HOME
*





On Leong Chinese Merchants Association
The On Leong Chinese Merchants Association () or simply Chinese Merchants Association, formerly known as the On Leong Tong (), is a tong society operating out of its territory in Mott Street in New York's Chinatown. Established in November 1893, the tong fought a violent war for control of Chinatown's rackets and businesses with the Hip Sing Tong. In recent years the Tong has been linked to the Ghost Shadows street gang led by Wing Yeung Chan The Ghost Shadows or GSS () was a Chinese American street gang that was prominent in New York City's Chinatown from the early 1970s to the mid 1990s. Formed in 1971 by immigrants from Taiwan and Hong Kong, the gang is affiliated with the On Leon .... Currently, there are over 30,000 registered On Leong members, the majority of them with a commercial or industrial background. References Further reading *Denny LeeYears of the DragonsInformation on the history of Ghost Shadows, ''New York Times'', May 11, 2003. *MacIllwain, Jeffrey Scot ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Tong (organization)
A ''tong'' ()Chin, Ko-lin. "Chinatowns and Tongs". ''In Chinese Subculture and Criminality: Non-Traditional Crime Groups in America''. New York: Greenwood Press, 1990 is a type of organization found among Chinese immigrants predominantly living in the United States, with smaller numbers in Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom. In Chinese, the word ''tong'' means "hall" or "gathering place". These organizations are described as secret societies or sworn brotherhoods and are often tied to criminal activity. In the 1990s, in most American Chinatowns, clearly marked ''tong'' halls could easily be found, many of which have had affiliations with Chinese organized crime.Peter Huston. ''Tongs, Gangs, and Triads: Chinese Crime Groups in North America'' (1995) Paladin Press, Boulder CO These associations often provide services for Chinatown communities such as immigrant counseling, Chinese schools, and English classes for adults. ''Tongs'' follow the pattern of secret societies com ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Mott Street
Mott Street () is a narrow but busy thoroughfare that runs in a north–south direction in the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is regarded as Chinatown's unofficial " Main Street". Mott Street runs from Bleecker Street in the north to Chatham Square in the south. It is a one-way street with southbound-running vehicular traffic only. History Early configuration Mott Street existed in its current configuration by the mid-18th century. At that time, Mott Street passed just to the east of the Collect Pond; Collect Park today is three blocks to the west at Centre Street. Like many streets that predated Manhattan's grid, Mott Street meandered around natural features of the landscape rather than running through or over them. It was the need to avoid the now-long since paved-over Collect Pond that gave Mott Street its characteristic "bend" to the northeast at Pell Street. Having been previously known as Old Street, as well as Winne Street (also spelled Wynne) for the secti ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Chinatown, Manhattan
Manhattan's Chinatown () is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City, bordering the Lower East Side to its east, Little Italy to its north, Civic Center to its south, and Tribeca to its west. With an estimated population of 90,000 to 100,000 people, Chinatown is home to the highest concentration of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere.* * * * * Manhattan's Chinatown is also one of the oldest Chinese ethnic enclaves. The Manhattan Chinatown is one of nine Chinatown neighborhoods in New York City, as well as one of twelve in the New York metropolitan area, which contains the largest ethnic Chinese population outside of Asia, comprising an estimated 893,697 uniracial individuals as of 2017. Historically, Chinatown was primarily populated by Cantonese speakers. However, in the 1980s and 1990s, large numbers of Fuzhounese-speaking immigrants also arrived and formed a sub-neighborhood annexed to the eastern portion of Chinatown east of The Bowery, which has beco ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Gang
A gang is a group or society of associates, friends or members of a family with a defined leadership and internal organization that identifies with or claims control over territory in a community and engages, either individually or collectively, in illegal, and possibly violent, behavior. Definition The word "gang" derives from the past participle of Old English ''gan'', meaning "to go". It is cognate with Old Norse ''gangr'', meaning "journey." It typically means a group of people, and may have neutral, positive or negative connotations depending on usage. History In discussing the banditry in American history, Barrington Moore, Jr. suggests that gangsterism as a "form of self-help which victimizes others" may appear in societies which lack strong "forces of law and order"; he characterizes European feudalism as "mainly gangsterism that had become society itself and acquired respectability through the notions of chivalry". The 17th century saw London "terrorized by ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Hip Sing Tong
The Hip Sing Association or HSA (), formerly known as the Hip Sing Tong (), is a Chinese-American criminal organization/gang formed as a labor organization in New York City's Chinatown during the early 20th century (perhaps c. 1904). The Cantonese name "Hip Sing" ( 協 勝) translates roughly to "cooperating for success." The Hip Sing Tong, along with their rivals the Four Brothers and the On Leong Tong, would be involved in violent Tong wars for control of Chinatown during the early 1900s. During the 1930s and 1940s, the Hip Sings were involved in drug trafficking operations with the Kuomintang (KMT) and later the Office of Policy Coordination (OPC). They would later establish chapters in Chinese-American communities throughout the United States in major cities such as Chicago, Seattle and San Francisco (the latter being subject to a major drug raid by authorities in 1996). Recently some branches have begun to transform back into the legitimate fraternal organization they sta ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Ghost Shadows
The Ghost Shadows or GSS () was a Chinese American street gang that was prominent in New York City's Chinatown from the early 1970s to the mid 1990s. Formed in 1971 by immigrants from Taiwan and Hong Kong, the gang is affiliated with the On Leong Tong. They adopted the colors black and white as their clothing to match the name of the set. Throughout the 80s, the gang was often engaged in bloody turf wars with other Chinatown gangs such as the older Flying Dragons, affiliated with Hip Sing Tong and the Division Street Boys affiliated with Tung On Association, and their activities included extortion, kidnapping, murder, racketeering, drug trafficking and illegal gambling. The Ghost Shadows' influence was widespread, having links to Chinatowns in other cities as well as links to Sicilian-American Mafia families. The organization is defunct due to Federal RICO crackdowns during the 1990s. Members Wing Yeung Chan Wing Yeung Chan was president of On Leong Tong and for a decade the le ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Wing Yeung Chan
The Ghost Shadows or GSS () was a Chinese American street gang that was prominent in New York City's Chinatown from the early 1970s to the mid 1990s. Formed in 1971 by immigrants from Taiwan and Hong Kong, the gang is affiliated with the On Leong Tong. They adopted the colors black and white as their clothing to match the name of the set. Throughout the 80s, the gang was often engaged in bloody turf wars with other Chinatown gangs such as the older Flying Dragons, affiliated with Hip Sing Tong and the Division Street Boys affiliated with Tung On Association, and their activities included extortion, kidnapping, murder, racketeering, drug trafficking and illegal gambling. The Ghost Shadows' influence was widespread, having links to Chinatowns in other cities as well as links to Sicilian-American Mafia families. The organization is defunct due to Federal RICO crackdowns during the 1990s. Members Wing Yeung Chan Wing Yeung Chan was president of On Leong Tong and for a decade the le ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Chinese-American Organizations
Chinese Americans are Americans of Han Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans along with their ancestors trace lineage from mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, as well as other regions which are inhabited by large populations of the Chinese diaspora, especially Southeast Asia and some other countries such as Australia, Canada, France, South Africa, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Chinese-Americans include Chinese from the Chinese circle and around the world who became naturalized U.S. citizens and their natural-born descendants in the United States. The Chinese American community is the largest overseas Chinese community outside Asia. It is also the third largest community in the Chinese diaspora, behind the Chinese communities in Thailand and Malaysia. The 2016 Community Survey of the US Census estimates a population of Chines ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Chinese-American Culture In New York City
Chinese Americans are Americans of Han Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans along with their ancestors trace lineage from mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, as well as other regions which are inhabited by large populations of the Chinese diaspora, especially Southeast Asia and some other countries such as Australia, Canada, France, South Africa, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Chinese-Americans include Chinese from the Chinese circle and around the world who became naturalized U.S. citizens and their natural-born descendants in the United States. The Chinese American community is the largest overseas Chinese community outside Asia. It is also the third largest community in the Chinese diaspora, behind the Chinese communities in Thailand and Malaysia. The 2016 Community Survey of the US Census estimates a population of Chinese ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Gangs In New York City
A gang is a group or society of associates, friends or members of a family with a defined leadership and internal organization that identifies with or claims control over territory in a community and engages, either individually or collectively, in illegal, and possibly violent, behavior. Definition The word "gang" derives from the past participle of Old English ''gan'', meaning "to go". It is cognate with Old Norse ''gangr'', meaning "journey." It typically means a group of people, and may have neutral, positive or negative connotations depending on usage. History In discussing the banditry in American history, Barrington Moore, Jr. suggests that gangsterism as a "form of self-help which victimizes others" may appear in societies which lack strong "forces of law and order"; he characterizes European feudalism as "mainly gangsterism that had become society itself and acquired respectability through the notions of chivalry". The 17th century saw London "terrorized ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]