Here's some random stuff I recently found about Patricia Joe (Chow Kwun-ling), a Chinese-American actress who got her start in San Francisco at Joseph Sunn Jue's Grandview Film Company before becoming a big star in Hong Kong after World War II.
First up is a short blurb about Patricia that accompanied the above photograph in the "Interesting People" section of The American Magazine (March, 1945). Once the United States had entered World War II, Chinese began to be portrayed in the American media as the "good" Asians, while Japanese were demonized as the "evil" Asians. What didn't change, however, was that good ol' American ineptness when talking about other cultures. The description of Patricia as a Chinese Hedy Lamarr is a little out of left field.
A Gal Named Joe
In San Francisco's Chinatown the Chinese population of America has its own Hollywood. And the Hedy Lamarr of the lot is shapely, 21-year-old Patricia Joe, who works days in a business firm as a secretary and does her heavy emoting at night in front of the cameras of the Grandview Film Company, the world's leading producer of Chinese films. She is paid $300 a picture. Pat's real name is Joe Quan Ling, which means Universal Brightness Joe. Daughter of a tobacco merchant, Pat was born in Hawaii. She always wanted to be an actress, and finally made the grade when she got a bit in a solid Cantonese sender called The Lovers' Reunion. However, it was really in her second picture that Pat got her wheels off the ground. This epic was called The Calamity of a Country, or The Miser's Fate. When the release of this job came about, little Miss Joe won her way into the heart of every oriental film fan from San Francisco to the Chinese Theater in New York. None of her pictures have reached China, because of the war, but as soon as the Japs are chased out, Universal Brightness Joe will have a chance to shine in the East.
Next is this darkly humorous photo and caption from the February 1939 issue of Chinese Digest, the first English-language periodical written by and for second-generation Chinese Americans. The Chinese characters in the background mean "to resist" or "to boycott". At the time, Japan's war machine was being fueled by scrap iron from the United States. Chinese Americans were active in picketing the ships containing this cargo. They also initiated boycotts of Japanese products such as silk, one of Japan's leading exports.
You Will, Will You?
This appears to be what Catherine Joe is saying to her sister, Patricia, as the former aims a gun at the latter for wearing silk stockings. These two misses are actively helping the committee of the China War Relief Association in their campaign to bring about a U.S. embargo of all war materials to Japan, and also the boycott of Japanese goods.
Finally, here are two photos from the San Francisco Public Library's Historical Photograph Collection, which I will respectfully not reproduce here on blog. Just follow the links!
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