Below you’ll find a list of reference / research books, documentaries, podcasts, and audio files, as well as YouTube Playlists, website, and article links.
Purchase from the Searls Historical Library Bookstore (in-person or online), Amazon, or from a variety of retailers
Borrow Crossing from the Nevada County Library
Specifications | Bonus Materials
Reference Books
Cookbooks
Chin, Lily (1972) Your Favorite Recipes Calico Press
Chung, Su (1965) Court Dishes of China: The Cuisine of the Ch’ing Dynasty Charles E. Tuttle Company
Kan, Johnny L (1980) Eight Immortal Flavors California Living Books
History: California
Barker, Malcolm E. (1994) San Francisco Memoirs: 1835 – 1851 Eyewitness accounts of the birth of a city Londonborn Publications
Barker, Malcolm E. (1996) San Francisco Memoirs: 1852 – 1899 The ripening years Londonborn Publications
Benemann, William A. (1999) Year of Mud & Gold: San Francisco in Letters and Diaries 1849 – 1850 University of Nebraska Press
Huff, Roger (2014) Tales & Towns Along the Truckee Truckee Donner Historical Society
Lord, Paul A. (1981) Fire & Ice: A Portrait of Truckee Truckee Donner Historical Society
Mann, Ralph (1982) After the Gold Rush: Society in Grass Valley and Nevada City, California 1849 – 1870 Stanford University Press
Noy, Gary (2014) Sierra Stories: Tales of Dreamers, Schemers, Bigots, and Rogues Heyday Books
Speer, William (1870) The Oldest and the Newest Empire: China and the United States S.S. Scranton and Company
History: Chinese
Barth, Gunther (1964) Bitter Strength: A History of the Chinese in the United States 1850 – 1870 Harvard University Press
Chan, Gene O, Low, Russel N, Yee, Andrea (2014) Voices from the Railroad: Stories by Descendants of Chinese Railroad Workers Chinese Historical Society of America
Lee, Sue and Yu, Connie Young (2020) Voices from the Railroad: Stories by Descendants of Chinese Railroad Workers | 2nd edition | Chinese Historical Society of America
Chang, Gordon H. (2019) Ghosts of Gold Mountain. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Chang, Iris (2003) The Chinese in America: A Narrative Story Penguin Books
Chen, Yong (2000) Chinese San Francisco 1850-1943: A Trans-Pacific Community Stanford University Press
Confucius, translated by Dawson, Raymond (1993) The Analects Oxford University Press
Dolin, Eric Jay (2012) When America First Met China: An Exotic History of Tea, Drugs, and Money in the Age of Sail Liveright Publishing Corporation
Farkas, Lani Ah Tye (1998) Burry My Bones In America: the Saga of a Chinese Family in California 1852 – 1996 From San Francisco to the Sierra Gold Mines Carl Mautz Publishing
Harrison, Henrietta (2005) The Man Awakened from Dreams: One Man’s Life in a North China Village 1857 – 1942 Stanford University Press
Hom, Marlon K. (1987) Songs of Gold Mountain: Cantonese Rhymes from San Francisco Chinatown University of California Press
Lee, Johathan H.X. (2014) Auburn’s Joss House: The Auburn Chinese Ling Ying Association House Auburn Joss House Museum and Chinese History Center
Liu, Haiming (1953) The Transnational History of a Chinese Family: Immigrant Letters, Family Business, and Reverse Migration Rutgers University Press
McCunn, Ruthanne Lum (1988) Chinese American Portraits University of Washington Press
Miyazaki, Ichisada translated by Schirokauer (1976) China’s Examination Hell: The Civil Service Examinations of Imperial China John Weatherhill, Inc
Ni, Maoshing, PH.D. (1995) The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Medicine: A new Translation of the Neijing Suwen with Commentary Shambhala Publishers, Inc.
Qin, Yucheng (2009) The Diplomacy of Nationalism: The Six Companies and China’s Policy Toward Exclusion University of Hawai’i Press
Sinn, Elizabeth (2013) Pacific Crossing: California Good, Chinese Migration, and the Making of Hong Kong Hong Kong University Press
Tjoa, Hock G (2016) The Battle of Chibi (Red Cliffs): Selected and Translated from the Romance of the Three Kingdoms Sleeping Dragon Books
Wells, Robert S. (2014) Voices from the Bottom of the South China Sea: The Untold Story of America’s Largest Chinese Emigrant Disaster Adducent
Zhang Mike and Zhou Limin (2015) Chinese Railroad Workers Historical Photo Album 150th Anniversary Celebration Committee
Xueqin,Cao, translated by Hawkes, David (1973) The Story of the Stone Penguin Books
History: Donner Summit
Oudegeest, Bill (2015) Walking Through Donner Summit History iStreet Press
Signor, John R. (1985) Donner Pass: Southern Pacific’s Sierra Crossing Golden West Books
Stewart, George R. (1964) Donner Pass: and those who crossed it Lane Books
Towle, Russell (1994) The Dutch Flat Chronicles 1849 – 1906 Giant Gap Press
History: Lumber
Anderson, Cynthia (2019) From the Woods: True Tales of the Timber Industry Comstock Bonanza Press
Wilson, Dick (1992) Sawdust Trails in the Truckee Basin: A History of Lumbering Operations Nevada County Historical Society
History: Railroad
Ambrose, Stephen E. (2001) Nothing Like It in the World Touchstone
Chew, William F. (2004) Nameless Builders of the Transcontinental Railroad: The Chinese Workers of the Central Pacific Railroad Trafford Publishing
Deverell, William (1994) Railroad Crossing: Californians and the Railroad 1850 – 1910 University of California Press
Duncan, Jack E. (2005) A Study of Cape Horn Construction RSPress
Galloway, John Debo C.E. (1989) The First Transcontinental Railroad: Central Pacific Union Pacific Dorset Press
Kornweibel, Theodore Jr. (2010) Railroads in the African American Experience: A Photographic Journey The Johns Hopkins University Press
Kraus, George (1969) High Road to Promontory: Building the Central Pacific across the High Sierra American West Publishing Company
Maniery, Mary L., Allen, Rebecca, and Heffner, Sarah Christing (2016) Finding Hidden Voices of the Chinese Railroad Workers: An Archaeological and Historical Journey Chinese Historical Society of America
Mayer, Lynne Rhodes, and Vose, Kenneth E (1975) Makin’ Tracks: The Story of the Transcontinental Railroad in the Pictures and Words of the Men Who Were There Praeger Publishers
Sandler, Martin W. (2015) Iron Rails, Iron Men, and the Race t Link the Nation: The Story of the Transcontinental Railroad Candlewick Press
Memoir
Frankel, Victor E. (2006) Man’s Search for Meaning Beacon Press
Novels
Estes, Kelli (2015) The Girl Who Wrote in Silk Sourcebooks Landmark
Ryan, Shawna Yang (2007) Water Ghosts (previous title: Locke 1928) Penguin Books
Documentaries & Audio
‘Bone Scraping’ Was the Last Way Home – KQED (2017) Audio
George, Bill (2011) The Hidden Wonder of the Word: The Transcontinental Railroad From Sacramento to Donner Summit Nimbus Films
Mid Pacific podcast explores what it means to be Asian American and the feeling of being caught between two worlds – Capradio (2023) Podcast
Tahoe National Forest and Gigantic Film Co. (2020) Legacy
YouTube Playlists (Author created)
Websites – Articles & Organizations
1887 San Francisco Tourist Guide – Ancestry.com
California Chinese Mortuary Records 1870-1933 – Ancestry.com
California State Railroad Museum
Central Pacific Railroad Photographic History Museum
Chinatown’s Grant Avenue: A look back at one of San Francisco’s oldest streets | Curbed San Francisco
Chinese American Eyes: Famous, forgotten, well-known, and obscure visual artists of Chinese descent in the United States
Chinese Migrants and the Building of the Transcontinental Railroad (May, 2019 – Spring 2020) – Smithsonian Exhibit
Chinese in Northwest America Research Committee – Reburial: Exhuming the Dead and Returning them to China (2018)
Chinese Restaurant Beginnings | Flavor & Fortune
Chinese Restaurants in the 19th Century | Found SF
Chinese Historical Society of America (CHA)
Donner Summit Historical Society | Heirloom Newsletters
Goodreads Reference Book List | Chinese American History
How the Transcontinental railroad forever changed the US – BBC (2022)
Library of Congress, Lawrence Houseworth Photography Collection
The Local Food History of San Francisco Chinatown (pdf) | CHSA
Placer Serra Railroad Heritage Society
Preserving the Transcontinental Railroad Tunnels – Smithsonian Magazine (2022)
Redwood Lumber history – Timber Heritage Association
Stanford University | Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project
The Transcontinental Railroad – Smithsonian Interactive Map
12 Lost American Slangisms From the 1800s – NPR
University of California, Riverside | California Digital Newspaper Collection