Although the North Star State is less racially diverse than its American coastal counterparts, there is a significant population of Asian Americans, and the number has been increasing throughout the recent years. Bolstered by the influx of Vietnamese and Hmong refugees between 1975 and 1999, the population of Asian American in Minnesota has grown to 4%.  Overall Minnesota has a growing Asian population that includes not only Southeast Asian but a wide range of ethnic backgrounds. Similar to most regions in the United States, Minnesota’s early Asian Pacific population were predominately Chinese, Japanese, and Filipinos (Council on Asian Pacific Minnesotans, 2012). The earliest documentation of Asians in Minnesota was a man named Wang See Ling from China who arrived in 1875; in 1880 two Chinese men established the Chinese Laundry in St. Paul and the Lung Wing Laundry in Minneapolis (Holmquist, 1981). Of course, there were foreign students who came here for higher education, beginning more than a century ago. For instance, the first group of Chinese students attended the University of Minnesota  in 1914 (China 100, 2014). Asian population can be seen in almost every corner in the state nowadays with Southeast Asian population reached about 1.2 million in 2010 (Council on Asian Pacific Minnesotans, 2012).

Sources:

Council on Asian Pacific Minnesotans, State of the Asian Pacific Minnesotans: 2010 Census and 2008-2010 American Community Survey Report (April 2012).

June Drenning Holmquist, They Chose Minnesota: A Survey of the State’s Ethnic Groups (St Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1981).

University of Minnesota, China 100 (2014).