The Wah Chong Tai Company and Mai Wah Noodle Parlor buildings
are the most important and least altered physical remnants of
Butte's Chinese Heritage.
 The buildings are artifacts
in themselves, perhaps the most significant historical resources
associated with the ethnic heritage of Montana’s Asian population.
About 1893, Chin Chun Hock, the founder of Seattle’s earliest
and most successful Chinese mercantile business, the Wa Chong
Company, opened a branch store in Butte on West Galena Street.
Chin visited Butte in October 1898, and announced plans to construct
a new building for the company on China Alley.
By 1899, the company had moved into a new, two-story brick building
at 15 West Mercury. Architecturally, the Wah Chong Tai (literally
announcing beautiful old China) Company’s new building was
no different than the other business blocks being constructed
in other parts of Butte City. The mercantile operated from a
large room on the first floor, stocking items imported from China
to sell to Asians and to others. Merchandise included fine Chinese
and Japanese porcelain, bulk containers of dried herbs and tonics,
and string-tied packages of Chinese-style clothing.
An herbal store at the back of the mercantile was named “hung
fuk hong” or “together happiness meeting place.”
An open mezzanine around three sides of the mercantile provided
additional display space and an area for two offices.
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 A
restaurant was located on the second floor. Restaurant customers,
mostly Chinese, entered by a door on China Alley.
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The
inside of the Wah Chong Tai Co. in 1905.
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- Just as
rural general stores throughout the U.S. provided various services,
the mercantile also did much more than just sell goods. Besides
its obvious commercial activities, it was also the place to find
lodging, social interaction,and job opportunities. The mercantile
was a meeting place, a post office, and a bank. It also had political
functions, providing translators and spokespersons who represented
the Chinese within the larger society.
For several decades, the Wah Chong Tai Company remained a thriving
mercantile. By 1931, ownership of the building and business had
passed from control of the Seattle company and the real property
had been divided into 1/20th shares under eight different owners,
and the Wah Chong Tai Company was a partnership divided into
1/15th shares with five different owners. Three of the owners,
Chin On, Chin Yee Fong (Albert Chinn), and Lou Dick You lived
in Butte while Chin Quon Dai and Kong Sing Fong lived in China.
A "Report of the Partnership" filed with the District
Court on the death of Chin On showed the company in sound financial
condition at a time when many other Chinese businesses in Butte
were being forced to close. The partnership listed assets of
almost $10,000 -- three quarters of the amount was in cash. The
report also verifies the Wah Chong Tai Company's function as
a bank for local Chinese. It listed over $12,000 in a safe deposit
box at the First National Bank being held in trust for 15 individuals.
- In 1909,
the Wah Chong Tai Company retained George DeSnell, a Butte architect,
to design a new building to adjoin the mercantile. The two-story
brick structure has two storefronts at street level separated
by an entrance to the second story Mai Wah (literally “beautiful
and luxurious”) Noodle Parlor.
At least one of the storefronts was divided from front to back
into a series of small stores accessed off an interior side aisle
-- a small version of today’s shopping mall. An unusual
feature of this building, but one that is common in Victoria,
British Columbia's Chinatown, is a "cheater story,"
a floor sandwiched between the first and second stories. Divided
into a number of small rooms and with only about six feet of
headroom, it apparently accommodated lodgers.
By the mid-1940s, only a few Chinese families remained in Butte,
among them the Chinn family who owned and lived in the Mai Wah
Noodle Parlors and Wah Chong Tai Co. buildings. By 1949, William
Chinn, Albert Chinn’s son, owned the building. He rented
the building to Paul Eno who ran a fix-it shop and second-hand
store from the ground level until his death in 1986.
Hal Waldrup, a friend of Eno, recognized the historical significance
of the buildings and was crucial in organizing citizens to help
preserve and restore the buildings. Waldrup arranged for many
Chinese artifacts and photographs from the building to be transferred
to the Montana Historical Society in Helena.
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- What
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