New York's Chinatown united in defiance

The year 1937 was a somber one for Chinese and Chinese-Americans. It was the year that occupying Japanese forces launched a wider invasion of the mainland, and it concluded with the horrible Nanjing Massacre some 80 years ago.

The events were painfully felt by the Chinese community in the United States, but they also spurred what had been an insular Chinese community to action.

In New York, home to a bustling Chinatown, the Japanese invasion also did something that could not be accomplished since the founding of Chinatown around 1860: It led to a temporary cessation of hostilities between China's warring tongs, namely the On Leongs and Hip Sings.