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Today is February 8, 2021. My name is Ann Shi, and we are interviewing Mr. Harry Gee Jr. from the Houston Asian American Archive.

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Thank you so much, Mr. Gee, for taking this interview with us. To start, can you tell us a little bit about yourself? Well, I am an

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attorney and a graduate from Rice University; product of HISD, Rice, and the University of Texas Law School. And I'm married, and we have three kids and nine

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grandchildren. And the three kids, all Rice University graduates. Oh, wonderful. It turns out that I've got the diploma that says Rice Institute.

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They have the diploma that says Rice University. Wow. Oh, so Rice University weren't called the university, but it was an institute back then.

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It became the University in 1961. You know, up to that time, it was Rice Institute. Yep. Yeah. Well, thank you for recapping that history.

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So uh... Yeah, sure. Thank you so much. And I guess since we interviewed you before, and I read that your family came from China, and especially your mother

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came from the boat. And yeah, that that must be a tumultuous experience to, to— for anyone. I'm wondering, with their experience and family value in your

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upbringing, how has it affected your understanding towards love and marriage? Well, needless to say, when I was contemplating marriage, and contemplating marriage out of a race, that was problematical for my mother.

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She was concerned. Actually, it was partially her experience in terms of seeing other interracial marriages have occurred. My father had operated a restaurant.

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And I think my mother's only exposure to the Caucasian community was the waitresses that work at the restaurant. And so she, she saw that

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numbers of them to not have long marriage relationships, and that there were divorces, and there were breakups. And she was concerned about the acceptance of our children. When they began to arrive, would they be accepted in the

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Chinese community, or in the Caucasian community, and she was fearful that they would be accepted in neither, and that– that would be very problematic for our children, in their going up.

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So those are some of the concerns that she had. And she needless to say express them to me and said that she didn't think that the interracial marriage was a wise choice.

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And so it was problematical. Needless to say, you know, we have a deep bond with our mother. And that was simply something that I had to reconcile myself

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determining whether I could go against her wishes, and face the decision. But it so happened that I had the opportunity to date Antje for

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almost three years. And during that period of time, I became aware of the fact that she had a lot of the values, family values that we had, and that I was

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of the opinion that she would, that our relationship could last, and it has, over 50 years now. And so, yeah, it was a, it was a tough it was a tough decision to make. But I did make that decision.

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And I think that when the children began to arrive, and then my wife catered to my mother, so that they developed a relationship of respect. And then I think love and affection, that it worked out.

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It was ironic. But my wife— excuse me, my mother was concerned that our marriage might be faced with possible divorce, breakup. And our— my sister, who married Chinese, ended

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up getting a divorce, gave her marriage ended up cratering, sadly, and so I think that, you know, my mother subsequently understood, assumed the individual, more so than the race.

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Yeah, absolutely. And I'm also wondering, since reading from your earlier interview, you said, your mother weren't treated very well at the beginning by your father's mother,

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what has that kind of experience or understanding or her experience affected like the, the interaction towards an interracial marriage in your case?

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I'm not aware that that relationship caused any additional difficulty for my mother and accepting Antje has been other than Chinese. I think that her relationship with her

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with my grandmother, my mother's grandmother, relationship with my grandmother, I think came from the Chinese prejudice that, that the family had to have boy heirs.

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And my mother was the eldest of seven sisters. And so my mother was not for that marriage, because she was concerned that my mother would only bear girl,

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children. And so she, she, she opposed the marriage. And my father went against her wishes in selecting my mother. And so they subsequently, of course,

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had three children and were married for almost 50 years themselves. And so it's, I think it was more the old prejudice of concern about male heirs. Now, it turned out that my

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mother ended up having three children. Two of them were girls, it's just that I came first. And I think that with my arrival, Grandmother had a much different

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attitude toward my mother, and accepted her and received her into the family and treated her much better. My mother acknowledged the fact that I basically saved her life.

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Wow, that's amazing to hear. And it's also very interesting to kind of go back to that kind of patriarchy mindset that from like many years ago. Right, I think, I think that was the– the rubbing

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point. That was the point that caused the friction between my grandmother and my mother. But I think things improved once I arrived, and yeah, she was better received.

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My mother said that Grandma's attitude toward her significantly changed after my arrival. And so but it was, it was only a couple of years because we left China at that time; we came to America

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that she had, you know, typical of the traditions at that time. Once my mother was married, she moved from her family's household to my grandmother's household and had to live with my grandmother for

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some several years. Well, thank you for sharing. And moving on to like your dating stories, would you mind sharing a little bit about your wife like what is her name and what she does?

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Well, my wife is Antje Gee, and she is working as the bookkeeping accountant in our law firm, has raised three children, and now is in the process of helping

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our nine grandchildren. Yeah. Yes. And she is from Germany. And we met, I guess, in

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1967 if my recollection is correct. And interestingly enough, we met in Memorial Park, on the tennis court. And it turns out to, I've

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been playing with a friend of mine, who was a better tennis player than I. And on this occasion, surprisingly, I was winning. In the middle of the match.

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He said, “Let's take a break.” I said, "Wait a minute. I'm finally winning, and you want to take a break and break my momentum?" Turns out, he had been eyeing the girls on the next court.

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Girls were playing and when they were currently finishing up and leaving, he wanted to get by and get an introduction. And subsequently, we took the break and went for the introduction. And then he invited them to go out for

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a movie that evening. Well, I already had a date that evening. And so I couldn't go to that particular event. But I did get Antje's telephone number, and then was able to make connections with her there after.

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But uh, yeah. Now, by sheer coincidence, we live about, about two miles from the place where we met in Memorial Park. Wow, that's super adorable.

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And just like hearing about Memorial Park, like, being it's, uh, 50 years ago, and having that transcendence of time, and the story is happening back then, it's a really unique experience. Thank you so much for sharing that.

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And I was just wondering, so that happened later, like, did you ask her out? Like, how was your first date? Well, we went to, at that time, a hotspot in town was Old Market Square, which was

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a part of the downtown area that had been renovated. And we went to a bar and had a drink and started getting to know each other. And finding out about each other's history.

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I found out that she was quite a sports aficionado. And I am also; and that she enjoyed traveling, and I did also. And so these were common denominators

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that we had from the outset, and go ahead and build upon those particular relationships. She was quite the athlete, a good table tennis player, took no mercy on

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beating me. She was a good athlete and played tennis, getting started. And considering that she had had no background training, in terms of it. So yeah,

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we were able to find a lot of areas of mutuality of interest. We enjoyed going to the symphony and to the plays. And so yeah, we were able to go ahead and continue to build that relationship.

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Wow, that's super, super sweet. And how long did you date before getting married? A little over three years. Yeah, I think we got married in August of 1970.

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So I think we met in spring of '67. So it's just a little over three years. Did you have any, like hardship or challenges besides, like the discussion with your mother, as you

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previously mentioned? Were there any other challenges like long distance or did you ever like had arguments? No. Fortunately, we— I don't think that any of our

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matters rose to the point of being a significant argument or difficulty. The relationship at that time, there were still miscegenation laws

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that made it illegal. In a relation in a marriage relationships between the various races, but I didn't perceive it as being significant here in Houston.

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At that time, now I've talked with some friends and colleagues from California, and their relationships were much, much more difficult and frequently in terms of it. But here in, in Houston, it was a

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pretty accepting group. Now, it's also possible that, that we just didn't associate with the groups of people that would have those particular sentiments and feelings.

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We didn't go out to the hockey parks and the bars and places were some of the— possibly more extreme attitudes might be

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much more apparent. And, of course, we were, I was actively involved with the Chinese American associations and organizations and families, and then subsequently became involved with a number of

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other community organizations, that we begin to get more interaction with the broader community. But no, I didn't see did not have any incidences that were resulting from

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the interracial relationship that I had with Antje. That's great to hear. And you said that it wasn't legal back then to have interracial marriage like...?

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Some states, yes. In some states, I haven't done the definitive check to see which laws were in existence. But my understanding is that yes, there were some states in which it

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was illegal to have in a interrelationship in a relation⁠— interracial marriages. Yeah, but not in not in Texas. And that's why you registered?

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That I don't know. I never, I never took the time and research— that might be something for you to have your students do some research and find out… when the laws subsequently were

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repealed, or found to be unconstitutional, and stricken from the books, but my understanding is early 70s, there were still some of those laws in existence. Yeah. Wow. But it was completely okay to register,

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like at the city hall for marriage, right? Like... Oh yeah, Yeah. We didn't have any difficulty. Yeah, wow. It's really mind blowing.

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To hear that like, that interracial marriage wasn't even like an illegal in so many states back then. Wow. And when you kind of, like holding hands and public, or show affection of one another, do you get the stares from

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doing that in public? I'm not aware. I'm not aware. We read— the activities that we attended the Alley theater,

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symphony, you know the activities at Rice, at the University, I'm not aware that there was any unusual clamour

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because of our relationship there. At least I don't recall any incidences that may have arisen. Antje might have had a different view or so. But I don't recall anything of any significance arising because of

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that. And so did either of you dated outside of your race before meeting each other? Well, I don't think that Antje did because Germany did not have many people— I mean, it was pretty homogeneous in the population.

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Yeah, I dated other Caucasian girls, before Antje, and... but they were not long relationships.

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So yeah, I think after we started dating a couple of Caucasians, I realized that there was a lot of strong family values in her. And that, you know that I thought that we could have a

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life together, which, as fortunately, turned out that she probably has carried more of the weight of that. But she's done it well. That's great to hear. And I'm also curious, since you brought up family values on, on her end

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as well, like, what are some of the cultural traits or values from the different either ethnicity or culture became more pronounced, when your, you two started a relationship? Well, I think the most important characteristic was

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that she made sure that our children were well taken care of, and were pointed in the right direction, guided. And so, yes, she developed a very warm

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home atmosphere, and help them be involved in the church church activities, and supported them at the schools, that the family values were very, very comprehensive and complete.

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And I spent most of my time starting a law practice, and establishing that particular part of it and was not able to participate as extensively with the children as she did, in terms

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of it now. You know, our son, yeah, I supported him in his t-ball, softball, and various ball activities. And it turns out that my wife pointed out that I gotten pretty busy and when my daughters were cheering,

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became a cheerleader at Bellaire University— Bellaire High School that I needed to go ahead and coordinate my schedule to attend a number of those activities and so on, I pulled up the calendar and started taking down the ten,

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twelve games that this school was playing, I found that only two of the days were open. And my wife said, "That's not adequate." So I had to cancel a number of activities so that I could go to support our daughter and her

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activities in Bellaire High School. It turns out, it was outdoors, and those nights I end up selecting one of the coldest nights of the year. And so yeah.

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She, she reminded me that it's important that the breadwinner needed to go ahead spend more time with the kids and with the children as they were growing up, because they would grow up fast.

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And they did. And so it turns out that after those conversations, I made a special effort to invite her children join me on some of my travels. I've tried doing travels for business, and going to California.

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So our son joined me in going to Los Angeles. Our daughter joined me in going to San Diego, and then our youngest daughter joined me and going to Los Angeles again. So we were able to expend some parental

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time with our children because of my wife's reminder of the needing to build the relationships between father and children. Yeah, I'm sure that's actually very visionary for her, for

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her generation to have that mindset to build that family intimacy as well as, like the kind of stability of like, in terms of wealth, and financial needs. And then also, yeah,

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I'm also wondering, like in, I'm not sure if this question came up in any of your discussions, what are some of the racial or gender stereotypes that you might have experienced in your

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upbringing. For example, in school, if kids would, or were expected to play with toys or games that are more genders, like specific; for example, girls playing Barbie and boys playing with like, airplanes like

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toy airplanes, and all that. Did you happen to have any of those experiences growing up? Or if that's something shared with your wife, that some stories you can share?

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Well, I'm not aware that gender has significantly impacted any of the relationships that we've had. I mean, we've attended soccer games and other

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activities in which most of the activities, I mean, well, lacrosse, the girls, when they were in high school, participated in the lacrosse team, and the creative team at Bellaire, and did that competition.

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But short of that, you know, I mean, that was something that, interestingly enough, our girls were getting away from the feminine side of activities with dolls and other

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activities and getting involved in sports. You know, our youngest played volleyball, and so they were engaged in whatever capacity that they enjoyed participating. Our youngest, also played softball, played

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outfield. So they became cheerleaders. And so you know, they were involved along the line. Our son was involved in soccer and T-ball and other baseball activities when he was young.

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But as he grew up, his activities, were more centered to tennis and to soccer, but I'm not aware of the gender factor in the play. They participated where ever they felt the

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enjoyment and the opportunity to go ahead and participate. I mean, Antje and I primarily, were involved with tennis and mixed-doubles or something of that nature. Some– some of those activities.

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But yeah, I'm not aware that the gender factor came into play significantly in the development of our children and our relationships. Yeah, that's really nice to hear.

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And I'm also wondering, how has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the relationship of you and your wife? Not, well, we've become essentially hermits, just sitting around the house, trying to avoid

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interacting with the general community. I guess with the exception of shopping. I still play tennis with our group, and like, much of it has been restricted significantly

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for this past year. So we're hopeful. We had previously planned a trip last year in Germany for the Passion Play. Oberammergau Passion Play, but that was

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canceled, and it hasn't yet been rescheduled. And so now that we've gotten our vaccination completed, we're hopeful that we will be able to go ahead and effectuate some travels here in the future. We'll have to

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wait and see how that plays on out. More akin to I developed a stage four lung cancer problem. And so because of that, Antje has had to become

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my nurse, and she's done a great job is taking good care of me and making sure that I'm compliant with the doctor's orders and directions. So yeah, she's much more meticulous about following through and making sure that all of

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the proper processes and procedures I comply with. That's were very helpful to my health and welfare. I'm very sorry to hear that. And but yeah, it's– it's great to hear that you two are kind

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of taking care and bonding in this very unique time. And I'm also wondering. Has the last year and and during the death of George Floyd and overwhelming race and identity related

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conversations around the BLM, and the discussions around race in general, like has, has it popped up between the conversation between you and your wife? No.

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I think that if anything, she abhors the rioting and looting, and the problems that have come about. But no, I don't think that, you know, we're both in agreement that some of the

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Black communities have been badly mistreated over the years. And there's things that need to be revalued and actions taken. I believe that some of the police actions are excessive.

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But at the same time, we understand why some are so prone to shoot first and ask questions later, because they're fearful of losing their own lives. But it's,

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it's, it's a very difficult problem. But I mean, it's not entered in our relationship near as much as it might have. We've not been— people have been going out and demonstrating

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and marching and do things of that particular nature. And so yeah, although we sympathize, we've made efforts to help support some of the Black communities by helping them endowed

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scholarships at TSU and other institutions and trying to help through education, help people succeed in their various endeavors.

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Yeah, that's wonderful to hear that you are part of that effort. And I'm wondering, in your friend’s circle, do you have any many interracial couples? Or do you know, how big of a population are there that

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are engaged in interracial marriages or relationships? I don't know that we have specially reached out to various interracial couples. But there are a couple

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of them that we've had close relationships with, but we've had close relationships with members of the Caucasian community and members of our Chinese community. And so but, you know,

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I could probably, may not be able to name on one hand, the number of interracial families that we are actively involved and engaged with. So it's not something that we have endeavored to,

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it just so happened that one of the families that we are pretty close with, happens to have a Chinese husband and a Austrian wife. So, you

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know, that's pretty close to Austria, that their language is also German. And so you know, that, that is probably the closest that we've had to our particular relationship.

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But no, you know, I think if there's one other Chinese couple— Chinese husband that went in World War II Germany, and he ended up meeting and marrying a German girl.

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We're not particularly close. He's a bit older than myself. And actually, I think he's passed away now, but the wife is still around and, you know, we associate with them

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periodically, but not not extensively. Yeah, I see. Thank you for sharing that. And I guess moving on to the next generation, like as you

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have so many grandchildren now and wondering, what are some of the advice or like, you and your wife have been married for 50 years, like do you see the next generation keeping that kind of value in terms of

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dating and marriages? We hope so. We are thinking of their own welfare. The stability of the family and the attributes that can come by virtue of those relations, strong relationships will be

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beneficial to them. And we hope that they are as blessed as we have been, and having a strong relationship. But now we find out that everybody

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is individualistic. To my surprise, you know, I had thought we would have in our three children a high degree of similarity.

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And yet each one of them have their own characteristics, strengths and weaknesses, and we find the same thing with our grandchildren. So it's hard to say, I think that

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they're all getting good solid values and understand– understanding the importance of family, and they've been involved with the church, the schools.

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And so I think, through those institutions and activities, that they have been able to go ahead and build a firm foundation. But, you know, it's still up to the individual to take those values

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and, and traits and skills to the next level and develop those particular capabilities. But yeah, I think that our children have begun to instill in our grandchildren,

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hopefully the appreciation for learning, and the appreciation for family and the appreciation of church and other institutions of stability. And what would you advise them to place

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as a priority, like the number one value that you would want them to be instilled with? Well I think that family frequently, is the most significant, that's the people that you call

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upon when there are times of need and circumstances and they're the ones who are most likely to be responsive, and to be supportive. And so developing strong family

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values, that turns out that we've endeavored to do so by having our kids when they were growing up, spend some time with their cousins in Germany, and spend some time developing those relationships.

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And I think they've been able to go ahead and build upon that, a part of it. Similarly, you know, for our grandchildren, to spend the time and activities with their cousins, it's something that we're very pleased to see develop in a

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very comprehensive manner. And so they participate in various activities together, and interact together is a good thing. Now COVID-19, has caused some degree of separate is a

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separate– separate– separation, in that once they started going back to school, again, they're a little bit more apprehensive as to the possibility of having caught the virus.

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And so I think, you know, some of the activities have been curtailed, but yeah, for the most part, they've and numbers of joyous birthday parties and other parties together, in which the cousins were all getting together.

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And I think that the interaction between the cousins is, has been very, very strenuous and my observations is that, you know, there will we build bonds in those regards. Now, hopefully, they'll also have an appreciation for

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education. And we'll continue to build upon that critical part of it, because, yeah, all of our kids were not only, not only got their degree from Rice, but took advanced degrees later on.

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And so, you know, we're hopeful that they will be able to go ahead and pursue education to the fullest extent of their capabilities. Yeah, we're super grateful that you're so tied with Rice as well. And we are really honored, want to

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honor that connection. And I wonder if you will like to kind of leave a time– time capsule in at Rice with, with us, with the Archive. That... Yeah, go ahead.

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I think one of the things that I found out, after my graduation from Rice, I was not actively involved at Rice, because when I was in school, because I worked in my dad's restaurant. And so I was working

00:39:47.290 - 00:40:02.510

full time, same time going to school. And later on, one of the things that we endeavored to do is to enable our kids to participate on campus as extensively, in fact that you know, they lived on campus, even

00:40:02.510 - 00:40:16.070

though we're in town. And so actually, for our daughters, had they not been able to live on campus, they probably would have gone to school someplace else.

00:40:17.130 - 00:40:33.340

So, but it was good for them to gain that particular experience and interaction with their classmates and friends. But I, I didn't have that exposure. And so when I first graduated from law school, pursuing my career,

00:40:34.770 - 00:40:49.430

I was not very actively engaged at Rice in various activities and whatnot. It's only later, after I got my career established, and was operating rather

00:40:49.810 - 00:41:05.490

efficiently then, I took time out to be involved or engaged on various Rice activities, and participate with the Alumni Association, and served as president of the Rice Alumni Association one year, so.

00:41:07.220 - 00:41:20.820

It took a while to be able to develop the capability of being supported, and spending the time that was necessary to handle some of those activities successfully. So it took a while.

00:41:21.960 - 00:41:39.450

If there's any capsule, we've been trying to, we have been endeavoring to establish some scholarships. We established two of them at Rice and a number of other universities, where we've attended and

00:41:39.920 - 00:41:57.940

been able to go ahead and build in that regard. And we'll probably endeavor to do something, when, in my last will and testament, so we'll see how those situations work out.

00:41:57.990 - 00:42:14.830

But we were involved with the establishment of the Rice University Chinese Alumni Association, RUCAA. And later on, the group was expanded to become inclusive of Asian Americans as opposed to just Chinese.

00:42:15.500 - 00:42:33.370

But we've been disappointed that that organization hasn't been more actively involved or engaged. And so yeah, it's been a bit of a...

00:42:33.370 - 00:42:48.590

Well, for any organization to be successful, they need people to be actively participating. And I think somehow, the organization has gotten off the track, and has not been as active

00:42:49.640 - 00:43:04.560

over the last several years that it had been at the outset when I'm getting started. But, you know, when the Chinese were actively involved with the organization, there were activities and programs that were ongoing;

00:43:05.240 - 00:43:23.830

but subsequently, although they have expanded to go ahead to be inclusive of Vietnamese, Indian and other groups, they have not been able to generate the activities and participation to extend the magnitude as they had

00:43:23.990 - 00:43:40.740

previously. But, yeah, hopefully, those activities would be appropriate. Yeah, we're very thankful for all you do. And the Gee Family Association, in propagating

00:43:43.050 - 00:44:02.590

a lot of the messages about racial unity, as well as some getting more awareness of this important issue. And I'm so yeah, I really want to thank you for your time in doing this. And as you as we discussed, the materials and

00:44:02.860 - 00:44:17.290

contributions by the Gee Family Archive will be part of the Asia Society's program for the high schoolers to learn more about, like ethnic studies and, and engage them early on in that conversation.

00:44:18.070 - 00:44:26.920

So thank you all for, for the time and effort in sharing, sharing your stories with us. Great.