Here, a group of Chinese American men pose together in a building at 420 Eighth Avenue South in Seattle's Chinatown International District. The men were in town to attend the fourth annual convention of the Eng Family Association, hosted by Lock Tin Eng, president of the Seattle chapter. The convention drew 37 Eng family members from all over the country and from as far away as Hong Kong.

Traditionally, members of the Eng family lived around Canton in Southern China. When emigration increased to the U. S. in the 19th and 20th centuries, members of the first generation created local chapters of the Eng Family Association to maintain close cultural ties with their homeland and other immigrant relatives. The Eng Family Association chapters held regular meetings, events, and national conferences. Formal meetings of the association were conducted in a special parliamentary dialect that was increasingly unfamiliar to subsequent generations born in the U. S. By the time of the 1962 convention pictured here, discussions were underway to use colloquial Chinese and English rather than the formal dialect during meetings. In order to promote closer ties with their young people, the theme of the convention was, "Strengthening of Family Ties for a Stronger Nation."

Sign on building: Hip Wah Hing

Caption information source: "The Eng Family Gets Together," by Jay Schille, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, September 26, 1962, pp. 4.