting fake immigration papers made and also needed to send money back home to
China to provide for his family. Along the way he met people like Charlie Chin and Uncle Lee
before taking over his dad’s laundry business. While being at the business he even slept in one of
the rooms to save money on rent and transportation to have more money in hand to visit the
homeland every few years. At the laundry business in 1935 he was making $15 a week and was
unable to pay off his debt, which was $2,400, since he had to support his family. He did not have
a lot of money to even buy additional clothing to protect himself from the cold weather in the
North East. Over time he sold the laundry business that was not profitable and started working
for Sing Suey, who was his distant cousin, for fifteen dollar a week. At that time his father was
also sick in the hospital and needed funds to take care of the medical bills. Chin thought he could
ask his distant cousin, also his employer, but he declined. At that moment Chin realized that the
life in the Golden Mountains came with a new set of cultural rules than the one he knew back
home. Eventually he decided to become a laundry business owner again thinking he was buying
the hand laundry at a fair price. Unfortunately Chin was unaware of the actual profits being
earned since the previous owner verbally exaggerated the profits they were making. He decided
to take the plunge and realized he was cheated. Eventually he realized he wanted to change for
the better and stopped gambling and to use his spare time to learn English. Chin had a strong
background in Confucian classics and classic poetry so once he learned English, he went over the
English & the Chinese classics side by side to understand it better. He eventually even became
the sermon interpreter in 1939 at a Lutheran Church in New York’s Chinatown to acclimate
himself more into the American society.
The Golden Mountain Dreams is now shifting to his life after the attack of Pearl Harbor in 1941.
Chin had just finished paying half of his debt that was previously owed and was wanting to go to
college to further his education but life does not go as planned. On December 8th, 1941 the
United States declared war on Japan just one day after the initial attack. Then three weeks later,
Chin decided to join the United States Navy and left the laundry business with a loss of $750. In
the first chapter of this section , A Navy Man, Chin explains his experience in the Navy during
World War II and going through the difficulties as a minority. He felt like a 3rd class citizen
since his main job responsibilities were serving coffee and doing basic chores for the United
States Navy officers. He realized as a paper son he entered the country as a single man while
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having a mother, wife, and two sons back home to support. In his time in the Navy, he had a
evolving feeling of national pride and power and realizing how far he has come from Sha-tou
village. He compared the uncertainty of China to just one section of the powerful United States
military. And in that moment he was proud to be in the “Gold Mountain.” While being in the
Navy he did have a $10,000 life insurance policy but it was under his paper mother’s name and
when he got discharged he decided not to take it. He opted in not taking the policy with him
since he did not want to disclose his truth of being a paper son. Throughout all that he still
desired to further his education and to eventually attend college. Chin had a mentor throughout
the war who told him not to give up on his dreams and his name was Dean Ralph Pickett. After
the war Chin returned to New York as a different man. He got more involved in politics and
world affairs, he joined the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance (CHLA), and started writing in his
spare time. After some time he found his passion and became more involved in writing and
wanted to make a name for himself as a poet. He did not desire college anymore and knew he
could be whatever he wanted to be in the land of opportunity.
“Becoming American” goes over the daily life of Chin working the laundry business and running
the household while his wife went to go work at a factory and children went to grade school. In
this time Chin was constantly trying to prove to the FBI that he was never a communist and loved
his life as an American. He understood that they were Americans, but that they would also be
known as Chinese Americans. He did everything to prove that with his actions and the type of
material in his home. All he wanted was to earn a decent living and live a decent life with his
family. He was constantly questioned about his involvement with the newspaper, China, and his
day to day activities and wanted to protect his wife and children at all costs as any family man
would. As an American, Chin even adopted the national holidays like Thanksgiving to make sure
his children were not left out in anything when his teacher would question regarding their holidays.
He even advised his own brother in law to take advantage of furthering his education instead of
working for a restaurant because he felt he would have done that if he was 21 and single with no
family. He realizes over time he made the best decision for himself and his family by securing a
future for his children that could not have happened if they were in China.
Chin did struggle with having his paper name and his own name that he had in China but refused
to ever change himself and proudly adopted the name he legally had because he never wanted to
confess or change what he had already started nor desired to. He also talks about how he
constantly struggled with his passion for writing due to the fear of something happening such as
the FBI coming again or it affecting his children’s future education. Chin retires peacefully
knowing he did the best for his children to make sure they did not go through the hardships like
he did. He also continued to write poetry in Chinese in his free time to publish it in Chinese
papers for others to be inspired by his journey.
After reading and summarizing I understand why Tung Chin changed his identity and adopted a
new one when migrating to the United States of America. I have much respect for someone who
strives to do better and not settle for less. The strength is how the United States was really shown
when living in it and not just some fantasy people had thinking there was a golden path made.
The weakness point was the ending of the book because I assumed the authors would show a
better future for Chin but instead it was not as exciting to finally be at the end. The author could
have also went more in depth with the relationships Chin made with his American associates,
friends, or neighbors throughout his life. The book mainly spoke about the individuals in
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Chinatown sticking together as a society and that is how Chin made friends. The particular
audience could be anyone because this story inspires immigrants to want better & for Americans
to be grateful for the life they have while not having many hardships like Chin did in his time.
Example of an academic book review
This book review is included here with the permission of both
the author, Heather Kavan, senior lecturer in Business
Communication, and the editor of Stimulus, the journal in which
the book review was published.
Behind Closed Doors
Ngaire Thomas, privately published, 2 Alaska Court, Palmerston
North, New Zealand, www.behind-closed-doors.org, 2004.
294pp. ISBN 0646499106. NZ$34.
Bibliographic information
Behind Closed Doors is an inside look at what goes on behind
the doors of the Exclusive Brethren. The book answers the
question of what it is like to be a member of a select group who
believe they are chosen to maintain the only pure path of
Christianity. The author, Ngaire Thomas, was born into the
church in the 1940s and left in the 1970s.
Introduction
Statement of book’s
purpose
Statement about the
author
It is probably just coincidence that this book was launched at
roughly the same time that sociologist Bryan Wilson died.
Wilson published the definitive study on the Exclusive Brethren
in 1967, and was an expert witness in their court cases. Wilson’s
conclusions were based on information the religion provided
about itself; he dismissed ex-members’ accounts as suspect
atrocity stories and warned courts not to give credence to their
testimony.i Today, after outbreaks of violence in other religions
have repeatedly demonstrated that ex-members accounts are
often more accurate than academic ones,ii we may be more
welcoming of their insights.
As one such ex-member account, Ngaire Thomas’ book is
compelling. Her style is non-judgemental; she describes her
experiences while acknowledging the Exclusive Brethren’s right
to follow a religious path in which they find meaning.
The book begins with Ngaire’s childhood. She is different from
the other children with her long dresses and strict upbringing.
She loves school because it is the only place that she can be her
real self. Worldly things are forbidden: there are no radios
(because Satan rules the airwaves) or non-Brethren books. Life
revolves around the Bible, and when Ngaire brings friends home
from school her mother preaches to them about the end times in
Revelation. Other Christians are also deemed suspect, and Ngaire
recalls getting the strap when caught secretly attending Bible in
School classes.
A Salem-like undercurrent of holy surveillance pervades the
scenes, and this undercurrent surfaces in Chapter 10, when
Ngaire is pressured into falsely admitting that she has
“committed fornication” with her cousin (she has no idea what
Places the book in a
context
Statement about book’s
genre and potential
significance
Overall evaluation
Summary of the book’s
beginning – giving details
which provide the context
of the author’s conflict
“fornication” means). Her case is taken to the Auckland
assembly, and after a hearing in which she is found guilty, she is
forced to confess, sobbing, before 500-600 solemn faces. But the
story has a strange twist – which I won’t spoil for the reader.
In the next chapter, Ngaire meets her future husband, Denis.
They marry in the 1960s during the church’s notorious “no
compromise” era in which the rules are tightened. Members are
not allowed to eat and drink with outsiders, and can not be part
of another association, such as a library. Even beloved pets are
deemed to be idols, and are destroyed, given away or just
disappear. There are rules for Ngaire too: she must limit her
conversation to 10% of her husband’s (which proves difficult as
he is generally silent).
More summary of later
parts of the book, showing
how the author has related
her own experiences to the
experiences of others and
to the philosophies that
were dominating the
religion at the time
Of value is Ngaire’s account of the bouts of “confession
madness” that swept through the church at this time. The priests
take on the role of religious police, examining people’s lives like
forensic investigators, dragging up rumours from decades past.
Members are forced to confess to sins real and imagined, and
encouraged to drink whiskey to prove they have nothing to hide.
Those who confess pay heavily. They are “shut up” (in effect
placed under house arrest) or “withdrawn from”
(excommunicated), and lose access to loved ones. Almost
inevitably, Ngaire (who has now had four children) and her
family are withdrawn from.
The family’s adjustment is massive. They are unused to their
new freedom and do not know how to act in normal society. The
two eldest sons end up in prison. (The boys love the prison
discipline, and when they earn a reduced sentence they choose to
stay instead.) Denis dies of liver cancer, and Ngaire goes to
University. Readers, especially those familiar with Fowler’s
stages of faith, will be interested in following Ngaire’s shifts in
faith throughout, as she ultimately finds the kingdom of heaven
within.
It is difficult not to like the author with her unpretentious
forgiving style. To be sure, there are some weaknesses in the
book. The structure is a little unpolished (some later sections
would be better as appendices), and there is a small printing error
on the inside cover. Also while the author answers many
questions, she invites even more. Why, for example, is the most
serious abuse limited to only a few passing sentences?
Nevertheless the book provides a valuable and absorbing
window into a religion that is for most of us inaccessible. As
religious autobiographies go, Behind Closed Doors may not have
the theological complexities of St Augustine’s Confessions, or
the mystical insights of Teresa of Avila’s Life, but there is
Reviewer indicating the
value for readers
interested in research on
the development of and
changes in faith
Further evaluation – some
weaknesses and omissions
noted
Restatement of overall
impression and
recommendation
something almost archetypal about one woman’s courage to
speak her own truth.
i
Bryan Wilson, “The Exclusive Brethren: A Case Study in the Evolution of a
Sectarian Ideology,” in Patterns of Sectarianism: Organisation and Ideology
in Social and Religious Movements, ed. B. Wilson (London: Heinemann,
1967) 287; Bryan Wilson, The Social Dimensions of Sectarianism, Sects and
New Religious Movements in Contemporary Society. (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1990) 19; Bryan Wilson, Letter to the Editor, Evangelical Times (23
Sept 1999).
http://pub28.ezboard.com/fexamininfprotestantismfrm2.showMessage?topicI
D-420.topic [Αccessed 18 December 2004].
ii
This point is made by Benjamin Belt-Hallahmi, “ Dear Colleagues: Integrity
and Suspicion in NRM Research” (paper presented at the annual meeting of
the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Nov. 1997, San Diego, CA).
http://www.apologeticsindex.org/c59html [Accessed 18 December 2004].
References: These ones
are included as endnotes
as endnotes

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