Racial Equity Resources

If asked, many of us would identify Chinese workers on the transcontinental railroad as the first group of Asian immigrants to arrive in the United States. In fact, Spanish records document the landing of Filipino workers from a Spanish ship in Morro Bay, California, in 1587, although they left within days. The first permanent residents from the Philippines had arrived in Louisiana by the early 1800s, where they fought against the British in the War of 1812 and developed the shrimp industry.