Poster 25: A Chinese Restaurant and a Kerouac Family Friend

The “Chop Suey” sign at top center advertises Chin Lee, Co., a popular Chinese restaurant offering Lowellians elegant dining at the heart of Kearney Square for over a half-century.  Jack Kerouac, who would have been five years old when this photo was taken, later memorialized the restaurant when he wrote of his fictionalized father: “On his way home to supper he stops off at the Chinese restaurant to see his old friend Wong Lee.”  The woman is walking past Donaldson Camera, a long-running business that for many years contracted with Annie Powell to take photos for City Engineers.

Source: UMass Lowell Center for Lowell History City Engineers Collection