oldest head tax survivor dies

Ralph Lung Kee Lee, who I mentioned here as the oldest living person to pay Canada's racist head tax, died last month—five days after celebrating his 107th birthday: Chinese immigrant, 107, was oldest to pay head tax. He was born March 10, 1900 in China's Guangdong province, and immigrated to Canada at the age of 12. He spent five years working as a dishwasher in order to pay off the $500 head tax he was forced to pay upon entering Canada. Last June, he was one of several surviving head-taxpayers present when Prime Minister Stephen Harper formally apologized for the head tax. It took over ninety years, but at least he lived to finally hear that apology.