Chung Way Cemetery / Young Wo Cemetery - Folsom, California

DATE VISITED:  03/08/2015

HISTORICAL SITE:  Chung Wah Cemetery

LOCATION:  1221 Mormon St., Folsom, Sacramento Co., CA

MARKER #:  1995000999

DEDICATED:  August 21, 1995

**closer look below

PERSONAL REFLECTIONS: Well, now I know why Dana and I couldn't find the cemetery. It's located at the back of the current cemetery behind gates and signs that say "do not trespass".

I'm totally confused over the Chinese cemeteries in Folsom. Everything I read says there were 3 of them. The federal application for historical designation says any remnants of the Young Wo Cemetery no longer exists yet I visited it...I think. And when you google "Chung Wah Cemetery", you often see a picture of the Young Wo Cemetery. I also have seen reference to the Chung Wah Cemetery being on private lands and so not accessible to the public. While I am unable to confirm, I'm going with the inaccessible story as I found a sign leading back to where the maps said the cemetery is and the sign has "Chung Wah" on it.

When I told Dirk what I had found, he said...so there is a national landmark on private property that we're paying for that we can't get to? Yep, and I'm sure this isn't the only one I will find like this.

One of the reasons it is not longer open to the public is that the graves were desecrated in 1967. Vandals dug up graves and destroyed the shrine. Jewelry and artifacts stolen were traced to pawn shops in San Francisco.

A little history...Chinese did not "mix" with other Chinese from different provinces in China, mainly because of the differences in dialects. Basically, they weren't speaking the same language. The competition between these factions was fierce and so Associations were started up in America that could help the newly arriving Chinese from particular provinces. While these Associations assisted newly arriving Chinese that were here mainly because of the discovery of gold, they also were a source of support and news from home. The reason there were 3 Chinese cemeteries is simple...they were overseen by the different Associations.

The graves were never set in any order and the deceased were buried haphazardly. I think it was done because the Associations that oversaw the various cemeteries would disinterred the deceased and send the bones back to China. It looks like this was done, more or less, once a year, so there were never really any headstones as is pretty standard in any other cemetery.

Because there were no headstones and records weren't kept, the exact number of Chinese buried remains unknown but all 3 cemeteries saw a large number of burials in 1893 from some epidemic as noted in the Folsom Telegraph on November 4, 1893..."Chinatown is full of sick heathens . . . and the number of deaths is greater than ever before known in history".

 

HISTORICAL SITE:  Young Wo Cemetery

LOCATION:  Forrest St., Folsom, Sacramento Co., CA

DEDICATED:  1994

"This sacred grounds is one of three revered cemeteries *Young Wo, Sam Yup-Sze Yup, and Hakka * that served the Chinese community once located just north of here. One cemetery vanished during the gold dredging activities; only the Young Wo and Sam Yup-Sze Yup remain. The Young Wo Cemetery provided burial primarily for people from the Chung Shan District of China. Buried here are Chinese pioneers who struggled for economic survival and human dignity and in so doing helped build Folsom and the West"

**closer look below

PERSONAL REFLECTIONS: Became a California state historical point of interest but couldn't be designated as a state landmark because major modification had already taken place.

While I was taking a picture of the front gate, a family came and went in. I could hear one parent telling the kids that this is an old Chinese cemetery while the other said the land should be used for the neighborhood. They then proceeded to throw Frisbee's and playing around. I honestly don't know if the Chinese community would consider this in bad taste, but somehow it seemed wrong to me.  

I was reminded of the time my youngest, Daniel, was visiting a cemetery with his grandfather and us. We were in an older part of the cemetery, and he was running around, singing, touching every headstone and jumping around. Both his father and I tried to rein him in when finally his grandfather said "leave him alone...this is more attention than these people have gotten in a very long time".