Discussions

The seventy-five Chinese residents of Brandon in 1911, and Chinese celestials throughout the world entered a new era.  
 
By official decree a supreme message read:  
 
“ His excellency Wu Ting-Fang, having given the matter deep consideration, has come to the conclusion that the most auspicious time for the removal of the “Queue” will be the sixteenth day of the first month of the third year of His Imperial Highness Suen Hung. That day he will order the barber to cut off his Queue.”  
 
In Brandon, senior Chinese gentlemen chose to disregard the order, but all others followed the Decree, and as a group had their long familiar plaits shorn from their heads.  
 
Note #1: The wearing of the Queue was a fashion Mongolian conquerors had forced upon that Asiatic race two and one half centuries earlier.  
 
Note #2: All the Chinese residents living in Brandon were Male because of the Immigration laws of the time.  
 
Note #3: In an Essay by Dr. Alison R. Marshall she reports that in Winnipeg the Chinese had a Freemasons Society, and they in April of 1911 had invited the “Father of Modern China” Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925). To show their support of Dr. Yat-sen, Chinese Nationalism, and their opposition to the Manchurian government who ruled China some men hacked off their Queues.  
 
Note #4: Dr. Marshall is with the Department of Religion at Brandon University and has done extensive studies to document the history of the Chinese in Winnipeg, Brandon, and Manitoba. Her Essay is published in the winter edition of the publication Manitoba History, which is on sale at Daly House Museum.  
 
Source: Brandon a City by G. F. Barker.  
 
 
http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/?irn=341390  
 
 
 
Edited by Robert Booth, 2010-02-16 07:52:39