Finding Samuel Lowe: China, Jamaica, Harlem
“Told through an intimate family portrait . . . a moving account of a vivid historic migration; an unyielding and dogged journey of the human spirit.” —Walter Mosley, New York Times–bestselling author

Now an award–winning film directed by Jeanette Kong

This powerful debut tells the story of Paula Williams Madison’s Chinese grandfather, Samuel Lowe. He became romantically involved with a Jamaican woman, Paula’s grandmother, and they lived together modestly with their daughter in his Kingston dry goods store. In 1920 his Chinese soon-to-be wife arrived to set up a “proper” family. When he requested to take his three-year-old daughter with him, Paula’s jealous grandmother made sure that Lowe never saw his child again. That began an almost one-hundred-year break in their family.

Years later, the arrival of her only grandchild raising questions about family and legacy, Paula decided to search for Samuel Lowe’s descendants in China.

With Finding Samuel Lowe, Paula has produced an emotional memoir that travels from Toronto to Jamaica to China. Using old documents, digital records, and referrals from the insular and interrelated Chinese-Jamaican community, she found three hundred long-lost relatives in Shenzhen and Guangzhou, China. She even located documented family lineage that traces back three thousand years to 1006 BC. Her wonderfully warm elders, all born in Jamaica and raised in China, shared the history and accomplishments of the Lowes in the East and the West, as well as the hardships and persecution suffered by her capitalist grandfather during the Communist era and the Cultural Revolution.

Documented in Finding Samuel Lowe, Paula’s remarkable journey “will produce more OMG moments than any prime-time drama on cable or Netflix could ever hope to elicit” (Essence).
1119984111
Finding Samuel Lowe: China, Jamaica, Harlem
“Told through an intimate family portrait . . . a moving account of a vivid historic migration; an unyielding and dogged journey of the human spirit.” —Walter Mosley, New York Times–bestselling author

Now an award–winning film directed by Jeanette Kong

This powerful debut tells the story of Paula Williams Madison’s Chinese grandfather, Samuel Lowe. He became romantically involved with a Jamaican woman, Paula’s grandmother, and they lived together modestly with their daughter in his Kingston dry goods store. In 1920 his Chinese soon-to-be wife arrived to set up a “proper” family. When he requested to take his three-year-old daughter with him, Paula’s jealous grandmother made sure that Lowe never saw his child again. That began an almost one-hundred-year break in their family.

Years later, the arrival of her only grandchild raising questions about family and legacy, Paula decided to search for Samuel Lowe’s descendants in China.

With Finding Samuel Lowe, Paula has produced an emotional memoir that travels from Toronto to Jamaica to China. Using old documents, digital records, and referrals from the insular and interrelated Chinese-Jamaican community, she found three hundred long-lost relatives in Shenzhen and Guangzhou, China. She even located documented family lineage that traces back three thousand years to 1006 BC. Her wonderfully warm elders, all born in Jamaica and raised in China, shared the history and accomplishments of the Lowes in the East and the West, as well as the hardships and persecution suffered by her capitalist grandfather during the Communist era and the Cultural Revolution.

Documented in Finding Samuel Lowe, Paula’s remarkable journey “will produce more OMG moments than any prime-time drama on cable or Netflix could ever hope to elicit” (Essence).
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Finding Samuel Lowe: China, Jamaica, Harlem

Finding Samuel Lowe: China, Jamaica, Harlem

by Paula Williams Madison
Finding Samuel Lowe: China, Jamaica, Harlem

Finding Samuel Lowe: China, Jamaica, Harlem

by Paula Williams Madison

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Overview

“Told through an intimate family portrait . . . a moving account of a vivid historic migration; an unyielding and dogged journey of the human spirit.” —Walter Mosley, New York Times–bestselling author

Now an award–winning film directed by Jeanette Kong

This powerful debut tells the story of Paula Williams Madison’s Chinese grandfather, Samuel Lowe. He became romantically involved with a Jamaican woman, Paula’s grandmother, and they lived together modestly with their daughter in his Kingston dry goods store. In 1920 his Chinese soon-to-be wife arrived to set up a “proper” family. When he requested to take his three-year-old daughter with him, Paula’s jealous grandmother made sure that Lowe never saw his child again. That began an almost one-hundred-year break in their family.

Years later, the arrival of her only grandchild raising questions about family and legacy, Paula decided to search for Samuel Lowe’s descendants in China.

With Finding Samuel Lowe, Paula has produced an emotional memoir that travels from Toronto to Jamaica to China. Using old documents, digital records, and referrals from the insular and interrelated Chinese-Jamaican community, she found three hundred long-lost relatives in Shenzhen and Guangzhou, China. She even located documented family lineage that traces back three thousand years to 1006 BC. Her wonderfully warm elders, all born in Jamaica and raised in China, shared the history and accomplishments of the Lowes in the East and the West, as well as the hardships and persecution suffered by her capitalist grandfather during the Communist era and the Cultural Revolution.

Documented in Finding Samuel Lowe, Paula’s remarkable journey “will produce more OMG moments than any prime-time drama on cable or Netflix could ever hope to elicit” (Essence).

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780062331656
Publisher: HarperCollins
Publication date: 12/15/2023
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 301
File size: 3 MB

About the Author

Paula Williams Madison is Chairman and CEO of Madison Media Management LLC, a division of Williams Group Holdings LLC, a Chicago-based investment company. She spent twenty-two years with NBC Universal and was most recently the Executive Vice President of Diversity as well as a Vice President of the General Electric Company. Honored for corporate leadership and community outreach, Madison was named one of the "75 Most Powerful African Americans in Corporate America" by Black Enterprise Magazine in 2005 and was included in Ebony magazine's "Power 100." She is Vice President of the Los Angeles Police Commission. On the occasion of the 2013 Centennial Anniversary of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Madison was inducted as a member of Honorary Centennial Six, a great career achievement. A native of Harlem, she and her husband reside in Los Angeles. This is her first book.

Table of Contents

Prologue 1

Dreams of My Grandfather 3

Part 1 Mothers and Daughters

Beijing, 2008 9

The Outside Child 13

Part 2 Where Love Begins

Kingston, Jamaica, 1918 21

Usury and Obeah 29

My Daddy Elrick 31

This Is Where Sarah Came From 35

Elrick Grows Up 39

Two Outside Children Meet 45

Lies and Marriage 53

Part 3 Growing Up Williams

Scenes From a Marriage 63

Growing Up Williams: Scene One 67

Nocturne in Nell Minor 73

Finding My Own Space 79

Umbilical Cords 83

Custody Matters 87

Growing Up Williams: Scene Two 91

Breaking My Daddy's Heart After He Broke Mine 95

Meet My Grandma Sarah 101

The Year Of My Discontent 107

Part 1 Searching For Samuel Lowe

The Year of the Dragon 117

The Hakka People 123

Chee Gah Ngin: Many Places, One People 125

The Capitalist Class and the Servant Class 131

Samuel Lowe Was My Father 137

Do You Know That You Are Black? 139

Part 5 Prosperity, Family, Education

The Point of No Return 145

Adassa Takes Charge 153

Gilbert's Journey 159

My Heart Was Somewhat Disturbed and I Found It

Very Strange 163

Lowe Shui Hap 167

Part 6 Samuel Lowe's Twentieth Century

A Journey of Ten Thousand Miles 177

Secondary Migration 183

Fire! Fire! 187

The Returning Wave 195

You Den, You Choy; Have Children. Have Wealth 199

The Ravages of War 207

The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution 213

And The Family Grows and Prospers 219

Part 7 My Three-Thousand-Year-Old Family Reunited at Last

Visiting Jamaica 227

Samuel's Shop 233

The December Reunion in China 235

Roosevelt Finds His Own China 239

Where My Ancestors Are Laid To Rest 247

Aunt Adassa Turns Ninety-Four 251

The Return of the JlA Pu 253

Chinese Names 257

Dreams of My Grandfather 263

Epilogue 265

Acknowledgments 269

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