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Mary Yin Kyau Lee Chong (December 22, 1882 – February 28, 1979) was an American community leader. A first-generation Chinese-American in Hawaii, she worked as an organist, Chinese-language teacher and Sunday school teacher at the Congregational churches her husband How Fo Chong worked in: the Kula Congregational Church in Kula and the Chinese Congregational Church in Waimea, Kauai.

Biography

She was born on December 22, 1882 in western Maui and moved to Honolulu during her youth. Her father Toma Lee, a member of the Revive China Society, emigrated from China alongside his wife, her mother, and he worked at a sugar plantation in Makawao and ran a grocery store and tobacco store in Honolulu. After spending time at a mission school in downtown Honolulu, she became the first Chinese female pupil educated at Punahou School.

She married another first-generation Chinese-American, How Fo Chong, a priest who preached at the Mills Institute for Boys and Fort Street Chinese Congregational Church, on November 24, 1900; they had ten children. Their wedding was the first one among Hawaii's Chinese community to have a wedding march. Her son-in-law Yao-Tsai Huang, husband of her daughter Mabel, was a Chinese-American community leader in New York City who was vice-president of the Wah Chang Corporation and president of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce of New York.

She and her husband worked at the Kula Congregational Church in Kula, where she was an interpreter and organist, as well as the church's Chinese teacher, Sunday school teacher. Originally a teacher for nearby Keokea School at the church due to limited space, she later moved to a new school in Kula, before standing down due to childcare commitments. She also worked as an interpreter and witness when the Kula church became Maui County's birth registry headquarters.

She later moved to the Chinese Congregational Church in Waimea, Kauai, where she was a Chinese-language teacher, Sunday School teacher, organist, budget treasurer, and acting minister whenever her husband had other commitments. She later moved to Honolulu with her family after her husband retired as minister, and she later served in the First Chinese Church of Christ as an advisor to their women's auxiliary and, for two years, their deaconess. She later participated in ceremonies celebrating the 1959 admission of Hawaii into the Union and the 1965 groundbreaking of the First Chinese Church of Christ's Founder's Hall. She was named Model Chinese Mother of 1961.

She was a Red Cross volunteer in World War I and sheltered soldiers in World War II, and during the 1918–1920 flu pandemic, she assisted in prescription filing. She was also a charter member of the Chinese Committee of the International Institute of the YWCA. She met Sun Yat-sen's wife Soong Ching-ling at least twice, including at the wharf at Makena and when the latter lived in Portuguese Macau in 1938. His husband died on July 6, 1953. As of 1961, she lived in the Makiki area.

She died in Honolulu on February 28, 1979, of pneumonia; she was 96.

References

1. ^ Mark, Diane Mei Lin; Chong, Mark Vera J. (1984). "CHONG, Mary Yin Kyau Lee". In Peterson, Barbara Bennett (ed.). Notable Women of Hawaii. University of Hawai'i Press. p. 73-75.
2. ^ "Model Chinese Parents Announced". Honolulu Star-Bulletin. January 4, 1961. p. 2 – via Newspapers.com.
3. "Yao-Tsai Huang, 79, N.Y. Chinese leader". The Honolulu Advertiser. January 27, 1983. pp. B-6 – via Newspapers.com.
4. "Rites Sunday For Kamaaina Isle Minister". Honolulu Star-Advertiser. July 8, 1953. p. 8 – via Newspapers.com.

• 1882 births
• 1979 deaths
• People from Kula, Hawaii
• People from Kauai County, Hawaii
• People from Honolulu
• Hawaii people of Chinese descent
• American Calvinist and Reformed ministers
• American Calvinist and Reformed Christians
• Protestants from Hawaii
• American community activists
• 20th-century American women civil servants
• Deaths from pneumonia
• Punahou School alumni