Jenny Lam, who owns Sidney Harbour Chinese Restaurant on Beacon Avenue, was surprised to discover that there used to be a small but bustling Chinatown two streets away. 

"I only know of one Chinatown and that's in downtown Victoria." 

She's not totally off-base. 

"There's hardly any evidence of the old Chinese immigrant town in Sidney, which makes its history a bit of a challenge to research and interpret,B次元官网网址� says Michael Goodchild, executive director of Sidney Museum and Archives. 

"Beyond archival photos from Victoria and a handful of historical objects, there's not a lot of physical evidence that there used to be a fairly thriving community of residents and businesses here." 

The more well-known , the oldest in Canada and the second oldest in North America after San Francisco, dwarfs its existence. 

For many years, this community served as the primary gateway for Chinese immigrants to enter the country and it's likely that those who eventually made Sidney their home first visited Victoria's Chinatown. 

According to Goodchild, before the 1880s a few Chinese Canadian immigrants were already on the Peninsula working as labourers.  

Although there is no record of how they arrived in the town and no accurate population estimates before the turn of the 20th century, census records provide some clues: 34 Chinese Canadian immigrants were registered as Sidney residents in 1901. By the 1911 census, this figure had increased to 124, accounting for 25 per cent of the town's total population. 

But where in Sidney was Chinatown? 

It used to occupy a single block between Beacon Avenue and Bevan Avenue, between Fourth and Fifth streets.

If you were standing in front of Starbucks and looking at the brick Olde Post Office building, you would be looking at where many Chinese immigrants lived and worked from 1909 to 1935.

There, the first Chinese Canadian businesses were established. By the 1910s, five of the six building lots on the block were owned by Chinese merchants. 

Two-storey buildings housed Sidney's Chinatown and were built quickly out of inexpensive materials, like many of the early Canadian structures built at that time. The rough and ready nature of their construction was concealed by their large false facades.

Several Chinese men lived in small rooms at the back of the buildings, while business was conducted in the front. Chickens, ducks and pigs roamed the muddy backyards of the buildings, all surrounded by tall fences. 

Most Chinese immigrants who came to the Peninsula worked on agricultural farms and for businesses like Sidney Sawmill, the North Sanich Brick and Tile Co., laundromats, general merchant stores and a brick factory near Sidney. 

For several decades, this community remained an important part of Sidney, but the public's perception of Chinatown ranged from curious to hostile.

The museum director disclosed there were verified instances where certain individuals had been arrested. There were also questions about whether or not some of the businesses were just fronts for opium smuggling. "There's very little actual evidence of that, but it was certainly a perspective shared by an insubstantial number of people around the time," he added.   

And then there was the fire in 1930. 

"We're not sure how it started, but it only really impacted businesses and homes between Fourth and Fifth Streets, where Chinatown was located," Goodchild said. 

Many of the burned buildings were either never properly repaired or abandoned by residents who relocated to Victoria in search of better employment prospects and a more hospitable, larger Chinese-Canadian community. 

"Because it was considered a 'general eyesore' by members of the public at the time when they were looking to build a new post office, this was an area where they felt that they could do so without much in the way of complaints from the community. There was a lot of popularity for the post office to be built there and not a lot of concern as to what it was replacing," Goodchild explained.

The post office was built in 1936 right in the middle of that block.

B次元官网网址淚t was kind of the final domino that basically put an end to Sidney's Chinatown, which at that time was already a shadow of its former self." 

Today, only a handful of artifacts, photos and newspaper clippings form the last vestiges of the Canadian Chinese community's past B次元官网网址� a few are on display at the .

"It's important to tell a complete story, even if sometimes those stories come with a little bit of warts," Goodchild said. This is as opposed to merely narrating Canadian history from a "European-esque perspective, which leaves out a lot of really interesting stories that create this really beautiful overall picture."

Goodchild and his team at the museum hope to shine the spotlight on this chapter in Sidney's history by setting up pop-up exhibits where locals can come and tell their stories.

They're also replacing interpretive panels around the waterfront to include a slice of Chinatown's history.

Meanwhile, anyone looking to rediscover this almost forgotten part of Sidney's past is welcome to stop by the museum, found underneath the Olde Sidney Post Office building on Beacon Avenue right where the heart of Chinatown used to be.