Word: tong
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...TONG WAR-!?Eng Ying Gong and Bruce Grant?Nicholas L. Brown...
Chop Suey and the Chinese tong are as American as hashed brown potatoes; neither is known in China; both sprang up to fill a need. Tong means association. The first tong was organized in San Francisco's Chinatown several years before the Civil War to protect its members from the invasion of competitors in business, from legal injustice (or justice). So effective was it that rival or imitative tongs were soon found wherever there were Chinese colonies. Tong leaders began employing hatchetmen (boo how doy), gun- men who managed the affairs of brainier tong leaders, terrorized respectable citizens, puzzled...
Author Eng Ying (Eddie) Gong, proprietor of an Americanized restaurant at No. 1 Pell Street (nucleus of Manhattan's Chinatown) observed, noted, took part in tong warfare, wrote an inside story of it. Along came Reporter Bruce Grant, who read the story, realized that it was an expose exciting and spectacular enough to appeal to underworld-minded readers, was the first authentic history of the tongs ever written, was a splendid scoop. He wrote Author Gong's manuscript into reportorial text. All Reporter Grant needed was a rewrite...
...Manhattan Ong You, 60, leader of the Hip Sing Tong, was hauled into court, charged with issuing tickets for a policy game. The court interpreter was asked to read one of these. Read he: "The dragon will walk the eternal paths of glory and the lion shall be exercised. Would that our ancestors bring on us only fair skies with shining suns." Ong You, purveyor of Chinese New Year's cards, was discharged...
This vivid expose of gambling dens and brothels, with their picaresque inmates, falls short of melodrama without losing excitement. The faithful account of all the greatest gang leaders sometimes runs to a monotony of horrors, but is soon varied with naive tong wars, and prosperous "fences"-fat women who bought and sold the loot of robbers...