Chinese American family donates $5 million to repay kindness shown to them by a Black family.
A Chinese American family from Coronado, California, wishes to return back the kindness and generosity they were shown decades ago.
When they relocated to Coronado in 1939, due to the racist housing rules in place at the time, the Dong family was unable to rent any property in the area. The Dongs were left stranded and did not know what to do next.
Fortunately, a Black business couple from the city, Emma and Gus Thompson, solved their problem by lending the family a rental home, which they later purchased.
SIMILAR: Read about the incredible $1 billion donation received by Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NYC.
Years later, the Dong family is now preparing to donate $5 million to Black college students across the nation as a way of returning this kindness.
With the Thompson family’s help, the Dong family was able to purchase the house, and they are now donating the proceeds from its sale.
Lloyd Dong Jr. told NBC News, the Thompsons were the main reason they could “have the education and everything else.” After living a good life, they now want to give back some money to the Black community.
The donation may “enable some kids to go and flourish in college that might not have been able to otherwise,” according to Janice Dong, 86.
Ron Dong, her 86-year-old husband, thinks that it is only “appropriate.”
The Dongs are trying to have the Black Resource Center at San Diego State University named in honor of the Thompsons, to show their gratitude toward the family that helped them establish themselves in California.
In the 1800s, Gus Thompson left Kentucky to work at the Hotel Del Coronado in California.
He earned and saved well and before the city’s racial housing rules were put in place, he constructed a home and barn near C Avenue in 1895, as per Coronado historian Kevin Ashley.
To help other minorities and immigrants, the Thompsons allowed many people to reside in their house on the upper level of the barn when the rules were changed.
After working as a farmer in the Central Valley, brothers Lloyd Jr. and Ron Dong told NBC News that their father, Lloyd Dong Sr., had relocated to Coronado to become a gardener.
Due to the few residential options available in the city back then, they finally found themselves at Gus Thompson’s boarding house.
The Dong family became the first Chinese Americans to buy property in the area when Emma Thompson sold them the Coronado house and barn in 1955, according to Ashley’s statement to NBC.
Later on, the family moved out of the city to various parts of California and turned the barn into an apartment complex.
All this while, they maintained the properties from a distance, but it was becoming increasingly difficult, so they decided it was time to sell.
About the choice to sell, Janice remarked, “It’s time,” as they wish to give back.
