Outside the Paint
Outside the Paint: When Basketball Ruled at the Chinese Playground
Kathleen S. Yep
Series: Asian American History and Culture
Copyright Date: 2009
Published by: Temple University Press
Pages: 216
https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt14btd73
Search for reviews of this book
Book Info
Outside the Paint
Book Description:

This fascinating book reveals that Chinese Americans began "shooting hoops" nearly a century before Chinese superstar Yao Ming turned pro. Drawing on interviews with players and coaches,Outside the Painttakes readers back to San Francisco in the 1930s and 1940s, when young Chinese American men and women developed a new approach to the game-with fast breaks, intricate passing and aggressive defense-that was ahead of its time.

Every chapter tells a surprising story: the Chinese Playground, the only public outdoor space in Chinatown; the Hong Wah Kues, a professional barnstorming men's basketball team; the Mei Wahs, a championship women's amateur team; Woo Wong, the first Chinese athlete to play in Madison Square Garden; and the extraordinarily talented Helen Wong, whom Kathleen Yep compares to Babe Didrikson.

Outside the Paintchronicles the efforts of these highly accomplished athletes who developed a unique playing style that capitalized on their physical attributes, challenged the prevailing racial hierarchy, and enabled them, for a time, to leave the confines of their segregated world. They learned to dribble, shoot, and steal.

eISBN: 978-1-59213-944-6
Subjects: Sociology, History
You do not have access to this book on JSTOR. Try logging in through your institution for access.
Log in to your personal account or through your institution.
Table of Contents
Export Selected Citations Export to NoodleTools Export to RefWorks Export to EasyBib Export a RIS file (For EndNote, ProCite, Reference Manager, Zotero, Mendeley...) Export a Text file (For BibTex)
Select / Unselect all
  1. Front Matter
    Front Matter (pp. i-vi)
  2. Table of Contents
    Table of Contents (pp. vii-viii)
  3. Acknowledgments
    Acknowledgments (pp. ix-xvi)
  4. Introduction
    Introduction (pp. 1-16)

    In the 1930s and 1940s, hundreds of Chinese American youth found refuge on a small plot of land in San Francisco’s Chinatown. Officially designated the “Chinese Playground” by the city of San Francisco, this public playground was a place where young people made lasting friendships and formed basketball teams that excelled in competitions. Girls’ and boys’ teams from the Chinese Playground developed their own style of playing, a style that emphasized speed and made stature almost irrelevant. Quick and agile, they were able to score against their generally much taller and much wealthier white opponents and to dominate their divisions...

  5. 1 The Chinese Playground
    1 The Chinese Playground (pp. 17-36)

    Sandwiched between buildings in the congested ghetto, the only public playground in San Francisco’s Chinatown became a source of community pride. An English-language newspaper, theChinese Digest, praised the success of Chinese Playground teams in an integrated citywide basketball league:

    Under [Oliver Chang’s] guidance, the Chinese Playground has made a name for itself in the annals of the city recreation leagues. The teams he enters in the city-wide competitions usually bring home the bacon; 1936 was no exception as it found five basketball teams carrying off top honors in their respective classes, while 1937 discovered three championship quintets from Chinatown.¹...

  6. 2 The Hong Wah Kues Discover America
    2 The Hong Wah Kues Discover America (pp. 37-62)

    In 1939, six American-born Chinese men from San Francisco formed the Hong Wah Kues, the first and only Chinese American professional basketball team. For two seasons, the Hong Wah Kues traveled around the United States and Canada on a barnstorming circuit. During the era of the Great Depression and the Chinese Exclusion Laws, basketball provided these mostly working-class men the opportunity to leave the confines of segregated Chinatown and see some of the world. The Hong Wah Kues received a great deal of media attention as well as the enthusiastic support of Chinese American communities in cities on the basketball...

  7. 3 The Mei Wahs Knew How to Use Their Elbows and Push
    3 The Mei Wahs Knew How to Use Their Elbows and Push (pp. 63-80)

    In the early 1930s, a group of mostly working-class, Chinese American women regularly climbed a chain-link fence to squeeze in a game of basketball during early San Franciscan mornings. Franche Lee, one of the players, recalls: “People worked afterschool. So, the only time we could play was in the morning before school…The (Chinese) Playground was our space. Somehow we hopped over the fence in order to play–poking our fingers in the fence to help us climb over. Those games were fun.”¹ Unwelcome on their school teams and with few options to play in Chinatown, these Chinese American women formed...

  8. 4 “Mr. Chinese Cager” Plays Madison Square Garden
    4 “Mr. Chinese Cager” Plays Madison Square Garden (pp. 81-100)

    Sponsored by theSan Francisco Examiner, the Pacific Association (PA) tournament in the late 1940s was one of the most illustrious basketball tournaments in San Francisco. In the same period, William Woo Wong was a legendary basketball player in Chinatown and gained wider fame when theExaminerheralded him as the “star of the 1947–1948 Examiner-PA basketball tournament.” Breaking the tournament record by scoring thirty-seven points in one game, Wong was acknowledged as “one of the greatest box office players in San Francisco history.”¹ In the 1948 PA tournament, Wong’s sharp shooting and skillful ball-handling were leading his team to...

  9. 5 Helen Wong and the “Muscle Molls”
    5 Helen Wong and the “Muscle Molls” (pp. 101-116)

    If you speak about Chinese American athletes with anyone who grew up in San Francisco’s Chinatown in the 1940s, Helen Wong’s name inevitably comes up. Wong was arguably one of the greatest athletes to come out of Chinatown before the 1960s. Regularly scoring over half of her basketball team’s points, she led her integrated team to two championships in the predominately white Catholic Youth Organization (CYO) league. In tennis, Wong pulled down eleven national Chinese tennis tournament championships and competed as the Northern California representative in the prestigious junior Davis Cup competitions. Focusing on Helen Wong, this chapter explores how...

  10. Conclusion: The Chinese Playground and Yao Ming in the Era of Globalized Sports
    Conclusion: The Chinese Playground and Yao Ming in the Era of Globalized Sports (pp. 117-122)

    On a sunny, crisp Saturday afternoon in 2002, hundreds of families streamed into Chinatown for the Chinese Playground’s seventy-fifth anniversary celebration at the Chinese Recreational Center.¹ Past participants from the Chinese Playground made the pilgrimage from the suburbs to their old stomping ground. A photo exhibit documenting the decades of play, friendship, and connection snaked around the gym. The din reached a fever pitch as people recognized long-lost friends, past mentors, and bygone crushes. A potent alchemy of giddiness, joy, and melancholy permeated the space. People entering the building stopped to greet Paul Whang, director of the Chinese Playground from...

  11. Notes
    Notes (pp. 123-162)
  12. Bibliography
    Bibliography (pp. 163-190)
  13. Index
    Index (pp. 191-199)
  14. Back Matter
    Back Matter (pp. 200-200)