ABSTRACT
On Sunday, August 16, 1829, when the American sailing ship Sachem arrived and docked at Long Wharf in Boston Harbor, among its cargo of sugar, sapan wood, gamboge, buffalo horns, leopard skins, and tin were the first Thais ever to set foot on American soil-the so-called “Siamese twins,” Chang and Eng. While these human curiosities entered the country at a time and a place in American history better known for mass immigration from Ireland, the majority of Thai immigrants did not arrive until much later. The earliest real movement of Thais to the United States began in the 1950s, when a few thousand arrived to pursue their studies, primarily in the fields of medicine and education. Still, it was not until the deployment of U.S. troops to Southeast Asia during the 1960s and early 1970s that the first significant wave of Thai migration took place. A second, larger wave came in the 1980s and early 1990s, followed by a leveling off in the years thereafter. By 2007, the total population of Thais in the United States stood at nearly 200,000.
