Celebrate Asian American and Pacific Islander Month

Detail of "Suruga Satta no kaijō". Hiroshige Andō, artist, 1858. (Library of Congress)

In 1992, Congress passed Public Law 102-450 which annually designated the entire month of May as Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month. The month of May was chosen to commemorate the immigration of the first Japanese to the United States on May 7, 1843, and to mark the anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869. The majority of the workers who laid the tracks were Chinese immigrants.

The Library of Congress has curated a remarkable, diverse collection of multimedia freely available for public enrichment, at https://asianpacificheritage.gov/audio-and-video.html.