It was 11:30 Saturday morning in San Francisco. The date was April 6, 1975.
The phone rang in the editorial office of the Chinese Times. A reporter answered.
"This is KAAA," said the caller. "We should like to have your comment on the death of President Chiang Kai-shek."
The reporter didn't acknowledge his shock. "The managing editor will be back in a few minutes," he said. "Can you call back?"
"Sure, and thanks," said the voice from KAAA. The managing editor, Chen Kwei-fong, returned to minutes later to be told that President Chiang was dead.
His face reflecting his sorrow, the editor walked to the teletype and tore off the first takes of the story from Taipei.
The editor alerted the printing department and started to work on the story of a great man's passing. Only a few minutes later, the typesetters were hard at work on the copy. The editor read the proof quickly and story was ready for the making of an offset plate. Within half an hour, 2,000 copies had come from the press.
By 12:30 p.m., the Chinese Times was on the street with the biggest story it had carried in a long time. A huge headline in Chinese characters went up in the window of the newspaper's office at 119 Waverly Place. Written with traditional brush in black ink on white paper, the 12 characters said:
"A great star has fallen. President Chiang Kai-shek died today in Taipei."
The Chinese Times was already out and on the stands when the managing editor learned of the President's passing. The earlier edition was quickly withdrawn and the Chinese people of San Francisco learned the sad news.
This small Chinese paper was the first in California to publish the story, beating its English language counterparts by several hours. The fact that a newspaper is in the Chinese language does not necessarily detract from its enterprise.
The Chinese Times is one of the 10 Chinese language newspapers published in San Francisco's Chinatown. At 12,000, its circulation is the biggest. There are only 67,000 readers for the to papers and some circulations are measured in hundreds rather than thousands. The second ranking paper sells about 5,000 copies. Four are dailies. One is published twice a week and the rest are weeklies. One is published in both Chinese and English; the others are wholly in the Chinese language.
Political orientation and editorial point of view are important in determining the popularity and circulation of Chinese-language newspapers published in the United States. Most papers incline toward conservatism and support the Re public of China. A few are leftist and backers of the Chinese Communists. Only one San Francisco paper, the twice-a-week bilingual East West News, is unabashedly leftist. The Young China weekly is published by the San Francisco branch of the Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party) and follows policies laid down by party headquarters in Taipei. The Sing Tao Daily News is Hongkong oriented and read principally by Cantonese immigrants from the British crown colony.
One of the oldest of the Chinese papers published in San Francisco today, the Chinese Times is objectively on the right. It has the biggest readership, the biggest type and the largest size. It also has old-fashioned stereotyped layout and a dull look by comparison with some of its livelier and shriller competitors. The Chinese Times first saw the light of day on July 15, 1924, at the address where it is still printed. The first page of the first issue carried this opening statement written in classical Chinese and bylined "Reporter: "
"The Chinese American Citizens Alliance has had plans to set up its own organ of public opinion. These plans have been under consideration for several years. One accomplishment of these years was establishment of the United Publishing Company. However, it is soil not fully equipped and its achievements did not amount to much until today, when at long last the Chinese Times is born. Publication of the Chinese Times was not so much delayed as waited for. The deeper the roots, the more luxurious the foliage. The richer the fertilizer, the brighter the luster. We have been occupied with intensive preparations and careful organization so as to be ready for whatever may come. There are already many Chinese newspapers in the United States. So this venture could not be undertaken lightly and with out thorough preparation."
Despite this impressive beginning, the Chinese Times was the last of the San Francisco Chinatown papers to begin printing by the offset method. On March I, 1975, the paper was two hours late. That may not have seemed like much in the long stretch of 50 years of publishing. But to the editors, and maybe to some readers, this was a momentous event. In these two hours, the paper had moved from 15th century printing from movable type into the offset method of the 20th century.
An older and professionally operated Chinese daily is the Young China, whose beginnings go back to August 19, 1910. Established as a revolutionary paper to support Dr. Sun Yat-sen's efforts to overthrow the Manchus of the Ch'ing dynasty, this paper still has a circulation of 5,000. It is printed in small type and in two colors. Editorials and news policy conform to Kuomintang concepts.
The San Francisco Chinese paper with the biggest circulation makes a pitch for more readership. (File photo)
With a circulation in excess of 5,000, Sing Tao prints most of its paper from plates flown from Hongkong. Only the first and last pages are written and composed in San Francisco. This apparently is to the liking of former Hongkong residents. It also plunged the paper into trouble this year.
The San Francisco distributor of Sing Tao and the parent paper in Hongkong got into an argument about who owned what and took the matter to the courts. For a while, two editions of Sing Too vied for attention on newsstands. One was printed from the Hongkong plates and the other was put together in San Francisco. The court leaned toward the original Sing Tao and ordered the imitator to suspend publication pending further study of the case.
Among the weeklies, most have small circulations and support the Republic of China. They tend to be editorialized broadsides rather than professionally edited and composed newspapers. Truth, which comes out twice a week, is strongly anti-Communist but also has good pipelines to local wheeling and dealing. Gossip is included in the content. People like to read about big deals in Chinatown, just as elsewhere.
The Chinese Pacific Weekly is pro-Communist. It carries Peiping propaganda articles and pictures, advertises Chinese Communist cultural events and criticizes the U.S. government and its policies. To attract circulation, this paper also specializes in crime news and exaggerates Caucasian "persecution" of the Chinese and other minorities.
The People's News specializes in pro-American articles of political and economic analysis. These fill the first page every Saturday. Then come 27 pages of advertisements and novelettes. Fiction is a traditional attraction of Chinese journalism. Leading dailies of Taipei have literary pages and carry short stories or serialized novels. These papers in fact make up the best market for the free Chinese writer of fiction today. The fiction of the mainland is propaganda pure and simple. No self-respecting creator of literature would be caught dead writing the stuff.
The Cathay Times comes out on Wednesdays with many stories from sources in the Republic of China. A fiction specialty is ghost stories, long popular among the Chinese. There is an analysis of international relations. Size is 32 pages.
All but one of the weeklies are composed and printed by job shops. The exception is the Sun Yat-sen News, which began Friday publication only last August. One paper - the Chinese Pacific Weekly - is actually a by-product of printing. Its shop also turns out invitations and menus for restaurants.
The weeklies are composed on Chinese type writers. These machines are imported from Tai wan, Japan and the mainland at about US$600 each. The type size is large. Of the dailies, the Chinese Times still composes with large movable type made of lead. The Sing Tao and Young China use smaller type similar to that of Taiwan and Hongkong.
Since readers of Chinese newspapers published in the United States tend to be middle-aged or old, the use of big type has a definite advantage. The Chinese Times may not have the biggest circulation because it is the easiest paper to read, but the type size is certainly not a handicap.
Newspapers also attract readers with their politics, their tradition and their entertainment value. Heavy-handed editorial expression of either the right or the left seems to turn off young readers. Older Chinese are sentimental about newspapers, home places and tradition. This is what keeps Sing Tao strong among the former Hongkong Chinese.
San Francisco's Chinese newspapers are over whelming conservative and on the side of the Republic of China and the Kuomintang. Los Angeles has a sizable population of younger Mandarin-speaking Chinese from Taiwan and Hongkong. The leftist influence is stronger there. Much the same is true in Vancouver, where many of the Chinese are younger people from Hongkong. Some of these were influenced by the Communist press they left behind.
In the end, however, politics is not decisive in the life and death of Chinese newspapers. Those which have gone bankrupt and fallen by the wayside were victims of mismanagement rather than of insufficient financing or readership.
Functional illiteracy is rampant on the Chinese mainland under Communism. But Taiwan, Hongkong and American Chinese literacy rates are high. The new generation reads in English; not many of its members can understand a Chinese news paper. The older generation still relishes news, opinion and entertainment in the several thousand characters these newspapers are using to tell the China and world story in Chinese.