H68.86.1

 Back to Search Results

1890's
H68.86.1

Beginners Platform, 10/1978





Photographs. Description: Photograph - Chinese Vegetable Vendor - Door to Door. Merchant pictured with bar across shoulders, basket at each end of bar. notation on back of photo. "Chinese Vegetable man, Berkeley 1890's. From the History Information Station: Object: Photograph of Bong, a Chinese vegetable vendor. History: Bong was an early door-to-door salesman who brought fresh vegetables to the householders of Berkeley in the 1890s. Plying his route along Channing Way, Bong carried upwards of one hundred pounds of fresh produce in the two baskets suspended from a carrying pole. On Fridays, he added a shallow tray of fresh fish to his load. Chinese vendors, known collectively as the Basket Brigade, were the only source of fresh produce in the east Bay until the late 1870s.

Picture This Information

This artifact is part of the OMCA's Picture This website. More about the context and history of this artifact is available at Picture This.

About the Picture This web project: California's Perspectives on American History is a resource for teachers and students to learn about the experiences of diverse peoples of California by using primary source images from the Oakland Museum of California's collections. Organized into 11 time periods spanning from pre-1769 to the present, more than 300 photographs, drawings, posters, and prints tell stories from the perspectives of different ethnic groups. Historical contexts are provided to offer a framework of California's role in relation to American history.

The National Archives state that primary sources, "fascinate students because they are real and they are personal: history is humanized through them." Picture This invites students to examine the historical record, encouraging them to connect history with real people and explore how images tell stories and convey historical evidence about the human experience. History becomes more than just a series of facts, dates, and events.      

Bookmark and Share