Yem-Po: Chinese Labor Camp

A century-old Chinese encampment buried in the creek embankment below Chabot dam was unearthed during a 1979 renovation of the dam. California State University Hayward students excavated more than 60,000 artifacts, revealing the life, diet, and work habits of the 800 Chinese people who worked on Chabot dam from 1874 to 1892. Soy pots and stoneware rice bowls reflected familiar foods, while remnants of imported turtle and perhaps wild cat indicated the use of traditional medicines for vitality. Opium bowls and related items showed the enjoyment of an ancient pastime, and rusting metal tool fragments reflected tasks similar to those performed by many in the Sierra gold mines and on railways. The excavators named the historic work camp Yema-po, Cantonese for wild-horse slope, acknowledging the laborers' role in running horses across the dam to compact the soil during construction. Among 20,000 animal bones found at Yema-po, 70 percent were pig, indicating a diet much heavier in pork than that of their Euro-American counterparts, and remains of cuttlefish, duck, turtle, and rare fish such as puffer fish were also found.

Oakland, California · United States