At one end of Spofford Alley stood a community mural, and one of the phrases on top is "Tape vs. Hurley". What you probably do not know was this was the EARLIEST court victory against school racism dating back to 1885, 70 years before Brown vs. Board of Education in Topeka, Kansas, and 11 years BEFORE "Plessy vs. Ferguson" (1896). Mural at Washington side of Spofford Alley, Mary Tape, Tape v Hurley 1885 courtesy author Joseph Tape was born in Guandong, in Southern China. He came to San Francisco, as a teenager in 1864, and worked as a servant to a dairy farmer, and steadily moved up to delivery wagon driver. He met and married Mary McGladery in 1875. Mary originally came from Shanghai as a teenager a few years after Joseph did, and MAY have been trafficked, but was rescued and placed with the Ladies' Protection and Relief Society's shelter, and chose to take her caretaker's name as a symbol of her rebirth. When they married, they both took the German su...
An exploration of San Francisco Chinatown typically NOT covered by tours