The Chinatown Storytelling Centre Digital Archives preserves and shares the historical records of Vancouver’s Chinatown. As the first archive in Canada dedicated to collecting materials from a Chinatown, it enables the community to document its own past and tell its stories in its own voice.
Located in the heart of Vancouver’s Chinatown, the Archives brings together photographs, documents and publications that reflect the neighbourhood’s social and cultural life. Its initial phase features the largest online collection of Chinatown News, an invaluable record of the community’s history.
Founded in 1953 by Roy Mah, a WWII veteran, journalist and community activist, Chinatown News was originally launched under the title Chinatown and was published biweekly until 1996. Today it is widely recognized as an important source for understanding Chinese Canadian history, the growth of Vancouver’s Chinatown and the lived experiences of the community during those decades.
Since opening in 2021, the Chinatown Storytelling Centre has been collecting copies from interviewees, community supporters, friends and the Chinese Community Library to ensure this record is preserved and made accessible. In 2024, the CSC secured the licence to digitize and publish the magazine in digital form.
The Chinatown News Special Collection includes approximately 800 of the nearly 1,000 issues published, with 300 issues already fully digitized and searchable. We would like to thank Kathleen and Janette Lee, The Chinese Community Library and the Chinese Canadian Historical Society of BC who helped source hundreds of magazines for this project. If you know of anyone with Chinatown News magazines stored away, we invite you to help us locate the 180 issues still missing. Even if you have just one copy to donate, please contact archives@chinatownfoundation.
