The city’s newest park comes with more than a century of history attached to its name.
Lisa Liddane walks past the “Sheltering Wing” sculpture by artist Roger Stoller in Heinlenville Park on Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2023, in San Jose, Calif. Community members held a ceremony to celebrate the opening of the new park which is named after John Heinlen, a German immigrant who rented to Chinese residents after the Chinatown neighborhood was burned in the late 1800s.
After a suspected arson fire in 1887 destroyed the Chinatown on Market Street downtown, John Heinlen — a German immigrant farmer and businessman who owned property just north of downtown — answered an act of bigotry with one of acceptance. He provided inexpensive leases to the local Chinese community and endured condemnation from the city’s white community.
Historian Connie Young Yu said Heinlenville ended after 44 years largely because of the Chinese Exclusion Act, and the area became the city’s corporation yard for many decades with Japantown next to it. She heard stories of Heinlen’s generosity from her grandfather, who fled the Market Street fire, and her father, who was born in Heinlenville.
“Sheltering Wing,” a 19-foot-tall metal sculpture created by Stoller Studios in San Jose, tells the story of the evolving and inclusive community through images of “Asian positivity” in the metal-lace artwork representing bamboo, peaches, koi, origami cranes, butterflies and chrysanthemums, among others. There’s an interpretive sign exploring the history of the area and a paved “history path” that recounts the Chinese American experience.
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