When the Union Pacific railroad started laying track eastward from the Pacific Coast in the mid-1860s, immigrant Chinese laborers were virtually enslaved to complete the dangerous work of building the roadbed across the Sierra Nevada. Although many Chinese died, those who survived the ordeal eventually settled in the San Francisco Bay Area. Some of these new Californians were shrimp fishers and they set their nets in the quiet waters of San Pablo Bay. They and their families lived and worked together in a small village that came to be known as China Camp. It is now an historical state park.

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