Letters from Readers

The Washboard Legacy We were pleased to see the excellent article in the Fall issue of British Columbia History about Chinese laundries in BC. It is worth noting, however, that discriminatory legal measures against the Chinese were not confined to head taxes and labour restrictions but were intended to affect Chinese laundries as well. In 1885, BC’s provincial government amended its Municipal Act to authorize municipalities to regulate and licence laundries with fees that were calculated to force them to shut down. The City of Victoria quickly enacted a bylaw designed to have this effect. Of course, everyone knew that such laundries were almost exclusively owned and operated by Chinese. Once such operator, Mee Wah, was convicted under the bylaw because he had not paid the exorbitant licence fee. He…

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British Columbia History (Digital) - 1 Issue, 53.4 Winter 2020

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