Resources for Asian American & Pacific Islander Heritage Month

May is Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month. Today we’re featuring AAPI resources from Archives and Special Collections, including books and pamphlets, and papers from our manuscript collections.

Featured Books and Pamphlets

Within our special collections, we have various unique books and pamphlets that speak to Asian American and Pacific Islander heritage. All of these books are available to view during our open hours.

Chinese cookery in the home kitchen; being recipes for the preparation of the most popular Chinese dishes at home. (1911)

Chinese cookery in the home kitchen is known as the first Chinese cookbook published in English in the United States. The editor of this book, Jessie Louise Nolton, is a newspaper writer from Chicago who gathered these recipes from local Chinese eateries in her area. According to Nolton, all of the recipes are authentic or prepared in a traditional manner. The book includes a notes section after each recipe; in this copy of the book, the previous owner included their own handwritten recipe for Kidney Bean Stew.

None of the Chinese dishes permit of the substitution of strictly American ingredients, therefore no so-called Americanized recipes are given.”

Author, Jessie Louise Nolton

Suminagashi-zome (1991)

This book is the first English translation of Tokutaro Yagi’s specific techniques for suminagashi-zome or “floating ink.” Suminagashi-zome is a Japanese art of marbling on paper or silk by floating color—usually black, red, or blue—on water and making it spread to form jagged flowing lines. These patterns mimic natural forms such as wood grains, water currents, or wind patterns in a rice field.

Keep Exploring AAPI Heritage with our Book and Pamphlet Collections

In addition to the books mentioned above, you find more books and pamphlets that directly relate to Asian American and Pacific Islander history and culture with these collections:

• Asian American History and Culture Collection
• Chinese Cookbook Collection

Other collections that may have similar subjects include:

• Walter Goldwater Radical Pamphlet Collection
• Political Movements and Social Issues Collection

Available Manuscript Collections

According to the Federal Asian Pacific American Council, the theme for this year’s heritage month is Advancing Leaders Through Opportunity. Archives and Special Collections stewards the papers of various individuals who reflect this theme. The following list of manuscript collections highlights a few of our collections that reflect leaders in the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities:

• Koda Family Papers
• Frank X. Ogasawara Papers
• Isao Fujimoto Papers
• Rosemary Chan Papers and Photographs
• Pioneering Punjabis Digital Archive
• Earn Hong Photograph Albums
• K.W. Lee Papers
• Nanao Sakaki Collection
• Steffi San Buenaventura Papers

Explore more of our manuscript collections here.

If you would like to view any of these collections, remember to request materials ahead of time.