Kam Wah Chung State Heritage Site opens for the 2024 season on May 2

GRANT COUNTY-Kam Wah Chung State Heritage Site welcomes visitors to its Interpretive Center and Museum for the 2024 season starting May 2. 

The Kam Wah Chung building and museum is a National Historic Landmark that preserves the home and businesses of two Chinese immigrants, Ing “Doc” Hay and Lung On. For more than 60 years the building was a social, medical and religious center for Oregon’s Chinese community.

The Interpretive Center will be open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursday through Monday with tours of the museum running at the top of every hour, the last one beginning at 4 p.m. The Museum and Interpretive Center will be closed Tuesday and Wednesday through May and possibly into June due to staffing. 

The free, 45-minute museum tour begins at the Interpretive Center at 125 NW Canton Street in John Day. Staff added a tour from noon to 1 p.m. this year to provide additional viewing opportunities. Space is limited to 8 people per tour. 

For more information or questions about tours and operating hours, please call the park office at 541-575-2800.

Even if you can’t visit this heritage site in person, you can learn more about the history through these online resources:

• Oregon Chinese Diaspora Project
• Oregon College of Oriental Medicine: Kam Wah Chung Medical Archive
• National Historic Landmark Nomination: Kam Wah Chung Company Building
• Oregon Encyclopedia: Chinese Americans in Oregon and Kam Wah Chung and Co.
• Oregon Historical Society: Beyond Chinatown: Uncovering Oregon’s Rural Chinese History and Centering Chinese History in Oregon and Herbs & Roots: A History of Chinese Doctors in the American Medical Marketplace

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