Donaldina Cameron was only 25 years old when she began her missionary work in Chinatown.

Donaldina Cameron House History

Donaldina Cameron House is a faith-based organization that has provided support to Asian women and their families for 131 years.

Started by the Presbyterian Church as the Occidental Mission Home for Girls in 1874, it's initial purpose was to intervene on behalf of young, Asian, immigrant females (some younger than the age of ten) who had become vulnerable and disenfranchised upon arrival into the United States. These women and girls were smuggled into the United States thereby circumventing immigration laws that excluded them. Asian women were commodities that were bought and sold (by their own families in many cases) as property in a system that became known as the "yellow slave trade". Bogus 'contracts' were created to enforce this system of slavery in which Asian women became domestics or prostitutes. The contractual conditions specified insurmountable recourse for women to purchase their own freedom. The number of Asian immigrant women who died in enslaved conditions in San Francisco was in the thousands.

Miss Donaldina Cameron came to the Occidental Mission Home as a sewing teacher; she stayed forty years devoting her life as a missionary creating a foundation and tradition of competency assisting Asian women who were victimized by violence and racial discrimination.

Throughout the century, the mission of "....serving urban youth, adults and families through leadership, development peer group counseling, group support, crises intervention, education and advocacy" has continued without interruption. The scope of Cameron House services has evolved over the years resulting in an agency that is a comprehensive family service organization serving low income, Asian immigrants and families residing primarily in the Chinatown area of San Francisco.

Recent events in Asia and the Pacific Rim indicate that the influx of immigrants from those areas, particularly into San Francisco and the Bay Area, will steadily increase. The Cameron House reputation throughout the Asian community is one of an organization that is culturally and linguistically accessible to those encountering life crises.

Cameron House is committed to enter the new century in a state of readiness to meet the challenge of assisting new immigrants and others assimilate into a new society and culture.

During research for his book "Southern Fried Rice", Cameron House alumnus John Jung, Professor Emeritus in the Department of Psychology at California State University, Long Beach, CA, found a page from the 1920 Census listing the people who lived at 920 Sacramento Street. Click here to see a larger copy of the page. Professor Jung's book studies Chinese people in the deep South.