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SMNTY Classics: Afong Moy · Stuff Mom Never Told You

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome stuff I
0:07
Speaker 1: Ever Told Your production of I Heart Radio. Recently, we
0:19
Speaker 1: had an episode with the always amazing Eves where she
0:23
Speaker 1: brought up a fung moy past episode she had done
0:28
Speaker 1: on a woman who was no really offensively as the
0:33
Speaker 1: first documented Chinese woman in the United States, Like that's
0:36
Speaker 1: sort of what she became. Uh So we thought, in
0:39
Speaker 1: order to clarify that in case you somehow missed it,
0:43
Speaker 1: we would bring back this classic episode, so please enjoy. Hey,
0:51
Speaker 1: this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Stuff MOB
0:54
Speaker 1: Never Told You production of I Heart Radio. And today
1:07
Speaker 1: is another episode of Female First with Me, where, once
1:11
Speaker 1: again joined by our good friend and colleague Eaves. Welcome Eaves.
1:16
Speaker 1: Hello everyone, We're always thrilled to have you. And as
1:21
Speaker 1: we're recording this, it is a Friday. It is a Friday. Yes,
1:27
Speaker 1: I like I say I say that with such like
1:30
Speaker 1: I know the day, right? You have to remind yourself. Yeah,
1:35
Speaker 1: so you haven't acclined me often of what day it is.
1:38
Speaker 1: I'm like, is it okay? Great? I just I just
1:40
Speaker 1: have a calengar saying things. That's true. Every morning I
1:45
Speaker 1: email Samantha like today on your docket is man, can
1:50
Speaker 1: we arrange that? I need that? If you do, I
1:54
Speaker 1: used to do that with my ex boyfriend, no joke,
1:57
Speaker 1: and looking back, like, I'm so surprised you put up
2:00
Speaker 1: with so much of my nonsense for so long because
2:02
Speaker 1: I would send him like an email today, We're going
2:04
Speaker 1: to do this, this and this and here are some
2:06
Speaker 1: other options, and I want to know what you think
2:08
Speaker 1: about this. So he didn't ask for this, You just
2:11
Speaker 1: took it upon yourself to do it. Uh, he didn't
2:15
Speaker 1: ask for it per se. But I was just such
2:17
Speaker 1: a bigger email communicator, which is odd looking back. I
2:21
Speaker 1: didn't text as much as I emailed, UM, so I
2:24
Speaker 1: think it was just sort of a natural he realized
2:27
Speaker 1: we would I respond quicker if he emailed me. That's hilarious.
2:32
Speaker 1: Text I like to I like to sit with texts
2:35
Speaker 1: for a minute, as I feel like they're easier to
2:38
Speaker 1: misinterpret because they're usually shorter. But an email you can
2:41
Speaker 1: be longer that emojis. You gotta use emojis and emoticons
2:46
Speaker 1: to pretend like, hey, look, I'm not being really serious.
2:48
Speaker 1: So I'm even worse at that out in emails because
2:50
Speaker 1: I don't put those in emails. So I feel like
2:53
Speaker 1: I'm even more blunt in emails than I am in texting.
2:57
Speaker 1: Your emails are hilarious because they're like no apps and
3:00
Speaker 1: no periods, and I'm just like, well, I'm gonna put
3:03
Speaker 1: my own emotion on this. Exactly what I'm saying. It's
3:08
Speaker 1: like there's nothing I add to it. I'm just like,
3:10
Speaker 1: here's the sentence end. Yes, Yes, I'm very professional. Mm hmm.
3:19
Speaker 1: That's efficiency, is what that is. I mean, honestly, I
3:22
Speaker 1: think you guys, I've worked in a government field that
3:25
Speaker 1: I had to get out emails so quickly and I
3:26
Speaker 1: try to be as like official as possible, but it
3:28
Speaker 1: would just be a literal like ten ten different back
3:32
Speaker 1: and forth conversation in one chain that I just like,
3:35
Speaker 1: get the stunt, get the stunts. So that's kind of
3:37
Speaker 1: in my mind frame. I get it. I get it.
3:42
Speaker 1: I feel like I if I had to choose my
3:45
Speaker 1: most random skill set, one of mine would be composing emails.
3:48
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm very good at it. Um it's
3:51
Speaker 1: an art form, that's are you proud of that skill?
3:57
Speaker 1: I just I'm so sending emails is a pain for
4:01
Speaker 1: me sometimes. So is that something that you you take
4:04
Speaker 1: with pride. Ann I do, because I do think you
4:10
Speaker 1: have to consider how it could be misinterpreted and just
4:14
Speaker 1: clear so you're not gonna have more emails than you want.
4:18
Speaker 1: I don't. I won't say I necessarily like it, but
4:21
Speaker 1: I am. I do feel some pride, some pride. It
4:25
Speaker 1: is a skill. It's a skill, for sure. Yes, yes, well, uh,
4:31
Speaker 1: we are talking about someone with a different set of
4:34
Speaker 1: skills today, not email are texting, Um, who did you
4:39
Speaker 1: bring for us today? You? Well, today we're going to
4:42
Speaker 1: be talking about apon Moy. So her history is very interesting. Um.
4:48
Speaker 1: She was another one of those people who I think
4:50
Speaker 1: we talked about for a previous episode who there isn't
4:52
Speaker 1: a ton about um, And that's very purposeful attentional, like
4:56
Speaker 1: who's history gets recorded? But yeah, we're gonna be talking
4:59
Speaker 1: about a Moy. So she wasn't the first Chinese person
5:03
Speaker 1: in the US, but she was likely the first documented
5:07
Speaker 1: Chinese woman in the US. She was the only Chinese
5:11
Speaker 1: woman to be exhibited as an exhibited that's in quotes
5:15
Speaker 1: as a curiosity because saying that a person was exhibited
5:18
Speaker 1: sounds weird, but like technically that's what she was doing.
5:21
Speaker 1: She was an exhibition and she was a performer, but
5:24
Speaker 1: as as a curiosity before Chinese people began mass immigrating
5:28
Speaker 1: to the United States. Um, so she got a lot
5:31
Speaker 1: of national recognition in the US. And also it's notable
5:35
Speaker 1: to think that there were Chinese men in the US
5:38
Speaker 1: at the time, but she was the only known Chinese
5:43
Speaker 1: woman who was in the US, So just to be
5:46
Speaker 1: in that position is a whole thing. But yeah, like
5:48
Speaker 1: I said, there's not a lot known about her life,
5:51
Speaker 1: and I think in the past. Something that's a little
5:54
Speaker 1: bit different about talking about a fon Mooy today is
5:56
Speaker 1: that in the past we've kind of really focused on
5:58
Speaker 1: women who we were. We're talking about their accomplishments, like
6:01
Speaker 1: their first were the things that were Oh they were
6:04
Speaker 1: the first black woman architect in this place, and obviously
6:08
Speaker 1: those things are very important, but that the circumstances around
6:12
Speaker 1: this first is a little bit different than the previous
6:15
Speaker 1: first we've talked about. So I just want to be
6:17
Speaker 1: clear that her arrival and kind of tenure in the
6:20
Speaker 1: US aren't necessarily like a celebratory thing completely. She was
6:25
Speaker 1: kind of trotted out like a show horse, you know,
6:28
Speaker 1: like she and of course she as one person can't
6:31
Speaker 1: stand for all Chinese people are all Chinese women. And
6:35
Speaker 1: so this isn't kind of me saying wow, like look
6:37
Speaker 1: Avon boy made it out of China into the US,
6:40
Speaker 1: like what a pioneer. Like That's not at all what
6:43
Speaker 1: I'm trying to say, because I'm definitely not here to
6:46
Speaker 1: uphold all of the isms in all of the problematic
6:49
Speaker 1: things that surround her time in the US, like so
6:52
Speaker 1: many like there are so many layers to the story.
6:53
Speaker 1: There's the xenophobia, there's imperialism, there's racism, there's stativism, there's
6:59
Speaker 1: the oddestizing and all that stuff was imparted on Moy
7:04
Speaker 1: during her lifetime, and so so I just kind of
7:07
Speaker 1: wanted to preface with that, Like this story. I'm also
7:09
Speaker 1: not here to paint her story as a tragedy because
7:11
Speaker 1: I feel like as a person who has limited knowledge,
7:14
Speaker 1: like I'm not a historian of Moy, and also like
7:18
Speaker 1: her story in general, there isn't that much documented about it,
7:21
Speaker 1: like her time when she was in China before she
7:23
Speaker 1: came to the US. So I'm not I don't want
7:25
Speaker 1: to paint her story as this tragedy, like the only
7:28
Speaker 1: thing that she embodied the only thing that her life
7:30
Speaker 1: embodied was performance. That's what we know about her, but
7:32
Speaker 1: that's not all of her life. And so I think
7:34
Speaker 1: we have to keep in mind, just as we would
7:37
Speaker 1: keep in mind as we're watching a movie, like we're
7:39
Speaker 1: starting in media risk kind of to be like a
7:42
Speaker 1: nerdy like metaphor, like there were things that happened before
7:48
Speaker 1: the conversation that we know we're able to have about her,
7:50
Speaker 1: and things that happened after that we don't know about
7:52
Speaker 1: her that we can't necessarily bring up today because we
7:55
Speaker 1: don't know it. And so her value wasn't only instilled
7:59
Speaker 1: her all you wasn't only about the performative work that
8:02
Speaker 1: you did in the US. So I just want to
8:05
Speaker 1: preface with that a lot of what we know about
8:07
Speaker 1: her comes from other people as well, like not from
8:09
Speaker 1: her own voice, comes from letters, it comes from articles,
8:12
Speaker 1: it comes from diaries, it comes from scrapbooks. Yeah, and
8:17
Speaker 1: the story is fascinating, and I know in in past
8:22
Speaker 1: episodes of Female First, um, we are perhaps me. I
8:27
Speaker 1: don't want to speak for both of you, but I've
8:28
Speaker 1: had that moment of oh, well, I don't understand all
8:32
Speaker 1: the historical cultural context of what was happening in China
8:36
Speaker 1: at the time, or in wherever. I mean, even in
8:39
Speaker 1: the US. There's just things that I might not even
8:45
Speaker 1: think to question unless I really really dig into and
8:49
Speaker 1: into things. Um. So I think that in her story
8:52
Speaker 1: is good to keep in mind as well. And it
8:55
Speaker 1: is so interesting looking back with our our modern eyes,
8:59
Speaker 1: where um now you can hop on a plane and
9:03
Speaker 1: go to pretty much anywhere. This was a time when
9:07
Speaker 1: a lot of Americans had never seen someone from China,
9:12
Speaker 1: and that's so I just keep that in mind. Um yeah, right,
9:20
Speaker 1: I mean I get the fun experiences of just being
9:23
Speaker 1: an Asian woman when I lived in like the smaller towns,
9:26
Speaker 1: and even though they know of Asian cultures, still there's
9:29
Speaker 1: enough ignorance out there not everyone obviously that they would
9:33
Speaker 1: be like what are you, which is the first question
9:35
Speaker 1: I would get, And that in itself is kind of like,
9:37
Speaker 1: can you imagine what happened when they have actually never
9:40
Speaker 1: knew an Asian person in general and then being like okay, seriously,
9:44
Speaker 1: what that like? That's kind of I could not imagine
9:48
Speaker 1: being just already having to deal with some of the
9:50
Speaker 1: confusion and ignorance here today and then going to think
9:53
Speaker 1: about the reality of oh my god, what would have
9:56
Speaker 1: been like back then, and that kind of that back
9:59
Speaker 1: of more than yeah, as you I know, you're gonna
10:02
Speaker 1: unfold all this reading about just some of the things
10:04
Speaker 1: that they assume about her life and again some of
10:08
Speaker 1: the silence and what might not have happened. It's kind
10:11
Speaker 1: of like, wow, I wonder how lonely at the same time,
10:15
Speaker 1: how much she tried to play into that to be accepted.
10:18
Speaker 1: But yeah, I know we're gonna get that. Yeah, yeah,
10:21
Speaker 1: for sure, I and I guess it's like weird. There's
10:25
Speaker 1: a weird line where you try to have or I'll
10:27
Speaker 1: speak for myself, where I try to have a level
10:29
Speaker 1: of empathy about like, well, this is a thing that
10:32
Speaker 1: is truly completely foreign to a person, but the way
10:37
Speaker 1: in which that was imparted on her, Like you can
10:41
Speaker 1: say I've never seen a thing. Oh, I've never seen
10:43
Speaker 1: a thing, and then you can say I've never seen
10:44
Speaker 1: a thing. How awful is that thing? Like how weird
10:47
Speaker 1: is that thing? How strange is that thing? And like
10:50
Speaker 1: they did that with her foot binding, which we'll talk about,
10:52
Speaker 1: and they did that with her, you know, herself, and
10:56
Speaker 1: had a lot of commentary on like you know what
10:58
Speaker 1: they thought was right and what they thought should be
11:00
Speaker 1: the case based on you know, American white values and
11:05
Speaker 1: religion and upbringing and morals and all of those things,
11:09
Speaker 1: and try to project what they thought was quote unquote
11:12
Speaker 1: right onto onto her culture and her customs and her
11:16
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's super complicated. I mean, yeah, like thinking
11:20
Speaker 1: about what you said, Samantha, just about how today like
11:24
Speaker 1: it's already it's a huge thing. To be the only
11:27
Speaker 1: Chinese woman that people have seen like period up until
11:30
Speaker 1: that time is definitely I can't imagine and I can't
11:34
Speaker 1: relate to be the only because I think we're still
11:39
Speaker 1: put in positions like that today. I'm still in rooms
11:42
Speaker 1: where I'm the only black woman in the room. But
11:46
Speaker 1: this is that on a way larger, different, different culture.
11:51
Speaker 1: So yeah, um, I guess we can get into her
11:53
Speaker 1: story now. Yeah, any you mentioned not knowing what China
12:00
Speaker 1: at the time was like art, I'm not specifically China
12:03
Speaker 1: at the time. Any you mentioned like not necessarily knowing
12:06
Speaker 1: the context around things that were happening in specific cultures
12:08
Speaker 1: and nations at the time. Um, and China at the time.
12:12
Speaker 1: I think it's worth talking a little bit about the
12:14
Speaker 1: background of the context in this case, just because it
12:17
Speaker 1: figure so much into the story and the way that
12:18
Speaker 1: people viewed her. And obviously I can't go through the
12:22
Speaker 1: whole history of the place as the largest China in
12:25
Speaker 1: a short amount of time, so this is going to
12:27
Speaker 1: be simplification. And obviously the history is more complicated than this.
12:31
Speaker 1: But this is during the Ching Dynasty, which lasted from
12:35
Speaker 1: the mid and obviously to my pronunciations I know are
12:38
Speaker 1: not nuanced when it comes to Chinese, but yeah, so
12:42
Speaker 1: it last it from around the mid sixteen hundreds to
12:45
Speaker 1: the early nineteen hundreds. It was generally prosperous. Um population
12:50
Speaker 1: was growing majorly in a big way during some part
12:52
Speaker 1: of the Chem dynasty, and there was restricted trade and
12:56
Speaker 1: relations with the West. Yeah, in the seventeen fifties, Western
13:00
Speaker 1: trade was restricted to the southern part of Canton guang
13:03
Speaker 1: Joe today. But um, as the demand for t increased
13:08
Speaker 1: and the Industrial Revolution came along, people in our Britain
13:13
Speaker 1: was looking for more markets for manufactured goods and so
13:16
Speaker 1: they tried to trying to extend that out to China
13:20
Speaker 1: and establish Western style relations with the Chinese. But by
13:25
Speaker 1: the early as you can imagine, um when trade and
13:29
Speaker 1: commerce and like relations starts, conflict starts to be a
13:33
Speaker 1: part of the pot as well, um, when people start
13:35
Speaker 1: to stick their hands and things. So Western countries began
13:39
Speaker 1: to be more engaged in conflicts with China as they
13:42
Speaker 1: were scrambling to kind of get access to Chinese products
13:46
Speaker 1: and markets for European and US trade. So yeah, there
13:50
Speaker 1: was this insular kind of isolationist situation that was happening
13:54
Speaker 1: in China. Um when it came to Chinese people leaving
13:58
Speaker 1: China and Western people coming to China. That was a
14:02
Speaker 1: part of it. Also, as I mentioned briefly earlier, afong
14:06
Speaker 1: Moy her feet were bound. That was a practice that
14:09
Speaker 1: grew a lot during the Chain dynasty, and the Manchu's
14:12
Speaker 1: attempted to ban that practice of footbinding, but they weren't
14:15
Speaker 1: able to do so, and the Han Chinese were They
14:19
Speaker 1: were the ones who mainly practiced footbinding um, and they
14:22
Speaker 1: continued to do so, and it did limit women's physical mobility.
14:27
Speaker 1: And so anyway, people from the US didn't visit China,
14:32
Speaker 1: So it wasn't like there weren't any Western people or
14:34
Speaker 1: people from the U s specifically in China. There were
14:37
Speaker 1: and there were people who were lived in the US
14:40
Speaker 1: who had never been to China, who were interested in
14:44
Speaker 1: it and had other depictions of China and saw it
14:49
Speaker 1: as this mystical, far away place. And yeah, so there
14:54
Speaker 1: were like landscape scenes on Chinese ceramics that made their
14:58
Speaker 1: way to the US and kind of paining China as
15:00
Speaker 1: this picturesque place. And people were also really into the
15:05
Speaker 1: idea of Chinese women and foot binding when they found
15:08
Speaker 1: out about it, and there was this air of mystery
15:11
Speaker 1: around that as well. Um, And I mean, there's obviously
15:15
Speaker 1: so much problematic stuff when it comes to the way
15:17
Speaker 1: that people viewed and spoke about Chinese women and footbinding
15:20
Speaker 1: and all that stuff back then, But I kind of
15:23
Speaker 1: think of it as this way where they're like portraying
15:25
Speaker 1: Chinese women as these cryptids. It's like, oh, this a
15:30
Speaker 1: list of unicorn or like a big foot that I've
15:32
Speaker 1: never liked seen. Maybe I'll get to see it one day,
15:36
Speaker 1: Like I have no idea how this creature works, type
15:39
Speaker 1: of situation. So that's kind of a little bit of
15:43
Speaker 1: background when it comes to China and views of China
15:47
Speaker 1: and how those were developing at the time. And as
15:50
Speaker 1: we'll get to a little bit later, those did change,
15:52
Speaker 1: those views did evolve over time. We have a lot
15:55
Speaker 1: more for you listeners, but first we're gonna pass for
15:57
Speaker 1: a quick break for word from our sponsors. Everybody, thank
16:12
Speaker 1: you sponsored. So onto the story of a fog Boy
16:18
Speaker 1: and how she got to the U S. So there's
16:20
Speaker 1: not much known about her personal family history before that time.
16:25
Speaker 1: This is kind of where her story starts. Generally, there
16:28
Speaker 1: were the traders Nathaniel and Frederick Carne, and they were
16:32
Speaker 1: in the business of importing foreign goods to the US,
16:35
Speaker 1: and they have their own backstory, but today is not
16:39
Speaker 1: about them, so we won't talk about I love it.
16:44
Speaker 1: So that included goods from China, and those Chinese goods
16:49
Speaker 1: were things like handkerchiefs, like shawls, fireworks, baskets, fans, watercolor paintings,
16:58
Speaker 1: and a bunch of other items. So these guys decided
17:01
Speaker 1: to develop a marketing scheme and what do you know,
17:07
Speaker 1: along with Captain o'bar. So they did this with Captain o'beer,
17:11
Speaker 1: and that would help with selling their goods, and they
17:14
Speaker 1: wanted to Their whole scheme was exhibiting a Chinese woman
17:18
Speaker 1: in New York and they wanted to surround her with
17:21
Speaker 1: Chinese decor and furniture so that they could sell their goods,
17:25
Speaker 1: but they would kind of use the woman as the
17:26
Speaker 1: centerpiece to bring people in, and then once they were there,
17:30
Speaker 1: they would scour her whole appearance and her customs and
17:34
Speaker 1: everything that she did. But in the meantime, all the
17:36
Speaker 1: things that she was surrounded by and be like, oh, like,
17:39
Speaker 1: my precious, you know, all of these shiny furniture and
17:43
Speaker 1: decor and items that they would love along the way
17:45
Speaker 1: and hopefully be tempted into buying them because middle class
17:49
Speaker 1: white women were had a little bit more time and
17:53
Speaker 1: resources to be able to get such things, and the
17:56
Speaker 1: morals and the values around being able to acquire those
17:59
Speaker 1: things was also something that was developing at the time.
18:02
Speaker 1: I know y'all can talk about it and probably like
18:05
Speaker 1: have you know, done research on it as well, But
18:07
Speaker 1: the storied history of white folks putting people of different
18:10
Speaker 1: ethnicities and customs and cultures on display is not something
18:14
Speaker 1: that's limited to a fung moy. So I know y'all
18:18
Speaker 1: have probably heard of Start Department or the quote unquote
18:21
Speaker 1: Venus hot and Ty who was put on display human
18:24
Speaker 1: zoos that were really popular in Britain, and so called
18:28
Speaker 1: freak shows and Chang and a Bunker who were the
18:31
Speaker 1: who they call the Siamese twins, who were conjoint twins
18:35
Speaker 1: who were put on display as curiosities. So a f
18:39
Speaker 1: Moy was objectified and kind of dehumanized in a similar way. Um,
18:44
Speaker 1: but I don't want to take all of her agency
18:46
Speaker 1: away from her, because she did have agency as well
18:49
Speaker 1: and made choices that's worth being, you know, recognized that
18:53
Speaker 1: yes she was tried it out, and yes she was
18:56
Speaker 1: put on display, and yes she was brought over from China,
19:00
Speaker 1: but there was agency in her story as well. So
19:03
Speaker 1: like oh Bear apparently reached an agreement with a fan
19:07
Speaker 1: boy's father who was likely a Cantonese merchant or comfordor
19:12
Speaker 1: and her father got money out of the deal. But
19:15
Speaker 1: apparently Oh Beer also promised to bring Moy back to
19:18
Speaker 1: China in two years. Spoiler alert, That did not happen.
19:23
Speaker 1: She stayed in the US for a lot longer than
19:24
Speaker 1: two years. Oh yeah, do we know did she ever
19:30
Speaker 1: make it? She didn't go back, right, No, she We
19:34
Speaker 1: don't know if she ever went back or not. I
19:35
Speaker 1: think the most we can do is speculate on whether
19:37
Speaker 1: she went back to China or not, like what happened
19:40
Speaker 1: after she left the U S. Has I read somewhere
19:42
Speaker 1: that she made gone to Europe at one point in time? Yeah, possibly, possibly, possibly, um,
19:49
Speaker 1: But there's not really any record of her after a
19:52
Speaker 1: certain point in the US, so she didn't. She came
19:56
Speaker 1: to the U S. In eighteen thirty four and a
19:59
Speaker 1: Fon Boy was a name that was probably given to her.
20:03
Speaker 1: She was on Chinese, which is surmised because of her
20:07
Speaker 1: foot binding um, and her her family background wasn't recorded
20:11
Speaker 1: when she arrived here. And this was before the times
20:15
Speaker 1: of the gold Rush. Like I said earlier, this is
20:17
Speaker 1: before mass Chinese immigration to the US. And she was
20:21
Speaker 1: likely around sixteen, probably no older than nineteen, so she
20:26
Speaker 1: was young. Um. And when she came to the U S.
20:30
Speaker 1: Was at that point where she became the first documented
20:32
Speaker 1: Chinese woman to enter the US. So she arrived on
20:35
Speaker 1: a ship called the Washington under Captain o'bear. She had
20:38
Speaker 1: come from Canton. Articles and there are a bunch of
20:42
Speaker 1: articles on her like that you can read, which are bad, hilarious, like, yeah,
20:48
Speaker 1: it's a lot going on in these articles, but it
20:51
Speaker 1: said that she was There was one that says she
20:53
Speaker 1: was four ft ten inches tall, and that her feet
20:55
Speaker 1: were just four inches long, since she wore quote unquote
20:59
Speaker 1: irons since she was twelve years old, and it said
21:02
Speaker 1: that she would soon start accepting visitors at Number eight
21:05
Speaker 1: part place in New York, and at first, articles gave
21:11
Speaker 1: her different names before she was given the name Afong Boy.
21:16
Speaker 1: There was one, for instance, that gave her the name
21:19
Speaker 1: Miss Ching Chung Foo. I don't know where they got
21:22
Speaker 1: that name from, but that was the name that they
21:24
Speaker 1: gave her in one article. That article was in the
21:27
Speaker 1: New York Commercial Advertiser, And so there were other names
21:30
Speaker 1: that she was given as well that I don't know
21:33
Speaker 1: the the source of. I don't know where those names
21:36
Speaker 1: came from. Obviously a lot to be said about somebody
21:39
Speaker 1: naming somebody when they get to the US, and also
21:42
Speaker 1: not necessarily knowing anything about Chinese culture or having ever
21:46
Speaker 1: seen a Chinese woman before yep. I don't know where
21:50
Speaker 1: they came from. Um. But she did have an attendant
21:53
Speaker 1: who would translate for her, so she didn't know how
21:56
Speaker 1: to speak English at the time. She had an attendant
21:58
Speaker 1: who would translate for her, and at the place where
22:01
Speaker 1: she would be exhibited, which they were setting up when
22:04
Speaker 1: she got over here. Um, and there will also big
22:07
Speaker 1: various objects of Chinese curiosity around her. Um. The price
22:10
Speaker 1: of that mission was fifty cents. There were some earlier
22:13
Speaker 1: sources that said twenty five cents, but it looked like
22:15
Speaker 1: they bumped it up after a while, and children under
22:18
Speaker 1: twelve were half that according to articles there. Of course,
22:24
Speaker 1: we're a bunch of physical descriptions of her appearance, and
22:30
Speaker 1: in articles and in letters, and so by way of
22:35
Speaker 1: somebody else's description of her, not her description of herself,
22:39
Speaker 1: I will tell y'all what they said she looked like.
22:42
Speaker 1: So there was a November article in the Vermont Courier
22:45
Speaker 1: that described her this way. She is short, but rather
22:48
Speaker 1: robust in stature. Her features are pleasing, her forehead high
22:52
Speaker 1: and protuberant, and her face round and full, with two
22:56
Speaker 1: languishing black eyes placed with the peculiarly it's a hard word,
23:04
Speaker 1: that is really hard, obliquity of her outer angle, which
23:08
Speaker 1: characterized a Mongolian. I guess that's how you pronounced that
23:12
Speaker 1: variety of the human race from which these people are descended.
23:16
Speaker 1: So the article later says that she was quote much
23:19
Speaker 1: pleased with our country and not at all homesick. I'm
23:23
Speaker 1: not sure. I'm really not quite sure how they reached that.
23:28
Speaker 1: I'm assuming. I'm assuming it's an assumption, because the article
23:31
Speaker 1: doesn't say that she said it. It says it is
23:33
Speaker 1: said that, So I don't know if those are words
23:36
Speaker 1: from her mouth or not. But as you would imagine,
23:39
Speaker 1: all of the things that we were talking about earlier,
23:40
Speaker 1: like the nativism and the patriots, is all those things
23:43
Speaker 1: that are probably happening I have to do with that.
23:46
Speaker 1: But that's my assumption as well. Yeah, So over the
23:49
Speaker 1: next decade, there were a lot more articles written about
23:53
Speaker 1: a fonoy Um, And as you can see about that
23:57
Speaker 1: kind of description and what we've talked about earlier, a
23:59
Speaker 1: lot of them were very orientalist, mothering and really grossly
24:04
Speaker 1: doting and patronizing um. And I'll pull out a quote
24:09
Speaker 1: from an article that tal Zog wrote in teen that
24:14
Speaker 1: was called the start of American Accommodation of the Chinese
24:17
Speaker 1: Aphong Boys experience from eighteen fifty UM, just because I
24:21
Speaker 1: feel like it's a good way too to put it um,
24:24
Speaker 1: And this is what said. Her very presence as the
24:28
Speaker 1: first recorded Chinese woman on American soil prompted a heated
24:33
Speaker 1: national discussion regarding how to accommodate the Chinese living among Americans.
24:38
Speaker 1: A two tier paradigm that emerged from this dialogue disparaged
24:42
Speaker 1: Chinese culture while extending paternalistic care Toimi, pushing her toward acculturation,
24:48
Speaker 1: which was to be realized in a symbolic way after
24:51
Speaker 1: her disappearance from the exhibition stage. And that is the
24:59
Speaker 1: paternalism that's just so apparent in her story. Is it's
25:04
Speaker 1: so gross, and like to also think that she was young,
25:08
Speaker 1: like she was actually very young at the time as
25:11
Speaker 1: a as a layer to that, and that that eventually
25:15
Speaker 1: did turn into hostility and specifically anti Chinese sentiment and action.
25:23
Speaker 1: Um of course, but it's kind of important to layer
25:28
Speaker 1: that in what was happening in the US at the
25:30
Speaker 1: top two, which was obviously many things, like many things
25:32
Speaker 1: are happening at once in the eighteen thirties, but some
25:35
Speaker 1: of the things were like Andrew Jackson was president, the
25:39
Speaker 1: Indian Removal Act became law in eighteen thirties, so just
25:43
Speaker 1: a few years before A fat Boy got to the US,
25:46
Speaker 1: and of course millions of people were enslaved in the
25:50
Speaker 1: United States. So there was an idealistic view of China
25:57
Speaker 1: at the time, the Opium War still had started taking
26:00
Speaker 1: place yet that would start happening soon. But there was
26:04
Speaker 1: this view of China that was influenced by the goods
26:08
Speaker 1: and by the letters of people that have been there. Um.
26:12
Speaker 1: So it was very very narrow view of what China
26:16
Speaker 1: and Chinese people were. If you can't even you can't
26:20
Speaker 1: even really group that into a whole thing. So but
26:23
Speaker 1: that that was it was a very limited view. So
26:27
Speaker 1: it's it's really unclear exactly how many people went to
26:30
Speaker 1: see ff On Boy, but it was in the thousands.
26:33
Speaker 1: Some people didn't record their experiences with her, and most
26:37
Speaker 1: of them were of the middle and the upper middle classes.
26:43
Speaker 1: After she got to the US, there were some really
26:46
Speaker 1: odd stories that popped up about her in the newspapers.
26:50
Speaker 1: There was one that she had never seen a left
26:52
Speaker 1: handed person before. Okay, yeah, there was ones that were
27:01
Speaker 1: saying she disappeared, um or she left or something like that.
27:05
Speaker 1: But when her exhibition finally opened, people came to ogle
27:10
Speaker 1: her and her bound feet, and according to newspapers, kind
27:15
Speaker 1: of in those early times, she didn't really like it
27:17
Speaker 1: when men tried to get a closer look at her feet,
27:20
Speaker 1: but wasn't as opposed to it when women would try
27:23
Speaker 1: to get it closer look at her feet at Tongue
27:26
Speaker 1: was the name of her interpreter, and he would help
27:29
Speaker 1: her communicate with visitors and also make sure that she
27:32
Speaker 1: would get out of her seat to walk around across
27:36
Speaker 1: the room for people from time to time. And there
27:39
Speaker 1: were plenty of people in New York in the beginning
27:42
Speaker 1: who did go to see her, but some did object
27:45
Speaker 1: to the way she was displayed as exploitation. Some people
27:50
Speaker 1: objected to the fact that her feet were bound, saying,
27:54
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, it's a disgrace that she was being
27:57
Speaker 1: you know, harmed by her feet being bound. Um. And
28:01
Speaker 1: just generally, I guess being and clear about like the
28:07
Speaker 1: custom of foot binding itself, um, and working through their
28:11
Speaker 1: feelings and thoughts on that after finally seeing it in person.
28:16
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. We have a little bit more for you,
28:18
Speaker 1: but first we have one more quick break for work
28:21
Speaker 1: from her sponsor, and we're back. Let's get back into it. Yeah. So,
28:38
Speaker 1: after her time in New York, she went on tour
28:41
Speaker 1: to other places across the US. For instance, she went
28:43
Speaker 1: to New Haven, she went to New Orleans, she went
28:46
Speaker 1: to Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, and she even ended up in
28:51
Speaker 1: Cuba and she would sing songs in Chinese and she
28:56
Speaker 1: was learning English all the while. And she she even
29:00
Speaker 1: met with Andrew Jackson in the White House. And it's
29:02
Speaker 1: not quite clear exactly what the reason for that was,
29:06
Speaker 1: but she did. And Captain o'bear and the Carnes did
29:12
Speaker 1: profit from her ticket sales, but they made more in
29:16
Speaker 1: the long run from the sales of the Chinese goods,
29:18
Speaker 1: like the ones that were in display in the rooms
29:20
Speaker 1: that she was in. So things like vass mirrors, lamps, chairs,
29:25
Speaker 1: all of the sort of decordive objects of furniture were
29:28
Speaker 1: things that they were able to sell because of her exhibitions. Yeah, so,
29:34
Speaker 1: of course the whole foot binding thing was the thing
29:37
Speaker 1: that was an anomaly or like so fascinating to so
29:40
Speaker 1: many people who visited her and got really um invasive
29:46
Speaker 1: at times when people wanting to her to uncover her
29:49
Speaker 1: feet and measure her feet. And there were physicians actually
29:55
Speaker 1: in Philly who examined them. They begged to examine them,
29:58
Speaker 1: and they got to she scented and they took measurements
30:02
Speaker 1: and they published those measurements in the newspaper and later
30:06
Speaker 1: I think it was in Charleston when she uncovered her
30:08
Speaker 1: feet again and this time for the ticketed public to see.
30:12
Speaker 1: So the story goes on and on like that of
30:14
Speaker 1: her in all these cities, in these exhibitions, acting as
30:19
Speaker 1: a performer, introducing real, live in the flesh Chinese culture
30:24
Speaker 1: and Chinese personhood two people. And those exhibitions created US
30:30
Speaker 1: interests and called Chinese culture and society, which there already
30:33
Speaker 1: was before, but it kind of hyped that up in
30:35
Speaker 1: addition to selling the goods. And she didn't really have
30:40
Speaker 1: a home though, so she was just traveling all the
30:43
Speaker 1: time to all these different shows, and she really depended
30:45
Speaker 1: a lot on her managers. And everything wasn't so sweet
30:51
Speaker 1: with the Carns though, Like everything wasn't always good with
30:53
Speaker 1: their business. Um they fell on hard times when the
30:56
Speaker 1: Panic of eighteen thirties seven hit, which was a kind
31:00
Speaker 1: of a financial crisis that kind of led to a depression. Um,
31:04
Speaker 1: So they were bringing in so many goods but didn't
31:07
Speaker 1: necessarily have the audience or the consumers to be able
31:10
Speaker 1: to pick that stuff up. And then all this other
31:12
Speaker 1: stuff and in the US economics was happening at the
31:15
Speaker 1: same time that didn't bode well for the business, and
31:19
Speaker 1: Afon Moy around that time was supposedly abandoned Um and
31:26
Speaker 1: lived in poor conditions in New Jersey, and she spent
31:29
Speaker 1: several years there according to documents, But interests in goods
31:33
Speaker 1: Chinese goods did resurface later in the late eighteen forties,
31:38
Speaker 1: and in eighteen forty eight she and Tom Thumb shared
31:41
Speaker 1: an exhibition space under P. T. Barnum, whose history is
31:45
Speaker 1: like a whole other thing, um that is a lot
31:48
Speaker 1: of displaying of like it's super controversial history. But she
31:53
Speaker 1: fell out of favor with Barnum after a while as well.
31:56
Speaker 1: And Moi was in the US until around eighteen fifty
32:01
Speaker 1: as far as we know, like that's not the official date,
32:05
Speaker 1: saying like, oh she left after that, but at that
32:07
Speaker 1: point records started of her disappeared, um, And that's kind
32:13
Speaker 1: of where her story in letters ends, like where her
32:16
Speaker 1: story in writing ends, as far as we know. And
32:20
Speaker 1: that was also around the time things were changing a
32:23
Speaker 1: lot in the U. S I mean, during her time
32:24
Speaker 1: here that we do know about, we know things were changing.
32:27
Speaker 1: So the mass immigration of Chinese people to the US
32:30
Speaker 1: begin in the late eighteen forties early eighteen fifties, views
32:33
Speaker 1: of Chinese people were changing, so Americans were increasingly to
32:38
Speaker 1: writing her clothing and her customs and Chinese clothing and
32:42
Speaker 1: customs in general, and her religious beliefs and Chinese religious
32:46
Speaker 1: beliefs were being criticized by moral reformers and other Christians
32:50
Speaker 1: in the US and the Opium Wars. Like I mentioned earlier,
32:54
Speaker 1: we're starting up and trade with China, like Chinese US
32:58
Speaker 1: relations and Chinese goods. All of that was changing at
33:02
Speaker 1: the time, and it was a build up to kind
33:07
Speaker 1: of I mean, so much stuff was happening at this
33:09
Speaker 1: at the time, but there was also kind of things
33:12
Speaker 1: that happened later around the eighties when the Chinese Exclusion
33:17
Speaker 1: Act was introduced and very specific anti Chinese legislation UM
33:23
Speaker 1: and actions were being taken on in federal and local scales.
33:28
Speaker 1: So it kind of just feels like this bubble in
33:31
Speaker 1: time um afon Moise story does, where she was there
33:36
Speaker 1: to see that transition. It was also part of that
33:38
Speaker 1: transition of while this mystical place that China was and
33:43
Speaker 1: then wow, this place that maybe isn't so great in
33:48
Speaker 1: our eyes that we thought before, you know, we feel
33:52
Speaker 1: a certain way about it now. Um and all this
33:55
Speaker 1: nativism creeping in all this you know, racism and in
33:59
Speaker 1: those kind of some and that's creeping in. So yeah,
34:01
Speaker 1: it just feels like I really wish I knew a
34:04
Speaker 1: lot more about her story and like what happened to
34:06
Speaker 1: her after after Yeah, and it is looking back at
34:14
Speaker 1: what we do have, it is such a it's strange
34:17
Speaker 1: looking at ads with her in them. And um, I
34:22
Speaker 1: would recommend to anyone who's interested in learning more because
34:25
Speaker 1: it is a very interesting story, um looking into that
34:29
Speaker 1: and uh huh, Yeah, it is just such a specific
34:34
Speaker 1: time and to read some of it, it's so kind
34:39
Speaker 1: of pro American and saying, look, compared to this, how
34:43
Speaker 1: much better, how more much more superior we are, um,
34:48
Speaker 1: especially towards the end, as you say, when attitude shifted.
34:52
Speaker 1: But yeah, I wish we knew more about her too.
34:54
Speaker 1: And I know there's a lot of interest because isn't
34:56
Speaker 1: there a movie that there's a book? But was a
35:00
Speaker 1: play about other play? Yeah? Yeah, okay, yeah, And I
35:06
Speaker 1: didn't see the play itself, but what I read about
35:08
Speaker 1: the play was that it was kind of attempting to
35:11
Speaker 1: be from a f on war's perspective, which is a
35:13
Speaker 1: lot that we haven't gotten through documentation since it was
35:15
Speaker 1: from other people's perspectives, and obviously that was that's something
35:18
Speaker 1: that I would love to know more about. Two, like
35:20
Speaker 1: what did aff On Boy herself think about? And even
35:23
Speaker 1: in the phrasing that people would give from the interpreter
35:26
Speaker 1: a tongue, I was like, is this really what she said?
35:28
Speaker 1: Or is this what you wanted to tell people that
35:30
Speaker 1: she said? Yeah, right, yeah, I know. I I would
35:35
Speaker 1: love so much to know the motivations for her, even
35:40
Speaker 1: though it was her father was involved in that decision,
35:43
Speaker 1: but just how does she felt and thought and when
35:45
Speaker 1: she was making this journey and then when she arrived.
35:48
Speaker 1: There was one report I read, because it was back
35:50
Speaker 1: and forth, that that was possible that she left to
35:53
Speaker 1: send money back to the family, the father or something
35:57
Speaker 1: like that. But I don't know how in of this
36:00
Speaker 1: is true. I think that was just one report out
36:02
Speaker 1: of you know, the majority was saying that it was
36:04
Speaker 1: a father that pretty much said she could go, rather
36:07
Speaker 1: than the other way around. But I just wondered if
36:09
Speaker 1: that was possibility as well, because it's, yeah, it's story
36:12
Speaker 1: like those way, you don't have a lot of understanding,
36:16
Speaker 1: and because she does disappear, which kind of names like
36:19
Speaker 1: the theme for this time frame for many of historical
36:24
Speaker 1: like figures um that you kind of wonder what did happen?
36:27
Speaker 1: And and for me like was it tragic? Was she
36:29
Speaker 1: able to get out of it? What happened? Right? Yeah?
36:33
Speaker 1: And I would I would love to know her thoughts
36:35
Speaker 1: on the performance, like, yeah, what was she really interested in?
36:42
Speaker 1: Like did she continue? I know she went on to
36:44
Speaker 1: barn them, but after that she still continued to perform.
36:47
Speaker 1: Did she enjoy it as a livelihood or was it
36:49
Speaker 1: just something that she had to do out of necessities,
36:51
Speaker 1: like you said, to send money back to her family,
36:53
Speaker 1: or yeah, what was her agency? In her own words
36:57
Speaker 1: as well? So so many questions eight yes, same questions
37:03
Speaker 1: mysteries of history as they say, Okay, I have heard that,
37:07
Speaker 1: but yeah, that makes sense. I say that all the time.
37:10
Speaker 1: Maybe it's just me, he's heurism and anyism, but yeah,
37:15
Speaker 1: it's it's almost tragic to say because she was put
37:17
Speaker 1: on a display at the same time, like I saw
37:20
Speaker 1: one report saying again, this is just probably an assumption
37:24
Speaker 1: again a bigger stereotype of her being a quote lotus blossom.
37:28
Speaker 1: On one hand, in her like uh, you know, mannerism,
37:31
Speaker 1: but then also the perpetuating but she was fierce tiger
37:35
Speaker 1: as well. Like those two stereotypes came into play at
37:38
Speaker 1: the same time, like how are you both how is
37:40
Speaker 1: she both playing like that? But why was that the
37:43
Speaker 1: descriptor for her? And that was like the perpetuating of
37:46
Speaker 1: the continued stereotype of Asian women in general. Yeah, and
37:51
Speaker 1: we've talked about like um as Western countries were getting
37:55
Speaker 1: these depictions of um Asian women Chinese women for the
38:00
Speaker 1: first time and fetishizing and exoticizing that and things you
38:04
Speaker 1: get like Madama butterflies happening, that kind of whole Asian
38:08
Speaker 1: dollar stereotype, which we talked about. And then I was
38:11
Speaker 1: fascinated with this. I learned this is I mean, I
38:14
Speaker 1: haven't dug too deep into this, but I learned that
38:16
Speaker 1: that's why t is sort of viewed as feminine and
38:21
Speaker 1: coffee is more masking because we associated tea with China
38:26
Speaker 1: with Asia and yeah, yeah, and um just things like
38:31
Speaker 1: that where you it really shows how big these impact
38:36
Speaker 1: these stereotypes have. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He didn't figure a
38:41
Speaker 1: lot into the story of the stuff that the Carns
38:43
Speaker 1: were importing and was accessible, like a lot of cheaper
38:48
Speaker 1: teas that were coming from China were accessible to a
38:50
Speaker 1: lot of people in the US at the time. Um. Yeah,
38:54
Speaker 1: it's so layered and so so many stories within the story,
39:00
Speaker 1: and she's kind of a mystery on our own because
39:02
Speaker 1: you don't really hear from her or any perspective from
39:05
Speaker 1: her in general. Yeah, yeah, my, but um, the story
39:14
Speaker 1: is fascinating and I am glad you once again you
39:19
Speaker 1: brought something to my attention that I had never heard
39:21
Speaker 1: about before. I've never heard of alread either. I love it, Yes,
39:25
Speaker 1: thank you as always, Eves. I can't wait to do
39:29
Speaker 1: it again. Where can the listeners find you? You can
39:33
Speaker 1: find me on the line at eve stef co and
39:35
Speaker 1: eve steffic on Twitter I am at not apologizing on Instagram.
39:40
Speaker 1: You can also listen to the podcast This Day in
39:43
Speaker 1: History Class, which is a daily podcast about things that
39:48
Speaker 1: happen to history and birthdays in history. And you can
39:50
Speaker 1: also hear me on I'm Popular. Yeah, and you should
39:55
Speaker 1: do go check all of that out listeners. Um, and
39:58
Speaker 1: in the meantime, you'd like to email us, you can
40:02
Speaker 1: our email is stuff Media mom Stuff at iHeart media
40:05
Speaker 1: dot com. You can fight us on Twitter at mom
40:07
Speaker 1: Stuff podcast or on Instagram at stuff I Never Told You.
40:10
Speaker 1: Thanks It's always to your super producer Andrew Howard. Thank you.
40:14
Speaker 1: Thanks to you for listening Stuff I Never Told You
40:16
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