William Reese Company

Rare Depression-Era Chinese-American Phone Directory for San Francisco

CHINESE TELEPHONE DIRECTORY MARCH, 1933 SAN FRANCISCO.

[Chinese-American Directory]:

[San Francisco]: The Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company, 1933. 32pp. including illustrated advertisement. Original printed brown wrappers, stapled. Wrappers somewhat stained, beginning to tear around staples, two holes punched in upper left for hanging. Evenly tanned, some chips and insect holes in the margins, rarely touching text. Later newsletter article laid in. Good plus. Item #WRCAM57122

A Depression-era telephone directory published by the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company to serve San Francisco's considerable Chinese community, printed almost entirely in Chinese except for an advertisement on the final page which encourages telephone owners to use their phones for inter-city calls. The early 1930s were a difficult time for most Americans, particularly those who had emigrated from overseas. This directory was published the same year Prohibition was repealed and San Francisco's Chinatown began to rebuild as a tourist destination, employing a large number of those who were struggling with the Great Depression. Also laid in to this copy is a clipping from a later issue of Openline, Pacific Telephone's monthly newsletter. The clipping tells the story of the first coast- to-coast telephone ceremony in 1915, which included a conversation between the manager of San Francisco's Chinatown phone exchange and a Chinese passenger agent for Southern Pacific Railroad in Boston, with a photographic illustration of the San Francisco Chinese Telephone Exchange. Not individually cataloged on OCLC.

Price: $800.00