The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1907-07-27
rHr 5APAN1zATIoN on FRISCO.
How Thrifty Japs Are Acquiring Bust
ness and Property in San Francisco.

| ness IfOptIAg IL - N@AHSAHNOf
Most people imagine, now that San
Frahcisco's oriental school problem has
ceased to be a nine days wonder to
the world, that her difficulties with the
japanese are settled. This, however, is
far from being the case. OF San Fran
cisco's troubles over the little brown
men the keynote has only been sound
ed, and the future bids fair to prove
prolific in new phases of the Nipponese
problem. A bone of contention growing
daily more important as casus belli is
the invasion of San Franchises CLOSE
in" residence districts by the Japanese
merchant and tradesman, who are con-
verting the abode of the American cler-
Iical, professional and business man in
to shops bazars, hotels and other pub
lie establishments to such an extent
that the men Of the fiat and furnished
room in that vast area fianking the
business district are being rapidly BAN
Iished from their homes. To those un-
acquainted with conditions San Fran
ciscan this may seem absurd. The
explanation is simple.
Let us take the example Of the pros
porous small merchant or professional
man with a family and a seven-room
fiat. We will recite the case of Blank,
who has store in the new business
district He has lived for years In Geary
Post, Bush, Pine, or Suffer street,
somewhere between Van Ness avenue
and the park, or on one Of the cross
streets between Sacramento and Mar
ket-which gives us, for the sake of ar
gument, several square miles to choose
from. Before the fire Blank paid $40,
and after it $50, which is about the
limit of his purse. Then the landlord
demands another $40 increase. Blank
protests, but, finally, sublets the front
parlor" and hands over the $50. After
about go days, notice of a raise to SIS
is given. Blank calls on the agent
and has heart-to-heart talk with
him.
"This is an outrage" he says, with
out circumlocution. You are asking
about 20 per cent. interest on the val
lie of the property. l can't stand it..
1t is unjust The neighborhood is de-
teriorating. Japanese barber shops and
pool-rooms are starting in the same
block. Japanese children play with my
youngsters. All the good people are
moving away" "Ah," exclaims the
agent 'There you have it. Blank The
Japs are offering more for your fiat
than l am asking you now l could
rent it for $10O inside of a week"
Then Blank forgets his anger in
amazement' and asks more questions.
He learns that the seven rooms in
which he quarters from six to eight
people, will provide Comfortable ac-
commodation" for half hundred little
brown men, women and children. The
basement will house barber shop,
laundry office and pool-room, with
bunking, cooking and eating facilities
for proprietor and employees. The front
parlor" will hold eight cots, for which
IS per month can easily be obtained.
The other rooms will contain without
difficulty from five to SIX cots or mats
each, including the combined dining
room and kitchen, where the cooks,
walters, chambermaidsi and proprietors
sleep with charming disregard for sex
conventions. The back porch is good for
five or six more guests.
Blank knows the multiplication table
and asks no more questions. He sub
mits to the inevitable and moves, as
many Of his contemporaries have al
ready done before him Here and there
the Jap encounters a property-ow
with Americansm enough to be OBJ
stinate. This delays, but does not
daunt him. If the property is not es-
Ipecially desirable, he passes it up"
temporarily, knowing that, by and by,
the white residents will move out of
Jap-ridden neighborhood. Thus it has
been on Geary street, which, for a dis
lance Of eight blocks, is largely Jap
anese Of habitation.- Especially Is this
the case on the block from Laguna to
Buchanan street, where there are but
two white tenants. AT Post and La
guna streets the ground floor OF a new
apartment-house has been rented to
Japanese, including a tailor, banker,
seed and notion merchant, and haber-
dasher. This is locality formerly de-
voted to high-class apartments and
adjoins the fashionable st. Hilaire
flats. Almost within stones throw are
the Majestic, Dorchester and Atherton
hotels, where the citys' elite lodge.
Thus it is all through the residence
district; not only the middle class has
been driven from home, but the man
sions of many Of the socially elect now
bear the curious twisted characters Of
the Nippon tongue. In the very shadow
Of old Trinity's august walls the Jap
anese merchant fourishes like a weed
and in the block opposite is line of
Japanese hotels, shops and offices, in
Gliding Buddhist mission, where weird
and noisy rituals compete with the
song services of the American place of
worship.
Some idea Of the Japanese invasion
may be gained from the fact that three
daily newspapers are successfully pub
lished in San Francisco, one of them,
the Japanese Daily New World hav-
ing a plant equipped with linotype
machines, presses of the latest design
and an equipment which compares IA
vorably with those of the American
dailies A metropolitan staff of report
ers and editors and advertising men
provide copy" for from eight to twelve
pages of printed matter, and the books
of the paper show a bona fide circula-
tinn of snrnnthiner like 40 non cnnins Thn