Ingrid Carlson performs an Ancient Fan Dance. The ancient fan is called Tuan Shan. This dance was popular spanning several ancient dynasties. It was to be performed as entertainment to the emperor.
Joyce C. Meyer | Special to The R-C
Douglas High School graduate Ingrid Carlson was among a dozen performers who helped her mom, Sonia, greet the Year of the Tiger in Carson City on Feb. 5.
About 70 people attended the performances by the Carson Valley Chinese Cultural Group at the Nevada State Museum and the Children’s Museum of Northern Nevada.
The performances were also viewed by around 400 people who watched it live-streamed on social media.
The state museum hosted the celebration on its front lawn and then viewers followed lion dancers down Carson Street to the Children’s Museum.
A Carson Valley resident for just over a quarter-century, Sonia Carlson has been conducting a presentation for Chinese New Year for the last 22 years.
“Chinese New Year is the most important and the longest celebration on the Chinese calendar,” museum officials said. “People from China have lived in Nevada as early as 1851 when Nevada was part of Utah Territory.”
Genoa had a section of town where Chinese woodcutters lived, and in 1860, the Dayton area was marked on maps as “Chinatown.”
The state museum holds extensive collections from several Chinese settlements throughout Nevada.
“This program brings life to Chinese cultural objects displayed in our exhibits. Imagine a Chinese New Year parade marching through our scale model of 19th century Winnemucca’s Chinatown in our History Gallery,” said Nevada Division of Museums and History Administrator Myron Freedman.
This program is funded in part by a grant from Nevada Humanities, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
