Known for her hit, “Don’t Know Why,” Norah Jones is a 10-time Grammy Award winning singer and songwriter who quickly rose to fame for her smooth, jazzy voice. Born in 1979 as Geetali Norah Jones Shankar, she found much of her inspiration in oldies music, especially the stylings of Billie Holiday. Her 2002 album Come Away With Me is the all-time best-selling debut album by a female artist, and the third best-selling album of the 21st century. 

Jones’ father, Ravi Shankar, a world-famous sitar player, was born in Varanasi (then a part of British India) and gained international fame for his sitar compositions. We found a record of him flying into New York City in 1956, to begin his first American tour. 

 Widely considered one of the greatest martial artists of all time, Bruce Lee was a skilled fighter and actor who revolutionized martial arts cinema founded the art of Jeet Kune Do. Lee grew up and began his career in Hong Kong, but he spent the first four months of his life in the United States. He was born in San Francisco, where his father was on tour with the Cantonese Opera Company, so Lee was already an American citizen by the time he returned to the States for work. Only thirty-two and at the height of his popularity when he passed away, Bruce Lee is remembered for his captivating and stereotype-defying performances in films such as Fist of Fury and Enter the Dragon.   

His father was an opera singer from Hong Kong who came to SF in 1939 for a year-long US tour with the Mandarin Theatre. He was accompanied* by his wife, who gave birth to Lee in November 1940, in the US. Here is a record of Lee’s family entering San Francisco.

*His mother is also listed as an actress on the manifest but was not.

Vera Wang  is a designer and entrepreneur who turned a single bridal boutique into a fashion empire. Having worked at Vogue for seventeen years and briefly at Ralph Lauren, she entered the bridal wear industry at the age of 40 and opened her flagship store on Manhattan’s Madison Avenue. Her designs, dramatic and often unconventional, quickly became popular and have been worn by numerous celebrities and public figures. Over the past several decades, Wang has expanded her brand beyond wedding gowns to include fragrances, home goods, accessories, and more.  

She was born in New York City to Chinese immigrant parents; her mother arrived in 1945, sailing from Bombay. Wang’s father traveled back and forth several times. Here is a record of Wang’s mother’s arrival in August 1945 from Bombay. 

Duke Kahanamoku was an icon of surfing. Kahanamoku was born to a native Hawaiian family three years before the Kingdom of Hawaii was overthrown by American businessmen. Having grown up near the beach, he was an avid swimmer and set the world record for the quickest 100-yard freestyle swim by the time he was 20 years old. He won five medals in swimming at the 1912, 1920, and 1924 Olympics. His travels during his athletic career introduced the rest of the world to the traditional Hawaiian sport of surfing.  

Kahanamoku made many trips to and from the US throughout his life, stopping at the ports of New York, San Francisco, and his home port of Honolulu.   

He served as an alternate for the US Water Polo team at the 1932 Olympic in Los Angeles. Later that year he travelled Los Angeles Harbor to the Port of Honolulu aboard the SS Monterey. His record is below. 

Born in Xiantan, Hunan, China, Chin Yang Lee was one of eleven siblings, his eight brothers were all well-educated, prominent figures in their respective fields of linguistics, engineering, writing, and music. Lee received his bachelor’s degree in 1942, emigrated to the United States in 1943 to attend Columbia University, and transferred to Yale to complete his Master of Fine Arts degree in 1947.

Lee then moved to California in the 50s, working as a newspaper journalist, a short story writer, and eventually a novelist with The Flower Drum Song. By 1957, the novel was a best seller and, in 1958, was adapted into a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical that would be the first Broadway show to feature Asian American actors. A film adaptation was released in 1961, which earned five Oscar nominations and began the illustrious careers of famous first-generation Asian actors Nancy Kwan and James Shigeta.  

Below is a manifest of Lee’s arrival in Los Angeles.