Looking for an out of print book on Chinese Immigration from the early 1900s? How about a high school yearbook from a Japanese American internment camp? Old newspaper clippings depicting anti-Chinese illustrations in California newspapers from 1850 to 1910? What about a unique matchbook cover from a Chinese restaurant in the U.S. circa 1930? People searching for these and other hard-to-find items should contact Steven G. Doi. He has obtained and sold Asian American historical collectibles since 1985.

Doi, a third-generation Japanese American, taught Asian American studies at San Jose State University. As part of the research for his classes, he bought books and reference materials related to the Asian American experience. This grew into a hobby. In time, he began purchasing so many items that his wife suggested he sell some of the collectibles to finance his spending. Thus a business was born.

Doi earned an undergraduate degree in ethnic studies from USC in 1975 and holds a law degree from Santa Clara University. He still teaches, so he only operates his business part-time, mainly through catalog orders from professors, library personnel and private collectors. Doi exhibits at one trade show a year – the National Association for Asian American Studies, an academic conference for Asian American scholars. He has found a niche because there are no stores doing what he specializes in. He doesn’t even need a website to promote his business.

He has sold books to most of the University of California colleges and many Ivy League libraries. As a dealer, Doi represented writer Frank Chin and negotiated the sale of Chin’s archives to the University of California Santa Barbara library, one of the largest purchases of Asian American materials ever conducted. In 2001, New York University commissioned Doi to appraise a 10,000-piece acquisition of Asians in America items called the “Yellow Peril Collection.”

What are some of the items collectors covet? Out-of-print books such as Mary Coolidge’s “Chinese Immigration” from 1909. Bret Harte’s “The Heathen Chinee” from 1871. Old San Francisco Chinatown photos, postcards and stamped envelopes. Japanese American internment keepsakes such as church programs or Christmas brochures distributed inside the camps. Asian American community group pamphlets from the 1960s. Old Chinese and Japanese telephone directories. Early Asian American magazines such as “Jade,” “Bridge” or “Scene.” Out-of-print Chinese cookbooks. Menus and marketing cards from Asian American businesses. Even historical wanted posters and mug shots of Chinese, Japanese and Filipinos from Hawaii and California.

Doi is passionate about finding an item that holds a special meaning for a customer, and he will spare no effort, including scouring church and rummage sales to locate it. His customers depend on him, and he won’t let them down.

He believes that the Asian American experience is captured in these items. He gave an example from the book “In Freedom’s Cause” published by the University of Hawaii in 1946. The pages showed the photographs of 800 Hawaii residents of Asian American descent, mostly Chinese and Japanese Americans, who fought in the military and died in World War II. Doi’s quiet tone conveyed the somber truth of this history, “It’s sad, the tragedy of it. These boys were eighteen or older. When I teach my class, I look around (the room) and many of my students are the same age. I think those could’ve been my students.”

There are important lessons embedded in these items of the past, and Steven G. Doi reminds Asian Americans to honor them.

(Ray Wong is a freelance writer in San Diego, California. He self-syndicates a column called “Family Matters” to newspapers throughout the United States. Contact him via e-mail at raywongwriter@juno.com.)